Which App? The iPad Photo Editing Showdown

I've always used Lightroom for photo editing on the iPad but is that the best one out there? I take a look at Darkroom and Pixelmator Pro to see how they compare and if I'll be make a switch.

Chapters
0:00 - Intro
2:50 - Darkroom Review
8:50 - Pixelmator Review
13:07 - Lightroom Review
16:44 - Wrap Up

[imaaronross]

Did I miss any apps? What are your recommendations?

[artscience]

I just bought my first mirrorless camera after being out of photography for a few years. Never used anything more than Apple Photos. I tried using Affinity Photo, but the learning curve was too steep for me. Sounds like Darkroom is more my speed. Don’t want to use Photoshop, I don’t like subscription models, and years of messing with Adobe Acrobat Pro have left kind of an unpleasant impression. Thanks for the comparison! I thought the audio was good enough :-)

[StrokeV]

You CAN batch edit in Lightroom. Copy settings. Select mode. Select all photos. Paste settings.

[darkroomapp]

Thanks for the great review. LR is hard to catchup to with them being around for effectively forever :) But one step at a time we will get there. Someday.

[springbrook]

is it just me or is the audio level too low, as in not loud enough.

[TheOverlordOfProcrastination]

Too many things are subscription-based these days.
I immediately discount them no matter how good they are.
When you have amazing software such as the Affinity suite as a one-time purchase everything else just seems like a money-grab.

[Zavens]

For your Pixelmator photo portion of the review, you may want to talk about the ML (Machine Learning) button that does good chunk of the photo correction for you then you can add some final refinements on top of that. I have used ML a lot and helps with corrections significantly

[Andy.Garcia]

Tried them all, after giving up LR. None came close to the FULL, cross platform functionality (mac, Windows, iPad, iPhone, and web) of the Adobe package. So went back to LR, and I do not regret it. $9.99 per month is not bad, given all you get from the Adobe photography plan.

[PauloParreira]

In Lr you can select the settings you want to copy then select all the files you want to paste in, i do it with all my imported files.
About Darkroom i don't understand why supports only uncompressed raw files but not compressed.

[cuuppaajoe]

The plane train Superman reference was enough for me to subscribe. Lmao

[TheLayinLo]

Aaron, lots of great points to consider, so thank you! If I may make a suggestion, check your audio feed and your final master. I was watching you on my home TV and the sound comes through my Atmos receiver. I couldn’t hear you at all when turned to the normal volume I watch YouTube at. Like a idiot I crank the volume up and I’m so immersed in the video that when the commercial came on the sound lifted me and my cat and the house up just like Dorothy in the Wiz of O movie. When we both regained consciousness we were 2 states away and 6 videos further into your rotation. I had to go watch all 6 again because kitty said she wasn’t about that life. Anyhow, maybe a little adjustment of the levels would help some poor schmuck like me to not scare the pants off the FAA for fear of a larger than 55 lb unregistered drone hurtling across the Mason Dixon line. 😂 I do appreciate the videos. Much love and respect. ✌🏽

[TormodMalmgren]

Thank you for a great video and comparing the apps. Since you made this video Darkroom has been upgraded with some Ai masking tools which work great. It makes darkroom even closer to Lightroom. So I find myself using Darkroom more these days.

[elwood]

What is the best app for interior or landscape designers wanting to draw over the top of photos?

[typicalairhead]

The only reason why I haven’t left the lightroom is because of the select tool. It’s the only editing app out of these three that has that. It gives you total control of the colors in the photo post production when you have less control pre production. Downside is, it’s really laggy when you use it (using ipad pro 2020) and I would have jumped ship already if there’s another app that had that it.

[ASVPXWolf]

yo, that wallpaper is awesome. Still have it?

[trehoje]

Do you have any screen protector on your iPad?

[ProfessorSlump]

i would like to see an updated review in 2022, darkroom has now masking tools and many more features since a few months ago, im checking some reviews to see if its worth an 80 buck one time purchase but can’t decide yet

[bitbybitfarmseast]

Thank you for an easy to follow review.of these apps. I used to use Picasa and Windows Movie Maker. They were so intuitive for me! I had to step away from editing in 2008 and now I am struggling to find the tools I liked. For instance, erasing an area in a photo, finding unique borders, etc. Is there some app that is simiilar to Picasa? Thanks

[semkobalcerski]

Do you know if it is possible to select and rate the images stored on an external HDD or SD card on the iPad, without having to import them to the iPad's memory?

[chrismv]

I have a question I'm having trouble getting the answer to. If I start editing a photo that's on a external source in Lightroom on an iPad, does the program automatically copy the image to the internal drive? This is really important to me. One of the hallmarks of any good media editing program is media management. I'm mostly a film editor. I edit on Avid Media Composer. None of my media are on the internal drive. Always on a external (sometimes a client's) drive. It's part of media management. I really don't want to have 3 or 4 copies of my media. One and a backup is fine thank you.