Why use Lightroom if you already have Photoshop??

On Tue, 16 Dec 2008 16:18:45 -0500, tony cooper
wrote:

On Tue, 16 Dec 2008 20:30:26 GMT, "Beefhooked" garybull - nospam -
wrote:


"Jack" wrote in message
...
Just wondering. I constantly see posts here and in other NG's WRT to
Adobe
Lightroom. I've gone to Adobe's web page to read about it, but I STILL
don't get it. If one already owns Adobe Photoshop (in my case, CS3) what
is
the purpose to buying and using Lightroom? Doesn't PS do everything LR
does? Can somebody with a clue help me out here as I seem to be
completely
clueless on this issue. TIA.

Jack

Great question - I have often wondered the same thing.
It`s questions like this, and the answers of course, that keep me coming
back to this group.

I'm still using Photoshop V7.0. I'm working with a trial version of
Lightroom now just to see if I'm interested. (Free for 21 days from
the Adobe site) So far, the one benefit I see is the ability to
increase/decrease exposure. This has worked out well with some
photographs shot using a circular polarizer. Increasing the exposure
by two stops in LR gives better results than anything I can do in PS7.

One thing, though...there is nothing intuitive about using Lightroom.
It's an absolute bitch to learn what does what. I try this, try that,
and then reset.


To the contrary, I find LR to be very intuitive, especially compared
to Photoshop. However, if you're used to Photoshop, it will take a
little time to adapt because the interfaces are quite different.

Give it some time and I think you'll find it to be very logical and
intuitive, as well as a lot more powerful than it may seem at face
value.

I look at Lightroom as the closest thing to working with film -- you
lay out your pictures on a lightbox; select, sort and rate them;
develop and edit them any way you want; then export them or print
them. It's totally flexible. And the really sweet thing is that
you aren't changing a thing in your original files like you would with
Photoshop -- just export the RAW file as a jpeg or whatever with the
settings you apply, and the RAW file remains unchanged.

Someone mentioned Capture NX. I've used that program also, and no
offense, but it is rather slow and clunky compared to Lightroom. (Plus
LR works with more than just Nikon files.)

"Paul Furman" wrote:

Can I zoom in & pan to a specific area, then flip to the next photo which
is nearly identical, to decide which to cull? It has to hold the zoom and
position, not default back to the center or upper-left.

It remembers what you were doing the last time you looked at a particular
image once you've worked with a few images. But it's two clicks to get to
the same point in the image to compare (one click brings you back to
full-image view, and then click at the point to compare to bring up zoom-in
view). Switching between images is a bit slow: with both 5D and 5DII images
I count to 3 or 4 before the image is ready to view after switching to a new
image. There may be ways to persuade it to cache the last few images, but I
haven't figured that out. For the way I've been working with it, this delay
is the only slowness I've noticed.

How accessible is the database? What if I want to synch that with a web
site built with mySQL & php? What if I decide I don't want to use LR, can
I get my data out in a usable form? Can I import data from a web site? Say
flickr... or my own, or another program?

I would use it to import my web pages, clean that up & standardize, then
export back to my web page and continue to keep those synched.

LR has some web page stuff in it, but I haven't played with it. I'd guess
that you'd have to plan on exporting LR data, not importing data from
elsewhere.

--
David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan

On Tue, 16 Dec 2008 20:30:32 -0500, Stephen Bishop
wrote:

And the really sweet thing is that
you aren't changing a thing in your original files like you would with
Photoshop

Those of us who use Photoshop routinely don't change our original
files. We duplicate the original layer and make the changes to the
duplicate layer(s). Most of my changes are made with adjustment
layers which allow me to change those adjustments later. In the case
of an image that I crop, and I'm not sure if the crop is done where I
want it, I do a "save as" and retain the original full image.

--
Tony Cooper - Orlando, Florida

On Wed, 17 Dec 2008 00:38:22 GMT, Bubba wrote:

On Tue, 16 Dec 2008 22:55:05 +0100, "Markus Fuenfrocken"
wrote:


"John Navas" wrote:
That's a non-trivial suggestion -- my own take is that the learning
curve is pretty high and steep.
Well i was pressuming the OP is already an experienced CS3/ACR and Bridge
user, so i guess it should be possible to get a quick feeling if the
workflow and possibilites that LR offers match his own working style.

I´d like to add one thing: Lightroom´s full abilities can only be unleashed
when working with RAW files, if you shoot JPEG only you don´t need it.

And how are you supposed to figure that out by using the trial version
for a couple of hours?

The free trial is good for 21 days.

--
Tony Cooper - Orlando, Florida

"Bubba" wrote:

I´d like to add one thing: Lightroom´s full abilities can only be
unleashed
when working with RAW files, if you shoot JPEG only you don´t need it.

And how are you supposed to figure that out by using the trial version
for a couple of hours?

Hmm. Someone forgot to tell you that LR was basically a raw converter with
image management, and that its ability to handle jpegs and tiffs is really
only a secondary thing.

But those sorts of questions, e.g what is a raw converter, why would one
want to shoot raw instead of jpeg, are things you should get by reading the
photography web sites, such as dpreview.

Also, the LR trial period is more like a month than a couple of hours, so
there's plenty of time to figure it out.

--
David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan

Bubba wrote:

Can it do retouching? Like removing a tin can from the grass?

Looks like it can clone a dot shape, I guess you could do lumps of
dots... the dot is handy for dust removal.

--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

all google groups messages filtered due to spam

David J. Littleboy wrote:
"Paul Furman" wrote:
Can I zoom in & pan to a specific area, then flip to the next photo which
is nearly identical, to decide which to cull? It has to hold the zoom and
position, not default back to the center or upper-left.

It remembers what you were doing the last time you looked at a particular
image once you've worked with a few images. But it's two clicks to get to
the same point in the image to compare (one click brings you back to
full-image view, and then click at the point to compare to bring up zoom-in
view). Switching between images is a bit slow: with both 5D and 5DII images
I count to 3 or 4 before the image is ready to view after switching to a new
image. There may be ways to persuade it to cache the last few images, but I
haven't figured that out. For the way I've been working with it, this delay
is the only slowness I've noticed.

How accessible is the database? What if I want to synch that with a web
site built with mySQL & php? What if I decide I don't want to use LR, can
I get my data out in a usable form? Can I import data from a web site? Say
flickr... or my own, or another program?

I would use it to import my web pages, clean that up & standardize, then
export back to my web page and continue to keep those synched.

LR has some web page stuff in it, but I haven't played with it. I'd guess
that you'd have to plan on exporting LR data, not importing data from
elsewhere.

Thanks, somebody posted these tutorials in another thread which pretty
much answered my questions except the database specifics:
http://www.whibalhost.com/_Tutorials.../01/index.html
Sounds like it would be darned useful for me.

--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

all google groups messages filtered due to spam

tony cooper wrote:
On Tue, 16 Dec 2008 20:30:32 -0500, Stephen Bishop
wrote:

And the really sweet thing is that
you aren't changing a thing in your original files like you would with
Photoshop

Those of us who use Photoshop routinely don't change our original
files. We duplicate the original layer and make the changes to the
duplicate layer(s). Most of my changes are made with adjustment
layers which allow me to change those adjustments later. In the case
of an image that I crop, and I'm not sure if the crop is done where I
want it, I do a "save as" and retain the original full image.

After watching those tutorials, I really see the value, the only problem
is other programs can't see the edits and many can't even preview raw
files. I guess I could continue with my practice of batching out a set
of final jpegs but that really isn't necessary for LR. It would be a
pretty big commitment to switch to LR, it means you either batch out
redundant jpegs or only use LR to browse photos in the future, and
always upgrade, etc. I suspect problems could arise even trying to move
or rename folders containing photos with explorer.

--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

all google groups messages filtered due to spam

seth1066 wrote:

LR is ideal for photographers who shoot thousands of images such as a
wedding, fashion or other commercial shoot. It allows you to quickly
reduce the shoot to the best shots and then apply preset image
modifications on a batch basis with a few clicks. Also, it doesn't
touch the originals and reads and modifies any RAW file format. Here's
an article by Patrick Lavoie that will further demonstrate LR's
capabilities:

http://photo.net/learn/digital-photo...n-photography/

Man, that's a lot. I didn't finish but good read.

--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

all google groups messages filtered due to spam

On Wed, 17 Dec 2008 11:27:29 +0900, "David J. Littleboy"
wrote:

"Bubba" wrote:

I´d like to add one thing: Lightroom´s full abilities can only be
unleashed
when working with RAW files, if you shoot JPEG only you don´t need it.

And how are you supposed to figure that out by using the trial version
for a couple of hours?

Hmm. Someone forgot to tell you that LR was basically a raw converter with
image management, and that its ability to handle jpegs and tiffs is really
only a secondary thing.

But those sorts of questions, e.g what is a raw converter, why would one
want to shoot raw instead of jpeg, are things you should get by reading the
photography web sites, such as dpreview.

Also, the LR trial period is more like a month than a couple of hours, so
there's plenty of time to figure it out.

Thanks for the lecture.

A previous poster on this thread was implying that instead of asking
questions here about Lightroom, that one should just download the
trial version and play with it to get the answers.

My point is that there is a significant learning curve to Lightroom
and that one is not likely to make the necessary discoveries to
properly evaluate the program by doing ad-hoc experimenting with a
trial version.

.... unless you really did dedicate 21 serious days to it. But it would
be a pity that after such a time investment you found that it was not
suitable for your purposes, and that you could have found that out by
asking some questions.

In fact, I did try the trial version earlier this year, spending a
couple of weeks on it on and off. I learned that it does very well as
a photo management program, and that it is good at making basic
changes in contrast/brightness/color balance. And the healing function
is useful. This trial experience told me nothing about LR being
"basically a raw converter". Thanks to your snobby remark, and those
of others in this thread, I now know that.

I was not able to discover any way to do cloning/retouching/local
manipulation that I could easily do with other programs. Therefore I
have uninstalled LR and continued on with other graphic tools.

In my experience, Adobe products are powerful but awkward and have a
counterintuitive interface. The Adobe software highpriests love the
progs because they know them. Lots of the rest of us don't share that
love.

Adobe snobs, give the rest of us a break.

bubba