An update to the GUI would be welcomed, but your suggestion that its importance is somehow equal to best-in-class features like DeepPRIME seems strange to me. The best interface in the world would be meaningless without the introduction of stellar new features like DeepPRIME to go with it.
I have lived quite comfortably with the interface since PhotoLab 1 and prefer DxO’s limited resources be used to make it a better overall product. This includes interface improvements which are being added in small doses in each new release. However, given the alternatives, I would take improvements to function over a more modern.looking form every time.
The main things I would change would be a few readability and contrast issues, but I am happy with the general look and feel. I do wish DxO would finally fix the two outstanding issues with the Smart Workspace buttons. The tools are still in alphabetical order unlike the like named standard palettes, and collapsing sections is not retained across editing sessions.
Seeing PhotoLab’s interface compared unfavorably to Luminar amazes me since IMHO Luminar’s interface is terrible. New and different is not always better.
Yes there’s always room for improvement in the small things but I would never change the whole look of the interface in order to match some vaguely perceived “modern” look. IMO the worst UIs in the post-processing world are Luminar and On1’s PhotoRAW.
Agree. I absolutely hate ON1’s interface. I have a license for ON1 Photo Raw 2022 but after a couple of months of having played with it trying unsuccessfully to get results from it as good as I get from PhotoLab, I uninstalled it. It is bloated with a multitude of different features that are mostly just variations of each other. On1’s focus seems to be on the number of new features they add rather than their quality.
Yes apparently On1’s philosophy is “The more, the merrier” never mind that none of them work up to DXO’s standards. When DXO adds a new tool, I know that it will work up to the highest possible quality standards(maybe a bug or two but usually quickly remedied).
I keep my copy of PhotoRAW around just in case I need to do something that I can’t do somewhere else. One thing you can say about PhotoRAW is that it will do anything post-processing-related. It may not do it very well, but it will do it.
Agree, but if the results are mediocre I would rather not use it at all. With some experimentation, time, and a bit of ingenuity I find there is little I want to accomplish which can’t be done in PhotoLab. It may even require using some of the tools in unexpected ways, but I love being to use PhotoLab in that way.
I was briefly taken in by some of ON1’s features that seemed compelling, but found them to be oddly implemented and not always what I expected them to be. Then my inability to produce output anywhere near as good as PhotoLab’s put the nail in that coffin.
I think they pay their marketing department more than their development department.
General spoken the UI ks much better then the v3. Those quick select buttons are very usefull. For the most of it i like the layout it’s easy to find and very customable. (maybd i am biast because i am grown in to it this last 5 years.
A User Interface is always changing because of changing toolset. Sometimes it changes drasticly because of updating overal view.
That said, personalisation is a pre in UI to get your feel of comfort but too much possibility’s could hide tools for the users due there choices.
An other thing is moving controls out the image frame means a more clearview which is good but then you need to auto active popup the tool window at the top to change things quickly.( i covered that by placing local window at the top and use quick button and favorite to get things as perspective crop and such up.
Best change would be quick links to the E-manual to see explaination how the tools work when click [?].
In general, I am NOT in favor of the current fascination with co-called ‘dark mode’. Especially when it’s presented as the ONLY way I can work with a program.
In A Perfect World, there would be a light, dark, ‘medium’ toned/themed interfaces available. Different monitors and eyeballs respond to things differently, often as a matter of ambient lighting and workflow color calibration. For the eyeball, which is a hugely variable analog device, sometimes it’s advantageous to change that style/theme of a UI during a long editing session just a a matter of relief.
PhotoLab has the best interface among the RAW developers/major photo applications in my opinion. Luminar is fairly awful.
I agree with you about the contrast issues. Ever low contrast in the last versions of PhotoLab is turned developing photos into fumbling around in the dark. The very low contrast has contributed to my lower satisfaction with PhotoLab.1
Note
1. Major reason, the refusal to support Mojave with PhotoLab 5, while still not properly supporting M1 Macs and Apple Silicon – forcing me to buy a computer pointlessly, a year or two before I should have had to make that change. The whole refusal to support current -2 at release and -3 over lifespan, all of one year is despicable).
That’s maybe so, but it should be easy to fix by DxO.
If I crank up the brightness of my screen, the GUI gets easier to read, but imo, it should be easy to read at around the 100 cd/sqm brightness that is used for calibrated screens and workflows…
Exactly. 120 cd/m2 is where I keep my monitors for photo work. Almost indiscernible contrast at those light levels. Surely DxO could allow the photographer to choose the contrast level of the application so that teenage PhotoLab users (do they exist?) and twenty year old UX designers can feel cool while living in a near zero contrast world AND grown-up PhotoLab photographers can actually read the interface text.