LIGHTROOM

ponyboy4130 · Mar 27, 2008

who is using adobe light room? Is it one of your digital tools? how come you like it? Pros and cons, or do you just use photoshop? i just wanted to know why you guys like it? OR don't.

onedayillknowbetter · Mar 27, 2008

I think this depends on what you are looking for. Photoshop is a Photo Editing program, Lightroom (like a darkroom) is a Photo Developing program--mostly. If you're looking for something to change your images into something entirely different from what it really looked like, Photoshop is a good tool for that. If you want to optimize the images i.e. bring up darks, lower flares, basic changes, Lightroom is the way to go. I usually optimize my images, and like Lightroom so I'll say why.
I used Photoshop for quite some time, but prefer Lightroom by leaps and bounds. First and foremost, Lightroom has different functions: Library, Develop, Slideshow, Print, and Web. They are all useful, but Library, Develop, and Web are my favorite. As opposed to Photoshop, you upload your images into a library one time. No more selecting open and choosing however many you want to edit, clicking ok, and walking away from the computer because it took forever. From there, you can select the ones you like of all the images shot and easily view them in Develop mode.
The tools when shooting in RAW are much more precise in Lightroom. The layout is self explanitory, and the menu is put right there in front of you, so you can just push buttons and adjust needles and the picture changes right in front of you. Photoshop requires you to open a window and do this.

I guess I should also say that I am usually working with at least 300 images uploaded at once, and they are usually of events. How long it takes is very important.

D40 · Mar 27, 2008

LightRoom owner

chrisburke · Mar 27, 2008

i love lightroom, i use it everyday... i like it because its so easy to use and its VERY versatile (more versatile than Aperture the software created by Apple)

Garbz · Mar 27, 2008

Use lightroom for everything I can and when I need more I right click and click edit in photoshop.

nicfargo · Mar 27, 2008

I use lightroom all the time. I also use photoshop, but I always start in lightroom. I'm able to organize and do batch jobs in lightroom. If I need to I just right click to edit in photoshop, and it saves the copy so I can then see it in lightroom. All this without damaging the original RAW file.

keith204 · Mar 27, 2008

Garbz said:
Use lightroom for everything I can and when I need more I right click and click edit in photoshop.

Same here. Using Lightroom just seems as if it was meant to be.

Also, I like how LR simply works with my RAW files.

Meysha · Mar 28, 2008

Lightroom is integral to my workflow. ACDSee just didn't cut it for me.. it's too clunky and takes too many clicks and different pages to edit raw. and changing files size in Acdsee is a pain.

Lightroom is sooooo quick to use.
Ditto Garbz and keith204

KhronoS · Mar 28, 2008

I use Lightroom as well... and its awesome. You can do a better organizations then other softwares ( i tested a lot of softwares), it has great editing capabilities (i love the fact that when you modify a photo it will save only the settings somewhere and the original remains untouched, and if you need you can export it or continue the advanced editing in photoshop)... there are a lot of positive thoughts for it, just download the demo and play a while in it and see if its suits you needs

Happy playing

nclester · Mar 28, 2008

Garbz said:
Use lightroom for everything I can and when I need more I right click and click edit in photoshop.

What he said.

JerryPH · Mar 28, 2008

I found the lightroom interface clunky. I don't need a library interface (I do my own cataloging), and the size of the window used to display the image was never to my liking.

The output results are ok, but I never have never had better results than when I used CS3. Besides the visually better results, I can also do a lot more in CS3 than in lightroom.

As far as the RAW tools, again, though layed out in a manner that was not as intuituve for me, they are close to CS3 (Adobe Camera RAW is Adobe Camera RAW).

Once the picture is imported and past the RAW basic adjustments stage, thats where PS just takes over and runs ahead.

If you have no desire for a much more granualar level of control over the aspects of your pics, nor do you have no wish to expand them artistically past the beginning post process level, LR is a nice tool... but I outgrew it in about a week and have never looked back.

CS3 is my choice of tool. Results are nicer and artistic limitations are within me, not within the program.

Depends on what you want to do.

mrodgers · Mar 28, 2008

I tried Lightroom and found that other than exposure and white balance changes, all other editing tools were not good at all. It is much easier to do levels and curves in photoshop. The changes to the images with the sharpening and noise reduction tools were almost non-existant.

Where Lightroom stood out for me for using as a cataloging system is the ratings and stuff you can assign to a photo. I already organize my folders that the images are in. I imported my entire folder contents into Lightroom, which kept the folder structure to make it easy to view between explorer and Lightroom. Then sorting through the photos, I would black flag anything that I didn't like, thus those shots would filter out. Then you can color flag photos according to stages of development or editing or for whatever you want.

As Jerry said, I also didn't like viewing photos in Lightroom. It just seemed weird for some reason and I couldn't see as much detail in the images as I could in Photoshop or Paintshop Pro, which is what I have used for graphic files for years.

A +1 rating for Lightroom and it's organization, a -1 for it's editing/development tools from me. Ideally, I would sort and flag with the colors and ratings in Lightroom, mild adjustments for exposure or white balance, then export TIFF for editing in Photoshop.

Big Mike · Mar 28, 2008

I use RawShooter Essentials (a precursor to Lightroom)...and I love it.

As mentioned, Photoshop is the better tool for editing images. But when you have several hundred or even thousand files to work though, Lightroom is much more preferable than Adobe Camera RAW.

keith204 · Mar 28, 2008

I used the "WEB" part of LR today, quite a bit. WOW. I do a bit of web design/development...and will continue doing that for some applications. However, for sharing images with family, it doesn't get any better than this. I have a preset set up to connect to my FTP server in the right folder.

Now, all I have to do to upload pictures, is highlight the ones I want online, click which style I want, add the gallery info on the right, and click Upload. Then I have a fancy gallery for some not-so fancy pictures.

Today I went through a lot of family snapshots, and set up several galleries so everyone can view them. It literally took me about 5 minutes to do 3 web galleries. Very nice once you get the hang of it, and it saves lots of time, if you don't need anything really custom.