Raw conversion software , what's best.

Hi all , I only have the basic nx software disc that came with my d5200 . So to get the best from this camera is obviously to shoot raw and so I can convert to either Tiff or Jpeg.
Can anyone point me in the riight direction for good software at a reasonable price .
My first initial thoughts were Capture nx 2 , but after all the bad reviews I kind of don't want to waste my money .So its either Lightroom or Adobe but I do not know which version , so please can someone help me out in this matter .
Thanks the lot fellow Nikonite

Have you tried Nikons new NX-D?

BTW, don't knock Capture NX2... I use it instead of the entire $4-digit suite of PhotoShop/Lightroom/Aperture stuff.

I'd tell you to download the free trial version of Lightroom and see what you think. You can buy a license for Lightroom for about $80 or so or go Adobe Cloud for $10 a month.

Bonus Link: Adobe LR Free Trial

...

Thanks but some were saying the cnx2 was slow is all . I have the basic nx and it seems fine but need something with more applications and better for user experiance.
maybe upgrading to FF this year too so a good software suite would be great.
Is Nx - d a newer version ? .Some do say though to Nx 2 defense its the best for actual Nikon cameras overall.

Thanks I have dowloaded a copy of Nx -d and going to try that out over the weekend .
Cheers all.

If you end up also trying Lightroom, be sure to check out the many training videos Adobe has.
Products | Lightroom | Adobe TV

yes thanks Nickt , I have limited experiance with these suites so I thought before I went FF I would get some practice .
Sounds like a good Idea so will give that a try too.

Nothing beats LR5...

Lightroom is great and what I use 99.99% of the time. I only ever use PS if I need to clone something intricate out because LR struggles with that.

480sparky said:

BTW, don't knock Capture NX2... I use it instead of the entire $4-digit suite of PhotoShop/Lightroom/Aperture stuff.

Click to expand...

If Lightroom and Photoshop cost me 4 figures I don't think I'd use it either. I've purchased copies of LR 3.6, 4 & 5, and CS6 (student teacher), and if you add in what I paid for Elements 8, 9 & 11 and the Nik Collection I don't believe it would hit 4 figures yet.

There are plenty of things that will let you work with RAW files. They will all do an adequate to great job. Lightroom is easily the best in what it offers for the price, and they continue to improve it. It's well worth the price and integrates with all sorts of other packages, from Photoshop to Nik to onOne. It's also got world class cataloging and printing functions. I've said it before, I use a lot of different packages, but if I had to live with only one it would be Lightroom, no question.

BackdoorHippie said:

If Lightroom and Photoshop cost me 4 figures I don't think I'd use it either. I've purchased copies of LR 3.6, 4 & 5, and CS6 (student teacher), and if you add in what I paid for Elements 8, 9 & 11 and the Nik Collection I don't believe it would hit 4 figures yet.

There are plenty of things that will let you work with RAW files. They will all do an adequate to great job. Lightroom is easily the best in what it offers for the price, and they continue to improve it. It's well worth the price and integrates with all sorts of other packages, from Photoshop to Nik to onOne. It's also got world class cataloging and printing functions. I've said it before, I use a lot of different packages, but if I had to live with only one it would be Lightroom, no question.

Click to expand...

It all depends on what you need. I've never needed anything in that whole gamut of software that I felt was worth the going price. And not once have I been working on an image and thought, "Gee, I can't do that with what I have, but I could if I had _________ (fill in the blank) I'd be able to."

And now they've gone to the Cloud, they've lost me forever. I just figure the money I saved has been spent on glass.

I bought Lightroom 5 on a one day discount from Amazon, and then I got an email from Amazon 3 months later saying that PS Elements was reduced for one day only, so I bought that too. So both cost me a total of £100 (US $167).

However I'm told that I'll get hit over the head if I don't also buy Nik Tools... So I'll get that maybe this weekend......

Yes....SteveH, I've got both but not as cheaply as you got it.....but that goes to show you...look for the deals. Lightroom is new to me, but so far I like it. Just starting to shoot RAW.

I tried Apple Aperture, Nikon Capture NX2, Nikon NX-D, Nikon NX2, Rawtherapee, and Lightroom. For me LR5 wins hands down. If you look at their online tutorials (extensive) and see all the things LR can do, you will be amazed.

sonicbuffalo said:

Yes....SteveH, I've got both but not as cheaply as you got it.....but that goes to show you...look for the deals. Lightroom is new to me, but so far I like it. Just starting to shoot RAW.

Click to expand...

When I got Lightroom, I didn't realise it was on a deal, I thought I had remembered the price wrongly from before! lol
Keep an eye out, as every so often Amazon will drop prices for a day without saying so... Lightroom 5 PC download cost me £65, so about 30% cheaper than normal, then they emailed saying Elements was £35 so I bought it just in case... To be honest, I have had Elements for week now and used it once But it's useful for panoramas etc which LR won't do.

If you don't consider Smart Fill (which is very different from the Smart Healing brush), Elements can do about 95% of the work that I currently do in Photoshop. I suspect that were they to put Smart Fill in Elements they'd lose a lot of Photoshop customers. LR + PSE is all most amateur photographers will ever need in terms of tools. The rest is just a matter of making the work easier/less time consuming.

Ultimately, while you can knock the cloud all you want, for $11/month ($132/year) with tax, I believe that anyone who is tied into the products will save money. LR has been upgraded twice since I started using it in 2012, and is due for another upgrade in the next 6 months. Had I started using the cloud in 2012 (were it available) I would have spent less in the subscription than I paid to maintain Lightroom alone (1 initial purchase and 2 upgrades). I understand why folks balk, and they have every right to do it. But to anyone whose art relies on their products, I do believe that the current pricing structure is more than fair provided that the product updates continue as they have thus far.

Im about to purchase Lr5 , please tell me its fully compatible with the Nikon d52oo , and do I need to remove nx view as some users have experienced problems loading photos with the nikon software then importing to Lr5 .
Any help would be fab thank you.

foo said:

Im about to purchase Lr5 , please tell me its fully compatible with the Nikon d52oo , and do I need to remove nx view as some users have experienced problems loading photos with the nikon software then importing to Lr5 .
Any help would be fab thank you.

Click to expand...

I didn't uninstall NXView when I first started with Lightroom, but I have since. Lightroom has it's own import function, so you don't need to go through that extra step of using Nikon software. The latest version of Lightroom is fully compatible with the D5200.

Also consider a book, as the YouTube tutorials can be hard to flick back and forth from - There are also good magazines with tutorials.

Cheers SteveH , managed to buy a new disc for £40 no box but certainly cheap enough , seems capture Nx2 is far to expensive for me.

Sent from my SM-T310 using Tapatalk

Lightroom and Adobe Camera RAW are only problematic with very new cameras since manufacturers tend not to release their new RAW formats ahead of time to allow software to adapt (shame on them). So if you're purchasing in the first couple months of availability expect to struggle with processing your RAW files until Adobe can get a new release of ACR out. Typically ACR runs 3-4 months behind a release, though some have been faster. Realize, when a major release of ACR comes out (and usually with it a new version of LR), previous versions of LR may not adapt, so if you're buying new technology with old software you may run into issues (i.e. you can use a D5300 and Lightroom 4 - or a D610, though there are workarounds for that since it's essentially the same RAW format as a D600).