Lightroom is it worth it?

Trying to save money for a big Holiday, the Daughter's wedding and on top on this we've decided to put the house on the market with a view to moving to a retirement property because of my mobility issues, so I'll have to wait a little while yet methinks. I'm still hanging out with my pair of 50D's that could do with upgrading, so it's all a matter of priorities and LR is low down on the list......Ho hum, that's life :)

Trying to save money for a big Holiday, the Daughter's wedding and on top on this we've decided to put the house on the market with a view to moving to a retirement property because of my mobility issues, so I'll have to wait a little while yet methinks. I'm still hanging out with my pair of 50D's that could do with upgrading, so it's all a matter of priorities and LR is low down on the list......Ho hum, that's life

Hope it all goes well Ade. If you do start on the [quote]a view to moving to a retirement property [/quote] keep an eye on the facilities for your photography. Pam & I keep muttering about this but none of the places down here would provide sufficient space for even my load of photography and printing bits, let alone Pam's China Painting studio, they don't consider old people with hobbies like ours round here :)

Hope it all goes well Ade.

If you do start on the
Quote:a view to moving to a retirement property
keep an eye on the facilities for your photography.

Pam & I keep muttering about this but none of the places down here would provide sufficient space for even my load of photography and printing bits, let alone Pam's China Painting studio, they don't consider old people with hobbies like ours round here

What exactly is 'soft printing' ? It sounds like it should be partially obvious but can anyone explain in a bit more detail...does it save from wasting ink printing photos which will need re-doing because of some error or omission? thanks karlo

What exactly is 'soft printing' ? It sounds like it should be partially obvious but can anyone explain in a bit more detail...does it save from wasting ink
printing photos which will need re-doing because of some error or omission?

thanks

karlo

I, like so many others on this thread, CS 5 so much less. I still prefer the clone tool and Highpass filter for sharpening in CS5, but for the general adjustment and crop tools, you can't beat lightroom. It's great value for money and I can't imagine being without it now. Marc

I, like so many others on this thread, CS 5 so much less.
I still prefer the clone tool and Highpass filter for sharpening in CS5, but for the general adjustment and crop tools, you can't beat lightroom.
It's great value for money and I can't imagine being without it now.

Marc

[quote]What exactly is 'soft printing' ?[/quote] More usually called soft proofing. It shows you what your print will look like after printing, as you probably thought. It has no value whatsoever unless you a calibrated screen and accurate profiles for the printer and paper being used. Photoshop and Lightroom are very different programs. Lightroom is for photographers, Photoshop more for art editors. Lightroom is radically different from Photoshop in that it is database driven. You never work with the original RAW File (there is no real point in using LR for jpg files), all edits are done in the database and applied to the image for viewing and exporting as jpg, tiff, whatever. Also, all keywording, editing, filing etc must be done within Lightroom for it to work properly. Once you have used Lightroom and understood it, it is very unlikely anyone would want to handle pix outside it anyway. I have both Photoshop and Lightroom but rarely use Photoshop.

Quote:What exactly is 'soft printing' ?


More usually called soft proofing. It shows you what your print will look like after printing, as you probably thought. It has no value whatsoever unless you a calibrated screen and accurate profiles for the printer and paper being used.

Photoshop and Lightroom are very different programs. Lightroom is for photographers, Photoshop more for art editors. Lightroom is radically different from Photoshop in that it is database driven. You never work with the original RAW File (there is no real point in using LR for jpg files), all edits are done in the database and applied to the image for viewing and exporting as jpg, tiff, whatever.

Also, all keywording, editing, filing etc must be done within Lightroom for it to work properly. Once you have used Lightroom and understood it, it is very unlikely anyone would want to handle pix outside it anyway. I have both Photoshop and Lightroom but rarely use Photoshop.

[quote](there is no real point in using LR for jpg files)[/quote] There is, because with Lightroom the editing is non-destructive, unlike Elements / Photoshop, and you can still use all the features including key wording, captioning, rating, collections, printing etc. etc. ;) Admittedly it is best to process with the raw file but with jpg files still results with good results !

Quote:(there is no real point in using LR for jpg files)

There is, because with Lightroom the editing is non-destructive, unlike Elements / Photoshop, and you can still use all the features including key wording, captioning, rating, collections, printing etc. etc.

Admittedly it is best to process with the raw file but with jpg files still results with good results !

[quote]What exactly is 'soft printing' ? More usually called soft proofing. It shows you what your print will look like after printing, as you probably thought. It has no value whatsoever unless you a calibrated screen and accurate profiles for the printer and paper being used. Photoshop and Lightroom are very different programs. Lightroom is for photographers, Photoshop more for art editors. Lightroom is radically different from Photoshop in that it is database driven. You never work with the original RAW File (there is no real point in using LR for jpg files), all edits are done in the database and applied to the image for viewing and exporting as jpg, tiff, whatever. Also, all keywording, editing, filing etc must be done within Lightroom for it to work properly. Once you have used Lightroom and understood it, it is very unlikely anyone would want to handle pix outside it anyway. I have both Photoshop and Lightroom but rarely use Photoshop.[/quote] bingo - best explanation of the differences I've read, nice one Lemmy :-)

Quote:What exactly is 'soft printing' ?

More usually called soft proofing. It shows you what your print will look like after printing, as you probably thought. It has no value whatsoever unless you a calibrated screen and accurate profiles for the printer and paper being used.

Photoshop and Lightroom are very different programs. Lightroom is for photographers, Photoshop more for art editors. Lightroom is radically different from Photoshop in that it is database driven. You never work with the original RAW File (there is no real point in using LR for jpg files), all edits are done in the database and applied to the image for viewing and exporting as jpg, tiff, whatever.

Also, all keywording, editing, filing etc must be done within Lightroom for it to work properly. Once you have used Lightroom and understood it, it is very unlikely anyone would want to handle pix outside it anyway. I have both Photoshop and Lightroom but rarely use Photoshop.



bingo - best explanation of the differences I've read, nice one Lemmy

I have had LR for about 6 months, and made several half-hearted attempts at processing RAW files through it over that time, but never really took to it, until this past week. I went to Adobe's learning site and watched several tutorials that somehow got through to me, :D and I've been working at it since. I find that even my jpegs, that I thought were fine with a bit of minor editing in Elements, are turning out much better, imo. I am seeing the definite advantages of the program, and I like being able to work on specific portions of my images without affecting other areas. I would suggest downloading the trial and giving it a go for a month, and whatever you do, be sure and watch Adobe's tutorials, they open up the real benefits of the program for photography.

I have had LR for about 6 months, and made several half-hearted attempts at processing RAW files through it over that time, but never really took to it, until this past week. I went to Adobe's learning site and watched several tutorials that somehow got through to me, and I've been working at it since. I find that even my jpegs, that I thought were fine with a bit of minor editing in Elements, are turning out much better, imo. I am seeing the definite advantages of the program, and I like being able to work on specific portions of my images without affecting other areas. I would suggest downloading the trial and giving it a go for a month, and whatever you do, be sure and watch Adobe's tutorials, they open up the real benefits of the program for photography.

[quote]Admittedly it is best to process with the raw file but with jpg files still results with good results ![/quote] Yes, I agree but personally I wouldn't bother if I was using jpg because if you already have Elements, all you need to do is make a copy and work with that. With Lightroom and RAW the entire process is based on exporting the best possible jpg/ png etc that your RAW can produce. With jpg you've already discarded the bulk of the captured information. But as you say, if you don't mind the loss of versatility, it does work with jpg.

Quote:Admittedly it is best to process with the raw file but with jpg files still results with good results !


Yes, I agree but personally I wouldn't bother if I was using jpg because if you already have Elements, all you need to do is make a copy and work with that.

With Lightroom and RAW the entire process is based on exporting the best possible jpg/ png etc that your RAW can produce. With jpg you've already discarded the bulk of the captured information. But as you say, if you don't mind the loss of versatility, it does work with jpg.

Thanks lemmy.

Thanks lemmy.