Capture One 21 Pro Software
Capture One editions
If you go for the Pro version reviewed here,
it works out at about twice the price of
Lightroom. Lightroom is subscription-only,
of course, but you can get a subscription to
Capture One 21 too, and it’s twice the price
of the Adobe Photography Plan at $20/£20
per month. Alternatively, you can buy a
perpetual licence for $299/£299.
We always like to point out that ‘perpetual’
licences don’t include version updates.
Sooner or later you’ll need to pay to upgrade
to a newer version, so subscriptions (which
include updates) do make a lot of sense.
Lightroom has a whole after-market in
presets; Capture One has Styles. Most are
sold direct from the Capture One website,
but there are Capture One bundles with
Styles included alongside the program.
There are other Capture One versions.
You can get Sony, Nikon or Fujifilm-specific
editions at a much lower price of $129/£129,
or $9.99/£9.99 per month.
There are even free Capture One Express
for Fujifilm and Sony cameras: these are
basic cut-down versions of the full software,
but still deliver Capture One’s excellent
raw processing and output.Capture One 21 is a combined cataloguing and
non-destructive editing tool, just like Lightroom.a partnership with Leica to allow
tethered shooting with Leica cameras
for the first time. Sessions are ideal
when you need to shoot, select and
edit images for a client on a job-by-job
basis. Capture One can also work
as a Lightroom-style cataloguing
tool, storing all your images in a
centralised catalogue with tools for
sorting, filtering and rating your
images, and the ability to store them
in collections and smart collections.
Capture One says that searching
and browsing is faster than ever
in this latest version.
Capture One 21 can ‘reference’ your
images in their existing locations, but
macOS users may be interested to
learn that it can also import them into
the catalogue itself, so that you get a
single big catalogue file rather than
having your photos spread across
your computer – just like Apple’s
late, lamented Aperture.
Capture One’s editing tools are
non-destructive, like Lightroom’s,
and organised into configurable tabs
at the side of the screen. It doesn’t
have the multi-module layout of
Lightroom Classic, and all your tasks,
including image export, take place in
a single window, with the option to
1Dehaze gives a traditional-
looking contrast boost
rather than the pseudo-
HDR look of Lightroom.
2
The Viewer shows the image
you’re working on, with an
optional before/after split
for comparison.3
The Browser shows the
images in the currently
selected folder, collection
or smart collection.http://www.digitalcameraworld.com MARCH 2021 DIGITAL CAMERA^121
display the Viewer (for editing),
the Browser Panel or both.
The global adjustment tools are
very powerful, and include both RGB
and Luminance Curves adjustments,
advanced selective colour editing
and a new Dehaze tool.
The local adjustments are
especially interesting. Where
Lightroom uses pins to position
adjustments directly on the image,
Capture One uses adjustment layers
with powerful masking options.
Lightroom’s local adjustment tools
are a subset of the full range, but
Capture One lets you use all
adjustments on any adjustment layer.
You can even name them to remind
yourself what you’ve done.
Other new features in Capture
One 21 include support for 8-bit
Apple HEIC image files and new
ProStandard Profiles with selected
cameras, for more accurate and
consistent colours.Ease of use
You wouldn’t call Capture One 21
beginner-friendly, exactly, but for
anyone who already knows their way
around an image editor, it’s perfectly
straightforward. Initially, the number
of tool tabs, and the number of panels
on each, can look daunting, but you
quickly remember where the tools
you need are located, and there’s a
Quick tool tab where you can gather
together all your favourite settings.
The interface is easy to customise,
and each tool tab has a fixed and a
scrolling section where panels will1 32Styles are ready-made presets that enable
you to choose different looks with one click.“Capture One’s
editing tools are
non-destructive,
like Lightroom’s”