Comments on: Luminar Neo Review (2026): Best AI Photo Editor for Beginners?

By: Tim Porter

Tim Porter — Mon, 11 Dec 2023 06:08:08 +0000

It would be nice if their official documentation mentioned Apple Silicon support or support for Xeon processors. It seems to be rather vague. I have a client that uses Aurora HDR to process hundreds of 30 megapixel photos and it takes 2+ hours on a 9th gen i9, w/ 64 GB of ram, a good GPU and fast SSD. He wants to drastically reduce the amount of time it takes to do that and we’re trying to figure out what hardware would be the best way to go to do so. It would be great if there were benchmarks out there.

By: john

john — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 08:19:44 +0000

Luminar AI is used to create a pleasing color scheme, push the saturation and brightness to their limits.

By: Darlene Hildebrandt

Darlene Hildebrandt — Fri, 17 Mar 2023 01:40:44 +0000

In reply to Pali Mad. @palimad:disqus They do, the logo flashes kind of. I have no issues running it

By: Darlene Hildebrandt

Darlene Hildebrandt — Fri, 17 Mar 2023 01:40:09 +0000

In reply to Trey. @disqus_JlFHOha9j9:disqus no it doesn't replace LR for image management. But I'm looking into Luminar Neo + Excire Photo to see if they pair well for that

By: Trey

Trey — Sat, 04 Mar 2023 22:47:00 +0000

Thanks for the helpful review. Sounds like a great option for beginners, vs Photoshop. What do you think about Luminar Neo to replace Lightroom Classic for image/catalog management?

By: Pali Mad

Pali Mad — Mon, 20 Feb 2023 16:46:19 +0000

I think it needs some UI improvements, it would be cool if it would let user know whether some computing is done in background. E.g. I open photo, tools appear, I select crop and cannot perform it, no mesh is shown. Btw it just crashed 🙂 So it is only good if you have plenty of time

By: Terra Encounters

Terra Encounters — Wed, 25 Jan 2023 21:59:47 +0000

In reply to Darlene Hildebrandt. Whoops . I forgot, that is in CAD. Actually that should be CAD 321 to match USD 240. Thank you for the idea of adjusting the feather to zero. However, I have a worse problem. After a while, Luminar starts up, displays the catalog for a few seconds, then crashes without any error message. Do you have any idea why? I believe this is the third or fourth time it has crashed. The last time I dramatically increased the cache and backup space settings.

By: Darlene Hildebrandt

Darlene Hildebrandt — Wed, 25 Jan 2023 03:22:42 +0000

In reply to Terra Encounters.

@terraencounters:disqus thanks for sharing but you have some facts incorrect. How do you calculate that PS is $339 per year? It’s $19.99/month which is only $240.

I can address one of the issues you mentioned as well:

The mask paint function uses a circular brush that can bleed over to undesirable parts of the image. – Just lower the feather to zero for a harder edged brush and make it smaller.

Hope that helps

By: Terra Encounters

Terra Encounters — Tue, 24 Jan 2023 18:59:02 +0000

Thank you for the comprehensive review of Luminar. I wrote about my own experiences with Luminar Neo which even though I ran into technical problems I am still excited about. My impressions can be found at https://terraencounters.wordpress.com/2023/01/24/luminating-photos-with-luminar-neo/

By: Terra Encounters

Terra Encounters — Tue, 24 Jan 2023 18:58:45 +0000

https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a3a066bf1d3e4ddecb42373dd8ff65315da08856bc582dddcfe8f7bbbd6fe18d.png

By: Darlene Hildebrandt

Darlene Hildebrandt — Sun, 02 Oct 2022 23:02:24 +0000

In reply to Steven. Thanks!

By: Steven

Steven — Sun, 02 Oct 2022 19:00:16 +0000

Great review …thanks Darlene!

By: Darlene Hildebrandt

Darlene Hildebrandt — Thu, 29 Sep 2022 23:47:55 +0000

In reply to Zig. What does a real layer entail and how is it different than what Luminar Neo has? It has real layers. You can add an image, change the blend mode, mask it, etc.

By: Spike Hodge

Spike Hodge — Sat, 24 Sep 2022 17:54:17 +0000

One thing I love about Neo, is that it is continually in development and improvement!
Almost every review is out of date by the time you see it 🙂 Clone is here now, noiseless extension working nicely with it’s own masking as well, etc., etc.
While we are still waiting for an instant undo redo, the ‘edits’ feature does allow you to go back and change or delete previous applications of the tools. And you can apply the same tools again as new applications. Very nice.
The speed with which Neo is progressing make any review a challenge! And that is good.
The DAM facilities are weak but I think the new association with Excire should fix that, and allow the team to continue to do what they do best, imaging.

A very important mention needs to go out to the amazing support they give. My experience asking both stupid, and comlex, questions has been great. Here is an example-
My question:
” I would normally use DxO Photolab 5 at the beginning of my workflow to apply camera and lens specific adjustments, as well as their ‘Deep Prime’ de-noise. I then export as DNG, and them open the DNG in Luminar Neo to do the real work 🙂 My question is; As DxO has already applied camera and lens specific adjustments in the DNG – will Luminar Neo try and do that again thereby “doubling” the wanted adjustments? I realize the adjustments for Neo and DxO will differ, but once set in DxO I don’t think I want Neo to add further adjustments based on the camera.
”
Their answer (Same day in this case!):
“Thanks for reaching out.

I will be happy to help you!

I have just tested the workflow you described and Luminar Neo did not apply its own lens correction and the DNG image remained intact

Feel free to reach us if any questions arise and have a marvelous day!”

Pretty impressive support!

By: Fabrizio Bertorino

Fabrizio Bertorino — Sat, 24 Sep 2022 12:59:50 +0000

For me a huge lack is that Neo isn’t a DAM. I know you can use Excire (I do it), but the workflow becomes a bit more complicated.

By: Zig

Zig — Fri, 23 Sep 2022 19:32:56 +0000

I agree with most of your suggestions, but I would also like to see REAL layers, not overlays.