I’ve been using On1 for a long time. Way back in the day I’d often tour with Bob Campbell, who ran onOne UK at the time. Mike Wong was in the US division back then. It just did a lot of things really well. Brian Matiash worked with them for a while as well, and like him, I’m a huge fan of Effects. But since bringing out Photo RAW, they’ve really doubled down. Long gone from merely being an addon to Photohsop, they’ve become a fully fledged application for photo processing and more.

I love Exposure’s X6, and I’m looking forward to X7, but in terms of a standalone application that’s competition to Lightroom - especially for those looking to own their own software, it’s hard to touch On1 Photo RAW. Or to be precise, On1 Photo RAW 2022, which is out shortly.  

Photo RAW offers a pro grade image cataloging system, with an AI driven processing engine. It supports over 800 Raw formats for development and as mentioned you can get it for a one time fee. It does offer a subscription model for those whom that suits. At the time of writing, there’s loads of bonuses to go with the one time purchase fee. 

In terms of the new features inside Photo Raw 2022, the list is long. So let’s look at a list of them.

• SkySwap AI

• NoNoise AI integration

• Line Mask

• Greater preview control in Browse

• Favorites pane

• Timelapse video

• Remaster Export and rendering

• Run Photoshop Plugins natively

• Backup and Restore

• Additional editing features

• Batch renaming 

The big ones are really SkySwap AI and the Time Lapse video generation, though being able to run Photoshop filters inside Photo RAW is fantastic. That said, a quick test shows that Boris FX Optics is not currently working.  

I’ll take a more detailed look when the application is released properly soon. I generally use this as a plugin to Lightroom, but I will cover file management stuff as well. Click the button below for more information (Affiliate link). If you preorder now, you bonus brushes, skies, lut’s and more.