WHY do I pay Adobe $10K a YEAR!?

The video opens with Linus noting that he pays nearly $10,000 a year for Adobe products, a figure he and his team feel each time editors complain about HDR workflow and stability issues. He frames the discussion as a challenge: can they produce a complete video entirely without any Adobe software by migrating to alternative tools? The host walks through a full production pipeline using non-Adobe software, starting with ingest and asset management with Kyno, which he praises for its lightweight design and broad codec support. He demonstrates how Kyno can log, organize, and feed footage into an NLE of choice, highlighting its non-project-based workflow as a contrast to Prelude. He then evaluates several contenders for the nonlinear editor, ultimately choosing Davinci Resolve for its color grading, built-in Fairlight audio, and Fusion effects tools, while noting the downsides of Resolve such as GPU memory constraints and a steeper learning curve due to its unconventional interface. The narrative examines the pros and cons of alternatives like Vegas Pro, Avid Media Composer, and Fusion, ultimately stressing that Resolve provides the best balance for a single-editor workflow while still acknowledging the deep integration and extensive app library that Adobe offers. The video culminates with a pragmatic return to Adobe due to superior ecosystem interoperability, file compatibility, and the ability to dynamically link apps, underscoring that in a collaborative, creative industry those advantages still drive efficiency and reliability. The sponsor segments and product plugs are interspersed, but the core takeaway remains that while you can assemble a capable non-Adobe pipeline, Adobe still represents a highly practical, if costly, standard for many teams. The closing reflections emphasize the economy of scale, file format interoperability, and the productivity gains from a unified suite, suggesting that an all-in-one approach continues to be the most efficient path for professional workflows, despite the ongoing temptation to save costs with alternatives.

Topics · technology · video editing · software · workflow