PicaJet
Search Build shortlist

PhotoShelter, OpenAsset, Daminion, MediaValet

Side by side on what we have verified on each vendor’s own pages. Where a fact was not checked, the table says so rather than leaving a blank that reads as “no”.

What decides it · Runs on your own servers

If the files genuinely cannot leave your infrastructure, this is not a close race — the platforms marked No below should not be on the call at all.

PhotoShelter

No

OpenAsset

No

Daminion

Yes

MediaValet

No

Everything else

PhotoShelter
OpenAsset
Daminion
MediaValet
Verdict
A cloud portfolio and image-storage platform for individual photographers, with client galleries and built-in print/licensing sales.
A project-based DAM for AEC design and architecture firms that syncs with Deltek Vision/Vantagepoint and places tagged project photos directly into InDesign proposals and RFPs.
A DAM offered as both cloud and on-premise, aimed at small-to-mid teams that want fast metadata-driven search over large asset libraries and want files to stay on their own infrastructure.
A cloud DAM billed by storage and configuration rather than seat count, aimed at agencies and distributed marketing teams with large or growing user bases where per-seat pricing would balloon.
Price published
No
No
No
No
Billed on
Quote-only. Priced per named "Library Seat" (2-5 seats depending on tier, custom for Enterprise) plus a storage allotment per tier (1TB-5TB, custom for Enterprise) and a cap on "Advanced Integrations" (0 to unlimited). Unlimited invited/contributor users and unlimited Social Content Publisher seats included on all/most tiers. Annual or monthly billing toggle shown on the pricing page, but no dollar amounts are published — all tiers show a "Get Pricing" CTA to a demo/sales call.
Quoted per customer
Annual subscription covering all features, integrations, updates and support
Not per user — the vendor states unlimited users and permission groups
Deployment
Cloud
Cloud
Cloud, On-premise
Cloud
Free plan
No
No
No
No
Free trial
No
No
No
No
Transparency index
Not checked
0%
30%
20%
Most common complaint
Not checked
A page titled pricing that contains a benefit calculator instead of prices
Like the platforms it competes with, it asks for a form submission before naming a price
The promise not to charge per user is prominent, but there is no figure to compare it against

“Not checked” means exactly that: we have not verified it, not that the platform lacks it. Every other value was read off the vendor’s own pages on the date shown on each platform page.

What to ask on the demo

One question per platform, drawn from what actually goes wrong with it — not a generic checklist. Vendors run the demo; this hands the agenda back to you.

OpenAsset A page titled pricing that contains a benefit calculator instead of prices — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.
Daminion Like the platforms it competes with, it asks for a form submission before naming a price — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.
MediaValet The promise not to charge per user is prominent, but there is no figure to compare it against — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.

No email required — the page prints as it stands.