ON1 2022 - First Impressions
Three years ago, I started using ON1 Photo RAW as my main RAW-Converter. A couple of days ago, I upgraded to version 2022 and here are my first impressions.
What Matters…
As a professional, I highly value speed, stability and usability in a program.
I never found the overall usability of ON1 Photo RAW lacking, but some things like the export dialog were improved and useful features added. I very much appreciate that, as especially updating export settings was cumbersome.
Regarding the stability, I have the impression that ON1 has improved considerably. While being a reasonably stable program to start with, it is now even better. Certain features like the machine learning supported Portrait AI tended to cause loading problems and crashes from time to time in the previous version. Now, the issues seem to have been resolved with some features added on top (yay!).
Loading times of pictures remain about the same, but even here the new versions seems to be a little bit better.
What Does Not Matter (for me)…
The program also gained several AI-powered features.
Sky Swap AI offers an easy way to exchange the sky in a (landscape) photograph. I have never tried it and my approach to photography kind of forbids that, but it might be useful.
ON1 Photo Raw 2022 Sky Swap AI
NoNoise AI is another feature. I rarely ever use noise reduction at all as modern cameras (currently rocking two Nikon D800) are so good and I love some added “digital grain" to convey the sense that the image was taken in low light conditions. Maybe users of older cameras will appreciate this feature more than I do.
ON1 Photo Raw 2022 NoNoise AI
Recommendation
More than ever, I can recommend ON1 Photo RAW as a RAW-converter. The powerful resize engine, photo management and the user friendly effects-workflow were always good arguments in favor of ON1. Now, with improved performance and overall feature set, there is nothing that should be holding you back.
If you run one of the early versions of ON1 Photo RAW, you should definitely get the 2022 version, the improvements are there.
And did I mention that you can choose between lifetime licence or subscription? Freedom!
