Author Topic: Adobe Lightroom? (Read 4525 times)

andyoxon · « **on:** 17 October, 2012, 03:34:18 pm »

Anyone use it; how does it compare to Picasa for image organisation, and other progs for PP raw files etc?

Ham · « **Reply #1 on:** 17 October, 2012, 04:13:25 pm »

Yes, all the time, alongside Picasa.

It is very strong indeed on organisation, it understands having RAW & jpg sidecar images, its tagging and filtering is absolutely tops (and I don't mean it couldn't be improved, just that it is very powerful indeed). It is a serious tool that means I only ever have to fire up photoshop very occasionally.

Equally, Picasa does a great job, and its basic catalogue ability is great. There's a place for both, but if Picasa does everything you need, you don't need Lightroom.

edit: the RAW processing engine for LR is common to Photoshop, AFAIK

Biggsy · « **Reply #2 on:** 17 October, 2012, 04:34:30 pm »

I tried Lightroom, but I prefer and love Silkypix Developer Studio Pro's graphical user interface. It's the other way around for a lot of people though. It's very much a personal preference thing.

(I'm only commenting on photo processing, not organisation, which I do manually).

perpetual dan · « **Reply #3 on:** 17 October, 2012, 06:14:49 pm »

I went from Bridge to Lightroom and always take as RAW and let adobe convert to DNG. For the most part it does what I want it to (I occasionally use Photoshop for the rest). The keeping files organised capabilities cope well with my rather intermittent use of tags and ratings. Exporting to JPEG for web is easy. Its better than whatever free stuff has come with various cameras over the years, I've not used Picasa.

Ham · « **Reply #4 on:** 17 October, 2012, 08:05:37 pm »

This might be useful:

What I use Picasa for:
- Managing the snapshots (odd bits and pieces) on my C drive, prob about 2,000 or so
- Receiving export processed by Lightroom, uploading to Blogger (blog) or Picasa (YACF, others)
- quick crop, resizing & eMailing
- Slideshow for showing photos on screen
- capture of screen capture

What I use Lightroom for:
- Importing photos from source (Picasa will, LR does it better)
- Organising online photo collection (c 55,000)
- Organising offline photo collection (c50,000 )
- Photo processing workflow, including watermarking. Noise removal, curve editing, white balance, channel balance, sharpening, graduated effects, etc etc etc Creation of presets, amazing range for B&W control. Non-destructive, lets you walk history.

Charlotte · « **Reply #5 on:** 17 October, 2012, 08:08:57 pm »

Although I'm still on v3, I flippin' *love* Lightroom. It helps me do everything I want to do with my images and keeps me from having to go near PS too often. The organisational features are strong and it's actually quite intuitive once you've got used to it.

mike · « **Reply #6 on:** 17 October, 2012, 08:33:21 pm »

Quote from: Charlotte on 17 October, 2012, 08:08:57 pm

Although I'm still on v3, I flippin' *love* Lightroom. It helps me do everything I want to do with my images and keeps me from having to go near PS too often. The organisational features are strong and it's actually quite intuitive once you've got used to it.

exactly this. I had lightroom 3 then went to apple aperture because it looked great, was frustrated by the rubbish interface* then went back to lightroom 4 and it's brilliant.

* not as bad as silkypix

tonycollinet · « **Reply #7 on:** 18 October, 2012, 12:51:37 pm »

Another evangelic lightroom fan here. I liked it so much I ~~bought the company~~ paid for the software.

Afasoas · « **Reply #8 on:** 18 October, 2012, 08:28:44 pm »

self-confess LR fanatic here.

I use picassa for event photography because it's lightweight and fairly good for quick crops, simple edits and provides quite a number of print options too.

The only way LR is let down slightly is that it just does not lend itself well to a multi-user/multi-machine environment.

I'm part-way through converting my catalogues at home from LR3/LR4, but at work I've been using LR4 for a while. Not really perceived any significant benefits yet, although I suspect some of you intrepid tourers will find the geo-tagging useful....

Afasoas · « **Reply #9 on:** 22 October, 2012, 10:31:36 pm »

On my second LR4 wedding and it's noticably better, albeit a bit more taxing on system resources.

andyoxon · « **Reply #10 on:** 23 October, 2012, 08:21:38 am »

Thanks all.

Quote from: Afasoas on 22 October, 2012, 10:31:36 pm

On my second LR4 wedding and it's noticably better, albeit a bit more taxing on system resources.

?

Tewdric · « **Reply #11 on:** 23 October, 2012, 08:33:58 am »

The improved interface in V4, together with the raw support for the X Pro 1, has persuaded me to move on from Bibble. It's very good indeed and camera raw now seems to match the excellent Bibble for Nikon raw conversion too.

docsquid · « **Reply #12 on:** 23 October, 2012, 01:28:33 pm »

Still use LR3 because I haven't got Windows 7 (only XP), but I think it is brilliant. Use it to organise and do most of the processing. If I need to do any fancy processing I nearly always use Corel Paint Shop Photo Pro (X5) rather than Photoshop, which I detest heartily. Corel has a much better interface and is much easier to use IMHO. The only thing LR doesn't do is RAW conversion for 5D3 but since I very rarely use RAW (over-rated IMHO - JPEG is just as good, can't be faffed with all the converting and converting back again to JPEG which is what you end up using anyway), then it is a bit irrelevant. If I REALLY need RAW then I convert it using Corel's offering.

Talking to local pros, none of them use RAW for their everday work - all use JPEG (for weddings, product photos, portraits, press work). I was brainwashed for ages into thinking that was what I needed to do. Now I don't bother, enjoy photography much better and get much better results too, as I'm not fiddling so much with the images. I do realise this is a minority view, but since I've had a lot of success with my use of JPEG, I'm not going to change!

frankly frankie · « **Reply #13 on:** 23 October, 2012, 02:41:22 pm »

Adobe Raw is a pain anyway, because you get very limited support for new cameras as they come out (without you also upgrade to the current version of Lightroom or Photoshop). My Photoshop installation is only a year old but it stopped supporting new cameras months ago.

Biggsy · « **Reply #14 on:** 23 October, 2012, 02:53:49 pm »

Silkypix frequently issues updates to support new cameras, and works with RAW (and JPEG and TIFF) directly.

Wombat · « **Reply #15 on:** 26 October, 2012, 01:17:38 pm »

Quote from: frankly frankie on 23 October, 2012, 02:41:22 pm

Adobe Raw is a pain anyway, because you get very limited support for new cameras as they come out (without you also upgrade to the current version of Lightroom or Photoshop). My Photoshop installation is only a year old but it stopped supporting new cameras months ago.

Adobe do frequent RAW updates. Just check on the website, I've done it on a couple of occasions when I've bought a new camera, and using an older version of PS (elements in my case, but the RAW update is the same.)

frankly frankie · « **Reply #16 on:** 26 October, 2012, 03:17:58 pm »

http://blogs.adobe.com/lightroomjournal/

Quote

Camera Raw 7.2 and DNG Converter 7.2 Now Available
Camera Raw 7.2 is now available as a final release through the update mechanism in Photoshop CS6. The goal of this release is to provide additional camera raw support, lens profile support and address bugs that were introduced in previous releases of Camera Raw. Customers of previous versions of Photoshop can utilize DNG Converter 7.2 for raw file support for newly added cameras.

(my bold) My CS5.5 is not exactly old software ...

Biggsy · « **Reply #17 on:** 26 October, 2012, 04:57:17 pm »

Adobe DNG Converter has the bonus of reducing file size with some proprietary RAW formats (including PEF). The program is quick and easy to use anyway, and free.

docsquid · « **Reply #18 on:** 26 October, 2012, 05:58:47 pm »

Ooh, I just noticed the DNG V 7.2 has support for Canon EOS-M. Which I might just have ordered as a second/lightweight/go anywhere camea

andyoxon · « **Reply #19 on:** 27 October, 2012, 06:39:28 pm »

Thanks all. I took the plunge and got Lightroom 4.1, so am trying to get to grips with some of the basics atm.

The graduated filter, and adjustment brush - literally being able to brush in levels, exposure, white balance, sharpness, NR etc, into specific areas seems very useful. Do many people use DNG? I quite often take RAW with jpeg, but don't often resort to using it.

docsquid · « **Reply #20 on:** 27 October, 2012, 08:46:47 pm »

FWIW I think JPEG is absolutely fine 99% of the time. Like I say, having talked to a lot of photographers, the pros hardly ever use RAW unless there is a particular reason eg for some landscapes. All the keen amateurs use RAW because they have been told it is "better", just like they never use automatic settings on their camera because they have been told manual is "better".

I do use RAW but only for a few things where maximum dynamic range is essential. It rarely is. I normally use one of the auto modes on my camera, but DO know exactly how and why to adjust and change from it if need be. I would love to be able to use LR 4.1 but won't run on XP and there is no way I'm ever buying 7 or even worse 8, so it will have to wait until I can afford an Apple.

Biggsy · « **Reply #21 on:** 27 October, 2012, 09:30:53 pm »

When available, I use RAW for everything because there's no downside for me as long as enough memory card space remains. More and finer adjustment can be done with it, and I need to do more adjustment than a pro with better equipment and opportunities (eg full frame, bigger flash gun, longer lens and permission to go where I cant).

RAW is wonderful for the amateur with computer skills. I always do some adjustment and the procedure is the same with Silkypix for RAW as it is for JPEG. Some pros do regularly use RAW anyway.

Biggsy · « **Reply #22 on:** 27 October, 2012, 09:37:12 pm »

Quote from: andyoxon on 27 October, 2012, 06:39:28 pm

Do many people use DNG?

Do you mean compared to propriatory RAW? I don't know, but any decent program should be compatible with both, or you can always convert to DNG later. The file sizes can be different.

andyoxon · « **Reply #23 on:** 27 October, 2012, 09:50:08 pm »

Yes, I've only really come face to face with it as an option with lightroom, apparently it allows changes to the native RAW file to be saved in a more compact form... or summat.

I've notice (on this PC) that Lightroom is quite resouce hungry, such that when it was importing 40 odd files into the catalog, both barrels of the Core2Duo were maxed out momentarily...

perpetual dan · « **Reply #24 on:** 28 October, 2012, 12:16:04 pm »

DNG is open, so I use it as insurance that I'll still be able to access older files if the camera manufacturer starts doing something silly with access to proprietary RAW formats in the future for whatever software I use. Obviously they can still muck up current camera access, but legacy cameras will become unsupported at some point.

I use the extra latitude of RAW often enough that it is useful. I don't take enough pictures that the extra size is a problem. So it doesn't "cost" anything to use RAW but JPEG would cost success occasionally.