Beginner Lightroom or Photoshop

saul01

saul01

Messages
791
Name
Sohail
Edit My Images
Yes
Hello,

As a newbie to photo editing (as yet still not purchased software), which of the above two would be easier to grasp and use?

It's just for basic touch ups just yet, and in the future would like to get a bit more creative.

Also any good websites/courses to learn either?

Thanks

Saul.
 
I found Lightroom easier to learn then progressed on to photoshop. There is the deal,with Adobe that you can subscribe and get both for around £9 a month. There are loads of free tutorials on YouTube. Why not download the free trial and see how you get on. For basic touch ups Lightroom will be more than enough though.
 
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Or Saul why not have a play with the editing software, that came with your camera.what do you shoot with?
 
SsSsSsSsSnake said:
Or Saul why not have a play with the editing software, that came with your camera.what do you shoot with?
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I have just pruchased a Nikon D750.
 
Nice camera Saul.then why not try Capture NXD which you can download from the Nikon site or its probably on a disk with your camera.

Or you could offer to pay Minnett to teach you :)
 
Free trial is the way to go.

For basic stuff, photoshop elements is pretty good or Capture NX.

Both lightroom and Photoshop are easy to learn, but very hard to master. You will never stop learning.
 
Thank you. I bought the camera used and didn't come with anything apart from the charger. Did not know about NXD will have a look at it tonight when I get in.
 
I think I'll download the adobe stuff as well and see how it goes from there. Anything more advanced can be purchased later.
 
To put it simply I normally consider it like this:

Lightroom is for organising your photos and processing them.
Photoshop is for editing them.

Processing is exposure, colour, etc and some basic manipulation (e.g. spot healing)
Editing is more involved manipulation of the image

There's some overlap and those lines can get blurred but I use LR for >90% of stuff.
 
I started with Photoshop Elements then went to Lightroom. I wished i moved to Lightroom earlier as I wasted a couple of years with PSE, LR does everything I want it to. Most of my editing (99%) is in Lightroom. It's great to organise and edit images. I too use the d750.

Don't forget you will need Lightroom 6 or Lightroom CC (subscription based) for it to be compatible with the d750.
 
rob-nikon said:
I started with Photoshop Elements then went to Lightroom. I wished i moved to Lightroom earlier as I wasted a couple of years with PSE, LR does everything I want it to. Most of my editing (99%) is in Lightroom. It's great to organise and edit images. I too use the d750.

Don't forget you will need Lightroom 6 or Lightroom CC (subscription based) for it to be compatible with the d750.
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Apoligies to OP for butting in.

Rob I have being using Elements 11 but this will not edit D750 raw files unless I convert them to TIF, will either Elements 13 or Lightroom 6 open d750 raw files without downloading any extra's ?
 
Lightroom is far easier for a first time user than full fat photoshop. Lightroom has features specifically aimed at photography rather than image manipulation plus the additional benefit of it's cataloging features. It's far cheaper also if you buy off the shelf.
I found Photoshop Express or whatever it's called akin to using software with an arm tied behind your back. It's just too dumbed down so not compete with their core offerings IMO.
Picassa is pretty good. I have a few friends who aren't so invested in post processing who produce very good results and libraries with the software.
 
Mikechappers said:
Apoligies to OP for butting in.

Rob I have being using Elements 11 but this will not edit D750 raw files unless I convert them to TIF, will either Elements 13 or Lightroom 6 open d750 raw files without downloading any extra's ?
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LR6 can import D750 files, allow you to edit and export them. When I used PSE 4 years I was converting RAWs to TIFFs using Nikon NX then editing in PSE to create a final JPEG.
 
rob-nikon said:
LR6 can import D750 files, allow you to edit and export them. When I used PSE 4 years I was converting RAWs to TIFFs using Nikon NX then editing in PSE to create a final JPEG.
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Thanks Rob, so I guess your recommendation would be to go with Lightroom rather than stick with Elements.
 
Looks like the general consensus is to go with Lightroom then. Are there any standard presets that you can download or am I thinking far too ahead?
 
saul01 said:
Are there any standard presets that you can download or am I thinking far too ahead?
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Lightroom does come with some built in presets. I would learn what each of the develop sliders can do first. You can get third party presets but you can also make your own.
 
I am relatively new in to the world of serious digital photography but taking more pics by the day and it looks like it would be worthwhile me setting my stall out with Lightroom etc so that I don't get a year more down the line and have thousands of pics to back track and sort etc.

I saw this on Amazon where I have a £30 credit sat and just checking that it is the Lightroom/Photoshop CC package that I would be subscribing to and not a cheaper variant. Could someone click on and confirm I am purchasing the right package ?

Many thanks

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Adobe-Creat...UTF8&qid=1442469831&sr=8-7&keywords=lightroom
 
Can I ask, does the quality/calibration of the monitor play any part whilst you are editing your photos?
 
saul01 said:
Can I ask, does the quality/calibration of the monitor play any part whilst you are editing your photos?
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I think yes, as if the screen is not correctly calibrated you may get the incorrect exposure.
 
tonybassplayer said:
I am relatively new in to the world of serious digital photography but taking more pics by the day and it looks like it would be worthwhile me setting my stall out with Lightroom etc so that I don't get a year more down the line and have thousands of pics to back track and sort etc.

I saw this on Amazon where I have a £30 credit sat and just checking that it is the Lightroom/Photoshop CC package that I would be subscribing to and not a cheaper variant. Could someone click on and confirm I am purchasing the right package ?

Many thanks

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Adobe-Creat...UTF8&qid=1442469831&sr=8-7&keywords=lightroom
Click to expand...

Yes - that's the 1 year lump-sum subscription.

saul01 said:
Can I ask, does the quality/calibration of the monitor play any part whilst you are editing your photos?
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Ideally you want the images on your screen to appear just as they will on someone else's screen and also to look the same as any prints you have made. Calibration will, to a large degree, make this possible depending on things that can interfere like ambient light levels etc. You can develop photos on an uncalibrated screen, but they will only look the way you intended on that screen alone. You should look for an IPS type screen (so that colours and brightness don't vary as you move your head around). Opinions vary, but I would *prefer* a minimum screen resolution of 1920 X 1200 and minimum size of 24", although larger than this is nice to have.
 
ancient_mariner said:
Yes - that's the 1 year lump-sum subscription.

Ideally you want the images on your screen to appear just as they will on someone else's screen and also to look the same as any prints you have made. Calibration will, to a large degree, make this possible depending on things that can interfere like ambient light levels etc. You can develop photos on an uncalibrated screen, but they will only look the way you intended on that screen alone. You should look for an IPS type screen (so that colours and brightness don't vary as you move your head around). Opinions vary, but I would *prefer* a minimum screen resolution of 1920 X 1200 and minimum size of 24", although larger than this is nice to have.
Click to expand...

I have a Dell U2515H 25-Inch LCD Monitor on order as we speak, and am also thinking of purchasing the X-Rite ColorMunki Smile
 
saul01 said:
Hello,

As a newbie to photo editing (as yet still not purchased software), which of the above two would be easier to grasp and use?

It's just for basic touch ups just yet, and in the future would like to get a bit more creative.

Also any good websites/courses to learn either?

Thanks

Saul.
Click to expand...

They are different to each other, it is not like comparing one word processor against another word processor, or one browser against another browser, when you compare Lightroom against Photoshop, it would be more like comparing say word processor against spreadsheet. They work different to each other.

You could have both, Lightroom for checking your image files and quick fix of any problems (ie: over or under exposure), and Photoshop for a full retouching.

Scott Kelby write good books on how to use them, check out his website (Google 'Scott Kelby') or check out his books.
 
Just made a purchase through Amazon and waiting for the info so I can download the package.

Quick question.

I have a MacBook Pro and currently just connect the camera and the pictures automatically download to Photos. Am I best still doing this and then moving what I want to Lightroom and ditching the rest or am I better to download straight to Lightroom ?

Many thanks
 
tonybassplayer said:
Just made a purchase through Amazon and waiting for the info so I can download the package.

Quick question.

I have a MacBook Pro and currently just connect the camera and the pictures automatically download to Photos. Am I best still doing this and then moving what I want to Lightroom and ditching the rest or am I better to download straight to Lightroom ?

Many thanks
Click to expand...
To use Lightroom the images must first be in the Lightroom Catalog.
It therefore makes sense to download directly into Lightroom, which is what I do.
 
tonybassplayer said:
Just made a purchase through Amazon and waiting for the info so I can download the package.

Quick question.

I have a MacBook Pro and currently just connect the camera and the pictures automatically download to Photos. Am I best still doing this and then moving what I want to Lightroom and ditching the rest or am I better to download straight to Lightroom ?

Many thanks
Click to expand...

In my opinion this is a very bad idea*. I would recommend moving images from the camera into folders that you create, name and control, then importing from there into LR. If you do this then when you want your basic images you will never be at the mercy of the software that can (and likely will) occasionally get corrupted and/or lose stuff. My approach is to create a new folder with a meaningful name each time I download images, remove the SD card from my camera and upload from the card into the folder, then chose which I wish to import and apply metadata etc before importing.

* It is less of a problem with lightroom, but with Apple software, trying to find and recover image files from your hard drive can be very difficult if all you want is the files. Rather like emails, iPhoto squirrels away the images, so that they only seem available through the software - I don't know if Photos does this as I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole.
 
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ancient_mariner said:
In my opinion this is a very bad idea*. I would recommend moving images from the camera into folders that you create, name and control, then importing from there into LR. If you do this then when you want your basic images you will never be at the mercy of the software that can (and likely will) occasionally get corrupted and/or lose stuff. My approach is to create a new folder with a meaningful name each time I download images, remove the SD card from my camera and upload from the card into the folder, then chose which I wish to import and apply metadata etc before importing.

* It is less of a problem with lightroom, but with Apple software, trying to find and recover image files from your hard drive can be very difficult if all you want is the files. Rather like emails, iPhoto squirrels away the images, so that they only seem available through the software - I don't know if Photos does this as I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole.
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You create, name and control the folders when you download within Lightroom, so there's no need for any additional steps.
Lightroom can automatically create a new folder by date for every download, which is what I used to do before I used Lightroom.
You have to configure Lightroom to do what YOU want it to, not just rely on it's default settings.
Once you understand how it works Lightroom is beautifully simple and elegant.
 
I always put them first on an external HD folder then import to wherever you want as Toni suggested,and I also have another folder on there for photos I've developed in say LR as a back up.
 
Brian G said:
You create, name and control the folders when you download within Lightroom, so there's no need for any additional steps.
Lightroom can automatically create a new folder by date for every download, which is what I used to do before I used Lightroom.
You have to configure Lightroom to do what YOU want it to, not just rely on it's default settings.
Once you understand how it works Lightroom is beautifully simple and elegant.
Click to expand...

While I agree, I just plain prefer to make the folders and move the files 'myself' rather than allow additional software to do it for me. Consider it a lack of trust on my part.
 
tonybassplayer said:
Just made a purchase through Amazon and waiting for the info so I can download the package.

Quick question.

I have a MacBook Pro and currently just connect the camera and the pictures automatically download to Photos. Am I best still doing this and then moving what I want to Lightroom and ditching the rest or am I better to download straight to Lightroom ?

Many thanks
Click to expand...

Scott Kelby wrote in his book The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom CC Book for Digital Photographers giving details of two different ways of getting your photos into laptop, such as if you prefer to download from camera direct into your hard drive, then import into LR, or if you want to download from your camera via LR to the hard drive. Rather than like with most How-to-do-it books telling you step-by-step, Kelby's book do the same, expect he seems to talk about his experience. He shares with the readers some examples of his workflow, what's best way for him to do his work. And that can help you decide which is best way for you.

Well, either way works fine, expect that have you thought of it this way: If you transfer direct from camera to hard drive, you would then have to delete bad photos (ie: flash fails to fire, model blinked eyes, some idiot walked in front of your camera, stuff you forgotten to check on your camera's LCD and delete from camera, or too small on a tiny LCD to be sure if it's really good), as well as having to rename them if you don't like the camera's file naming system, and so on.

To transfer via Lightroom would offer you those options: First you import thumbnails into LR, but not actually copy/transfer the actual image files to hard drive, then you can uncheck (remove tick mark) of any photos you don't want, set up any file naming you want, also tag them on the go, and such, then actually copy them to the hard drive.
 
ancient_mariner said:
In my opinion this is a very bad idea*. I would recommend moving images from the camera into folders that you create, name and control, then importing from there into LR. If you do this then when you want your basic images you will never be at the mercy of the software that can (and likely will) occasionally get corrupted and/or lose stuff. My approach is to create a new folder with a meaningful name each time I download images, remove the SD card from my camera and upload from the card into the folder, then chose which I wish to import and apply metadata etc before importing.
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Never say "move" images from camera to computer, always suggest "copy" images from camera to computer. Although it would be a moot point because if you move from one drive to another drive, Windows just automatically copy them, compare to if you move from one folder to another folder but on same drive, Windows move. But for all you know, if you recommend "moving", people would think of holding down the Shift key as they click and drag to move not copy.

Always copy first, make sure you have copies on the hard drive, if it's all okay, then do what you want with files on memory card in camera.
 
Major Eazy said:
Never say "move" images from camera to computer, always suggest "copy" images from camera to computer. Although it would be a moot point because if you move from one drive to another drive, Windows just automatically copy them, compare to if you move from one folder to another folder but on same drive, Windows move. But for all you know, if you recommend "moving", people would think of holding down the Shift key as they click and drag to move not copy.

Always copy first, make sure you have copies on the hard drive, if it's all okay, then do what you want with files on memory card in camera.
Click to expand...

Thanks for making the point I failed to - yes, absolutely copy, rather than move (like cut and paste) so the original remains on the card until it has been duplicated on the computer, preferably backed up too.
 
Just q quick question, how many back up of photo's do you guy's normally make? I have 2 (main pc and nas) and am now thinking of using cloud storage as another option .
 
I have no financial reliance on my images, so normally just 2 (computer + external drive) but will occasionally also back up to NAS. I couldn't use cloud backup because my data transfer speeds are too low for it to be effective.
 
The photos app is quite easy to manage these days and it's quite a quick and easy way of getting rid of the rejected pictures but will try with small batches a few different ways to see what feels right when I get my log in info etc.

What is NAS ?
 
Network Attached Storage - it's like a very basic fileserver.

in my personal opinion I would ABSOLUTELY NOT allow any Apple app to manage my images for the reasons I gave, though if you're only using it to view them that's a little different.
 
saul01 said:
Just q quick question, how many back up of photo's do you guy's normally make? I have 2 (main pc and nas) and am now thinking of using cloud storage as another option .
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My workflow goes like this.
1. Copy from camera into Lightroom, using a different date folder for each set of images. I rarely review "in camera" so it's at this stage I cull the obvious junk.
(I have Lightroom set to automatically add my copyright information as the images download.)
2. Title, Caption and Keyword images using Lightroom.
3. Make backups to three external USB drives (I use the Microsoft "Sync Toy" utility for this) so I therefore have a set of working images on my computer, plus three sets of backups.

Only after the above steps (particularly the backups) will I consider deleting the images from the memory card.
tonybassplayer said:
What is NAS ?
Click to expand...
Network Attached Storage.
Usually a hard drive array that is connected via Ethernet or sometimes Wireless connection, as opposed to a directly connected (USB) drive
 
i transfer photos from the card into dated folders, I then Import into lightroom, reason i do this is when I'm in Phtotoshop it works differently to lightroom and thus the flat folders with dates does me fine.
I use a 8TB thunderbolt drive in Raid 1 off the back of my Mac, i also have 2 NAS for the backups of the good ones should i need to do that, or i store them in dropbox and Onedrive.

I flick between windows and Mac when i feel the need. and i use a Wacom Intuos pro small for editing.

For your software i would go with Adobes cloud its peanuts a month and gets you Photoshop also, as you will find Lightroom cannot do somethings as you progress.
It also comes with 2 licences which you can either pop on a laptop or suchlike. i share mine with my DAD and we just log out and back in to whichever device we are working on, as long as we don't do more than 2 at any time its fine, and supported by Adobe.

Start with LR then progress to PS, LR is fast to do the easy touch-ups WB etc.
 
littleted said:
i transfer photos from the card into dated folders, I then Import into lightroom, reason i do this is when I'm in Phtotoshop it works differently to lightroom and thus the flat folders with dates does me fine.
I use a 8TB thunderbolt drive in Raid 1 off the back of my Mac, i also have 2 NAS for the backups of the good ones should i need to do that, or i store them in dropbox and Onedrive.

I flick between windows and Mac when i feel the need. and i use a Wacom Intuos pro small for editing.

For your software i would go with Adobes cloud its peanuts a month and gets you Photoshop also, as you will find Lightroom cannot do somethings as you progress.
It also comes with 2 licences which you can either pop on a laptop or suchlike. i share mine with my DAD and we just log out and back in to whichever device we are working on, as long as we don't do more than 2 at any time its fine, and supported by Adobe.

Start with LR then progress to PS, LR is fast to do the easy touch-ups WB etc.
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Hi Rob,

Thank you for your detailed advise. My transfer of photo's, is pretty much the same as yours, makes it so much easier to find!!. As my photo/flow rate is quite low at present I have now decided to temporarily use the regular cloud storage,one drive or maybe google (15gb free I think will be more than enough for me) and not having anything on hard disk other than the pc itself. Will also look into the adobe cloud option as well just for future reference.

As I have not yet committed to any software just yet (as I decided to upgrade my monitor first), would I still be able to import files from say The OneDrive?

I also did look into a graphics tablet but I think it's more a GAS thing than a need, don't think can justify it for the amount of photo's taken by me so far.

Saul.
 
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Hi Saul onedrive is fine also there all the same, i have both to be honest dropbox and onedrive, however what i would say is work with photos local to your computer first and backup to the cloud, using cloud as the functional drive can be slow if they are not synced across.
I'm unsure if your Pc or MAC but buy one of the Raided external drives for security that attaches by USB3 or Thunderbolt if its a mac, that will give you speed and well as security of 2 drives.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/8TB-Book-Du...sr=8-2&keywords=western+digital+external+raid


If you subscribe to Adobe they give you 20GB cloud storage also.

As for Graphics tablets these get good reviews if you fancy it, take some getting used to but good once you get there. or Wacom like mine but triple the cost. the tablet come in handy when your touching up mending and refining special stuff, for general WB colours etc mouse is fine...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Huion-H610-...?ie=UTF8&qid=1443708128&sr=8-1&keywords=huion
 
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