Lightroom CC slow after retouching with spot removal tool

[adamhiram]

Yet another thread about Lightroom performance issues...

I am running the latest version of Lightroom Classic CC on a Mac with i5 processor, 16GB RAM, SSD, and never had any real issues with Lightroom being slow during editing (generating previews is another story). I just updated to the new version that adds color profiles (7.3), but experienced this issue before updating as well.

While editing a portrait, I did pretty extensive retouching using the spot removal (healing) tool - probably around 100 spots, from skin blemishes to flyaway hairs and dust/lint on clothing. It seemed to be getting a little slow, which I assumed was just because it had so many edits to track.

Where I really noticed issues was when I attempted to use an adjustment brush afterwards, and had a 5-10 second lag from when I would make a brushstroke to when it would actually show up in the local adjustment mask overlay. Obviously this makes any precise editing impossible.

Is this a common issue? Should this amount of retouching be done in Photoshop rather than Lightroom? Spot removal and other retouching is something I typically do pretty early in my workflow, and while 100 spot edits may be a lot, I hardly think it is unusual.

 

[smoke665]

While editing a portrait, I did pretty extensive retouching using the spot removal (healing) tool - probably around 100 spots, from skin blemishes to flyaway hairs and dust/lint on clothing. It seemed to be getting a little slow, which I assumed was just because it had so many edits to track.

I'd be surprised if it wasn't working at a crawl. Using Adjustment Brushes will affect performance dramatically, the more you do it the worse it is. If you have a lot of work to do take it into PS, it's a lot easier and faster.

There's a few things that help in LR. For example make sure you're in 64 bit mode. If you use LR mobile make sure it's not trying to sync everything, that will slow down performance. In LR go to Preferences>Performance Tab. Try unchecking "Use graphics processor". Despite supposedly having a compatible processor, LR still refuses to play nice. Moving further down increase your Camera Raw Cache size to at least 30 GB. Lastly if you're bound and determined to do extensive retouching in LR, you might try checking the "use smart previews for editing rather than the original" it won't affect the quality of the final image, but may make it difficult for you to edit properly. You do have to restart LR for your changes to take affect.

On the same tab, there is a button to "Optimize Catalog". Learn to do this on a regular basis as it will speed up LR.

In your Catalog Settings, in catalog settings, uncheck the "automatically write changes to XMP". With this checked, every time you make an adjustment, the processor has to do double the work, but bear in mind, you lose the history of what you've done when you do this.

 

[adamhiram]

There's a few things that help in LR.

Thank you, some solid LR performance tips. I'm curious just how much these will help with this specific issue. I've learned to apply any sharpening or noise reduction at the end of my workflow, since they were typically the only settings that didn't update in realtime and had noticeable lag. It makes sense that adjustment brushes will have the same issue, although I haven't experienced it - possibly because I typically do those edits towards the end of my workflow as well, and I tend not to use them too heavily.

Most tutorials I've seen on portrait editing start with retouching blemishes early in the workflow. However, these almost always focus on Photoshop rather than Lightroom. I prefer to stay in Lightroom when I can, since that gives me the ability to revisit all edits, not just the ones since exporting to Photoshop. Perhaps Lightroom just isn't optimized for this, and I need to either move my retouching to the end of my workflow, or into Photoshop.

 

[smoke665]

It's not just the clone or heal, it's ANY of the adjustment brushes, they're cumulative on performance in LR. The suggestions I gave you will help some (did for me), but heavy retouching is still the realm of PS. If you're concerned about history then save file as a PS file with layers intact. It eats up a lot of memory but everything is there ready to step into when you reopen it. Despite the hype I've never believed LR was the choice for heavy editing. Yeah a couple of zits here and there, light dodging or burning, but for the heavy stuff it's better to do it in PS.

 

[Braineack]

LR is a horrendously poor written application for performance.

 

[adamhiram]

LR is a horrendously poor written application for performance.

I've been hearing that for years, but until recently, I haven't experienced any real performance issues. Previews used to take forever to generate, but Adobe made some real improvements there. Sharpening and Noise Reduction tend to take a few seconds to apply, but I don't use those too often. Other than those minor exceptions, it's been smooth sailing.

It sounds like the culprit here is overuse of the spot healing tool. Here is an example, where the bulk of the touch-ups were cleaning up fly-away hairs, which is something I don't typically worry about outside of portraiture. It sounds like this is a task better suited to Photoshop.


spot_healing by adamhiram, on Flickr

So a follow-on question... I prefer to work within Lightroom when possible, so I can preserve all edits and go back and re-edit if needed. Once I export to Photoshop, I can't go back before that snapshot and my edits are locked in. For example, I might want to go back and tweak the white balance, or maybe I realize I overdid it enhancing the eyes and want to pull back on an adjustment brush setting, but now I can't. Am I missing something? Is there a way to edit an image in Lightroom, then retouch in Photoshop, but still be able to go back and change edits made in Lightroom prior to exporting?

 

[smoke665]

ybe I realize I overdid it enhancing the eyes and want to pull back on an adjustment brush setting, but now I can't. Am I missing something? Is there a way to edit an image in Lightroom, then retouch in Photoshop, but still be able to go back and change edits made in Lightroom prior to exporting?

In PS if you save your files as a PSD all you edits are there including your layers. Or you can save as a TIFF. PS gives you the option of saving layer information in a TIFF, but I've never gone back to check if everything was there. Guess I need to explore that more.

My workflow is to import my photos from SD card via "Bridge". Bridge gives you the ability to look at the thumbnails and by clicking on the spacebar, quickly see a full screen image. I do my first round cuts here, quickly deleting the trash. I then select the photos I want, and using the batch tool, I rename them, add tags and move them to my designated folder. I then import the 0hotos to LR from the file, and apply any presets (I use a custom preset for my camera).

Once in LR I again cull the best and delete the rest. I select all the images go to Develop and using the first image (that includes my target card) set the white balance. Again with all images selected I click on synch and set the WB only on all images. Then I go back to Library and flag the best of the best. Click on show flagged only then using survey mode I weed out any more that won't make the cut by unflagging.

Once I have my picks, I again select all the flagged images and go to Develop where I start apply my global selections to the first image. When I'm satisfied I click on synch again and check all the boxes that apply.

Then it's back to Library>Survey for a final look at culling. At that point the survivors are opened in PS with LR adjustments. This is where I do the heavy editing. I use a lot of custom Actions to speed things up. When done I merge layers down and save as a TIFF.

Back in LR I open the TIFF file and tweak it in the Develop module. This is also the point that I crop and straighten.

So in answer to your question once you bring the TIFF file back you can edit to your hearts content in LR. You just can't go back before the edits in PS. However, if you use a "Virtual Copy" to edit in PS (something I do a lot when I'm unsure of direction) then your original raw file is untouched.

 

[Braineack]

for that sort of touch-up work, I'd edit in PS. It saves your layers and edits in the TIFF, and you can go back into PS and make changes.

 

[smoke665]

the bulk of the touch-ups were cleaning up fly-away hairs,

Would you try to cut down a large oak tree with a pocket knife??? Yeah you could do it given enough time, but a chain saw would make it quick and cleaner. So it is with editing. In PS there are multiple ways to fix blemishes. For fly away hair I use this method, as it has the speed of a chain saw, the precision of a knife, and the ability to delete the layer if you don't like it without affecting the underlying image.

 

[adamhiram]

For fly away hair I use this method, as it has the speed of a chain saw, the precision of a knife, and the ability to delete the layer if you don't like it without affecting the underlying image.

Thanks for sharing! This is almost verbatim what I did, but using the healing brush instead of clone tool, and using LR instead of PS. It probably took less than 5 minutes, it's just a lot of brush strokes, since LR keeps track of every stroke instead of just keeping them all on a separate layer. Anything edited in Photoshop gets saved as a PSD with layers intact, so none of my editing is destructive either way, I just didn't bother to switch applications.

 

[adamhiram]

for that sort of touch-up work, I'd edit in PS. It saves your layers and edits in the TIFF, and you can go back into PS and make changes.

Thanks, so it sounds like if LR is my primary workhorse, I should save any retouching for the end of my workflow, and complete the bulk of my edits before exporting to Photoshop. That makes a lot of sense, and I realized in my reply above why it's getting so slow - PS only tracks the layer, while LR is trying to track every single brush stroke. What threw me was that most of the tutorials I've seen start with retouching, but are almost always in PS, not LR.

So in answer to your question once you bring the TIFF file back you can edit to your hearts content in LR. You just can't go back before the edits in PS.

That makes sense, and sounds like it confirms the limitation I mentioned. My workflow is similar, except that I import directly into LR, do all my culling there, make most of my edits there, and only export to PS (as PSD) when needed, before saving back to LR.

The problem I have with this approach is that while it is technically not destructive to the original image, it is sort of destructive to any edits whenever you switch applications. Once you leave LR and start editing in PS, you can't go back to your original LR edits without having to redo your PS edits. Once you finish in PS and go back to LR and make more edits to the final image, you may not be able go back to PS to edit a layer without having to redo your 2nd round of LR edits on the tiff/psd.

Where this has hit me the hardest is when I have needed to do more complex object removal or composite several images together, invest a lot of time in PS, then realize I need to tweak something in the original edits in LR. I can't go back and change the WB, or boost the shadows, or un-crop in LR without starting over in PS. Of course it's possible to salvage some selections and masks, and some layers can still be reused, but the complex object removals and compositing often need to be done all over again.

 

[smoke665]

Once you leave LR and start editing in PS, you can't go back to your original LR edits without having to redo your PS edits. Once you finish in PS and go back to LR and make more edits to the final image, you may not be able go back to PS to edit a layer without having to redo your 2nd round of LR edits on the tiff/psd.

Not true. If you do as I said and create virtual copies you can work multiple versions of the same image. If you open the image to edit in PS from the library module then it gives you the option to open with or without LR edits. If you modify a TIFF in LR then reopen in PS, your new LR edits transfer to PS.

when I have needed to do more complex object removal or composite several images together, invest a lot of time in PS, then realize I need to tweak something in the original edits in LR. I can't go back and change the WB, or boost the shadows, or un-crop in LR without starting over in PS.

Again not necessarily true. You are correct that you can't go back and add sections of the image you cropped out. That's why my work flow is to do ALL crops and straightening in LR as a FINAL edit. Even then I will create Virtual copies a lot of times when I do this. However, ALL the edits available in the Develop module including adjusting WB are available and work on the TIFF you edited in PS. I regularly find a few things in the final stage that I want to change.

 

[BananaRepublic]

By now people should really realise that adobe is just trousering all your money and doesn't give a damn.