Use of Lightroom

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mushy

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Edit My Images
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Hi

I'm just restarting photography.

I plan to shoot jpgs in the main but will shoot in jpg+raw for some photos and see if I can learn a little about editing a raw file.

I currently use Gimp and darktable. Only issue is that doesn't provide a cataloguing system

Am thinking of subscribing to LR+PS. But I see LR also does photediting? Does LR cross over with PS?

Sorry if that's a basic question
 
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LR offers digital asset management (cataloging, watermarking, exporting in various formats etc) image development and merging (HD, Panos etc) some pixel level editing with brushes. There's also the cloud features that I know nothing about because I use an older version.
 
If you have the latest Lightroom (subscription only I think) you can do an awful lot of editing without going into PS.
 
LR & PS compliment each other.
LR provides the DAM and in a lot of cases all the editing functionality that you'll require. LR is non destructive.
PS then allows further or more complex editing, but is destructive unless you keep all of the layers in a PSD or TIFF (which can be huge).

ACR in PS provides the same editing functionality as LR without the Presets.
 
If you have lightroom (rather than classic) can you save it to your computer hard drive rather than cloud? 20gb would get used up if you have raw files
 
And I assume you can backup from the cloud to a SSD and then delete everything in the Cloud?
 
Considering that the Photographers Plan is the same price as the Lightroom only plan it makes sense to buy the Photographers Plan.

Adobe Lightroom pricing & membership plans | Adobe

Explore Lightroom Single App and the Adobe Creative Cloud Photography plans. Compare pricing and features to find the plan that's right for you.
www.adobe.com www.adobe.com
 
Yup. Will get the plan

Just don't want to pay for 1tb of cloud storage. I guess I can:
1. Copy from sd card to a folder on hard drive (originals)
2. Import into lightroom which will move into cloud. Process ones I like
3. Once every 6 months delete a load of files off Lightoom CC (those I haven't processed) and backup the originals on an external hard drive

That way I'll never have to worry about cloud storage
 
sk66 said:
I don't use the cloud functions at all... no need to pay for cloud storage.
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You don't have to use cloud with lightroom classic. But lightroom loads originals to cloud and not onto computer, only downloading a local copy temporarily while you are editing.

I've discovered through some googling you can technically pause sync and point lightroom to your local drive. But it's not made to work that way

So it seems my choice is:

1. Lightroom classic and store stuff on my sdd but have a less intuitive UI

2. Lightroom and use workflow as I suggest above ?
 
mushy said:
You don't have to use cloud with lightroom classic. But lightroom loads originals to cloud and not onto computer, only downloading a local copy temporarily while you are editing.

I've discovered through some googling you can technically pause sync and point lightroom to your local drive. But it's not made to work that way

So it seems my choice is:

1. Lightroom classic and store stuff on my sdd but have a less intuitive UI

2. Lightroom and use workflow as I suggest above ?
Click to expand...

Not sure why you think LR. classic has a less intuitive UI
 
Download a trial for each. The classic photography plan allows you to use LR (cloud) version too so you get the best of both but you get less storage and PS thrown in.

LR (cloud) may have a more modern look but it's certainly not any less intuitive.

On a side note, I’ve not looked into it as I only use Classic but the latest updates last week allow LR to save files locally now instead of just in the cloud.
 
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As above I never open the cloud based LR - I've no desire to have to juggle cloud storage to keep it a reasonable size. (same goes for i cloud, onedrive etc).

ANd as has been mentioned before - buy Adobe photographers plan annually during black friday or Amazon Prime days
 
Never used LR, only ever used LRC. Never used Photoshop either, probably never will as I'm a bit of a photo purist. I do have the subscription for the updates -- for example, the new Blur feature works well and the Denoise saved me a bunch on other noise-removal software. It's a hundred and twenty quid a year so it's not breaking the bank. If you've done darkroom printing in the past, you'll be quite comfortable with the standard features of LRC; I have no idea what LR Cloud actually does apart from store things there, but since I have about 8TB of space in and around my PC, cloud-based storage, for me, is rather pointless.
 
Interesting.

I'll get the subscription but I need to work out which package to invest time to learn. I get that a lot will be similar in both but I've also read LRC more powerful but also a lot busier (although a poster above says it is still intuitive).

I assume some of the auto fix colours and light features in LR are also in LRc?
 
mushy said:
Interesting.

I'll get the subscription but I need to work out which package to invest time to learn. I get that a lot will be similar in both but I've also read LRC more powerful but also a lot busier (although a poster above says it is still intuitive).

I assume some of the auto fix colours and light features in LR are also in LRc?
Click to expand...

If you can wait until around Black Friday you can usually get a year sub for around £75 on Amazon.

LR was missing features for quite a while so If anything is still missing features it will be LR not LRC
 
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For those with Lightroom classic, do you

A) backup the original files off the SD card
B) backup the catalogue in LR which contains the originals but presumably backs up in some Adobe format?
C) both
 
mushy said:
For those with Lightroom classic, do you

A) backup the original files off the SD card
B) backup the catalogue in LR which contains the originals but presumably backs up in some Adobe format?
C) both
Click to expand...

Sorry not really sure what you are asking here.

You import images into LRC and you can do that in a number of ways.

You can import the images into the catalog from this existing location (ie you have already copied them from your SD Card to a folder on your drive) or you can import from the SD card and have LR copy the files from the SD Card to your permanent storage location.

If you move your images outside of LR then the link in LR will break but you can fix that by telling LR the new location. Once your images are imported into the catalog the best way to move them is from within LR.

The catalog does not store the original images, it only stores the edits and the location of the images on your HDD.
 
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ecoleman said:
Sorry not really sure what you are asking here.

You import images into LRC and you can do that in a number of ways.

You can import the images into the catalog from this existing location (ie you have already copied them from your SD Card to a folder on your drive) you can import from the SD card to a have LR copy the files from the SD Card to your permanent storage location.

The catalog does not store the original images, it only stores the edits and the location of the images on your HDD.
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Thanks. I didn't realise that. I thought LRC copied the images and put them into its catalogue

I was thinking if tags were added to a photo that would only be in LRC though?
 
mushy said:
Thanks. I didn't realise that. I thought LRC copied the images and put them into its catalogue

I was thinking if tags were added to a photo that would only be in LRC though?
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Yes, keywords, meta tags etc are all stored in the catalog.

You can also have LR write an XMP file that sits alongside the original image which will also contain this information should you wish to send the file and any edits to somebody else, although that is optional.
 
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Thanks.

So when you backup, do you just backup from file explorer in Windows or do you use some backup function inside LRC?
 
mushy said:
Thanks.

So when you backup, do you just backup from file explorer in Windows or do you use some backup function inside LRC?
Click to expand...

LR has a built in backup which you can setup to backup every day, every week etc when you exit LR.
That just creates a copy of the catalog and puts in in a dated folder so you can go back should the catalog ever become corrupt.

As with everything, you are still advised to do a manual backup to a different drive / location on a regular basis.
 
mushy said:
Thanks.

So when you backup, do you just backup from file explorer in Windows or do you use some backup function inside LRC?
Click to expand...
My complete 'workflow' as far as files is concerned;

1) Use LR to 'Import' files
LR copies the files from the SD card onto the data SSD in my PC, (renaming them to prefix with the camera used, to ensure no duplication of names as I have 3 different Sony cameras), building a file structure as it goes so shots are physically located in a /year/date/ folder, associating the files with any keywords I have specified for that import, and optionally adding them to an existing or new collection for easy location of a group of files (EG If I was importing files taken at a 30th Birthday Party for Sue, I would add them to a 'Sue 30th Birthday' collection)
2) My cloud backup system replicates these new files into the cloud.
3) I manually back the new files up onto a removable HD after any large import, or after a few of small imports.
4) Delete images / Format SD (on camera) only once I have confirmed all OK in LR and have been backup up.
 
mushy said:
Thanks.

So when you backup, do you just backup from file explorer in Windows or do you use some backup function inside LRC?
Click to expand...

My method is as follows:

1) Copy files from SD/CFexpress card to the chosen file location using file explorer then remove card (removing the card prevents LRC from seeing it as a possible candidate from which to import).
2) Rename those pictures in file explorer (I just find it easier to do it then)
3) Open Lightroom Classic and import.
4) That's it. You now have all your photographs in LRC that are named according to your wishes, you can back up the photographs from your storage HD/SS drive using whatever method you choose (I use the old MS Synctoy), you can also choose a backup location for your LRC catalogue. From now on, anything you do to the original files on your storage device, apart from backing up, should be done through Lightroom Classic so that the catalogue doesn't lose track of it, so move or delete only using LRC.
 
My PC has Intel Iris XE integrated GPU rather than a dedicated graphics card

I take it LRc will run on that ok. I know it meets the "minimum specs" but I mean in a real world scenario it is actually ok and not going to crash or be very, very slow etc?

The processor is i5 10 core and it has 32 gb of memory
 
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mushy said:
For those with Lightroom classic, do you

A) backup the original files off the SD card
B) backup the catalogue in LR which contains the originals but presumably backs up in some Adobe format?
C) both
Click to expand...
Both, well the catalog doesn't contain the files, but I also take a back up of that every week - Lightroom prompts you to do it. It just means that the shutdown takes a wee bit longer.
mushy said:
My PC has Intel Iris XE integrated GPU rather than a dedicated graphics card

I take it LRc will run on that ok. I know it meets the "minimum specs" but I mean in a real world scenario it is actually ok and not going to crash or be very, very slow etc?

The processor is i5 10 core and it has 32 gb of memory
Click to expand...
It should be OK, but I think there is a free trial for it.
 
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