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Re: [OM] IMG: My Struggle to Learn to Use Lightroom

Subject: Re: [OM] IMG: My Struggle to Learn to Use Lightroom
From: ChrisB <ftog@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2017 06:37:53 +0000
Moose

I didn’t realise that you used FastStone, and I can’t understand why if you are 
importing your files to a LR catalogue.

Your workflow is almost as I imagined; I understand that you want to use layers 
extensively, but I should have thought that you could Edit with PS from LR, 
saving the .psd file.  Surely Adobe’s LR allows saving layered files.

Capture One has no modules: you don’t have to switch modules to perform the 
functions.  LR having modules seems to me rather an affectation, much like the 
silly scrollwork on the interface when I had a look at v1 (I think).

Thanks for showing me another way to do things.

Chris

> On 8 Jan 17, at 20:57, Moose <olymoose@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> On 1/7/2017 10:57 PM, ChrisB wrote:
>> I’ve long thought about this, Moose: I don’t know how you can deal with a 
>> 2-step system that ACR must entail.  Is it not immensely time-consuming?
> 
> I think you misunderstand the work flow. ACR is the front end for PS, just as 
> it is the underpinning for LR. All of the basic LR functions but some very 
> recent stuff is in ACR, was in ACR before LR existed, just not as pretty, nor 
> with a catalog. Many folk seldom went further than that, using PS as their 
> editor for the vast majority of their photos. LR started out as just a 
> catalog and a pretty face on ACR.
> 
> My work flow is different than that. I do almost no editing in ACR. When I 
> press the 'E' key on a Raw file in FastStone, it jumps to PS (which is always 
> open) and ACR opens the Raw file as a pop-up window in PS. I adjust WB and 
> highlights/shadows when needed, which can't be done the same after 
> conversion, click OK and the image is converted to a virtual image open in 
> PS. I then do my editing there.
> 
> It's really no slower for me than finding an image in the LR catalog and 
> selecting the Develop Module, and once open in PS, I can do SO MUCH MORE than 
> I can in LR.
> 
>> LR. Apple Aperture and Capture One provide a single-step process of Raw 
>> conversion, requiring that you import the images to the programme’s library; 
>> the Raw conversion is automatic and provides you with a preview and a 
>> library system.
> 
> I don't know about the others you mention. In LR, you have a choice, import 
> the image files themselves - LR moves them from your file structure into its 
> own - or add them in place, LR stores a thumbnail and the location of the 
> actual Raw file in its database, but leaves it untouched. When you open a 
> file and use the Develop Module to change anything at all, LR saves an .xmp 
> file (also called a 'sidecar' file) in the same place as the image file. The 
> .xmp file stores all the adjustments you made. When you later look at the 
> file, you see the modified version, but that is a virtual thing, reading the 
> Raw and .xmp files and applying the adjustments from the .xmp before 
> displaying.
> 
> (All this on the fly conversion is why LR is slow at some things. Select a 
> large directory full of subdirectories of many images and watch it take 
> forever to display fully sharp thumbnails. Go to the Develop Module and wait 
> a moment or two to see more than a half baked image.)
> 
> At this point, there has been no Raw conversion outside of memory. It's when 
> you export the file as .PDF, .TIFF, JPEG, etc. that Raw conversion becomes 
> real, a particular version of adjusted Raw image takes permanent external 
> form.
> 
> ACR in my workflow does almost exactly the same thing. When I've made WB, 
> exposure, highlight, shadow, etc. adjustments and click the OK button, it 
> saves an .xmp file, just like LR.
> 
>>  Once that is done any other process is fine-tuning and the user has no 
>> further file management to carry out.
> 
> Unless the image is to be used elsewhere, in which case a converted and 
> adjusted file must be exported, to disk and/or the web.
> 
>> I picture you opening a Raw file in ACR, fine-tuning and exporting the file 
>> to your storage location.  I understand that you can do it in batches, but 
>> it’s still 2-stage, is it not?
> 
> Indeed it is, although it need not be. If all I did was make adjustments in 
> ACR, I would not need to save another version. Next time I open it in ACR, 
> all the changes I've made are still there, read from the .xmp. When LR 
> started, the two processes were identical. LR has since added some functions 
> not in ACR. Dehaze is one, the ability to apply an adjustment to only part of 
> the image is another, so if one does those things in LR, that part of the 
> .xmp will not be done if you open it in ACR (at least I think not.)
> 
> However, in my case, I WANT to save a second version. I work extensively with 
> layers. That's why I find LR so limiting. I want to save that work as layers, 
> not all combined, so I can go back in and make changes. I could go on at 
> length, perhaps even with some lyricism, about how wonderful layers are and 
> what they allow me to do that I can't in LR, but that's another thing. (And 
> no, I don't do it in batches, although I could. As I do all serious editing 
> in PS, and in layers, batch conversion is no use to me.)
> 
> So, rather than an untouched Raw file and .xmp alone, I have those, plus a 
> .PDF file with my layers in it. For those that I'm going to post on the web, 
> there is also a downsized JPEG file with layers collapsed to upload.
> 
>> I know that Chuck could never get his head around how LR dealt with its 
>> catalogued files, but for me that is what makes these programmes so useful.
> 
> Chuck liked his own file structure, and did almost all his editing in ACR, in 
> effect using LR with a different face and without the catalog, as he also 
> preferred FastStone and another similar browser, (BreezeBrowser??)
> 
>> I don’t like LR, having tried it several times,
> 
> Nor do I, also having tried it several times. However, I geocode all my 
> images away from home, and the relatively new Maps Module in LR is pure magic 
> for finding images I'm looking for. I can go to the geographical location, 
> and there are all the photos I've taken there in the last several years. So I 
> dutifully import all of my new images into the catalog. I can see there the 
> date and camera - go browse them in FastStone and perhaps edit some. To me, 
> LR is a geographically smart catalog with a limited editor attached. :-)
> 
> When I get an intern, I'll get all those images keyworded, too. :-P
> 
>> but it must be useful for millions of photographers.
> 
> Of course, but so were Instamatics, drug store processing and photo print 
> albums, and so are cell phones, tablets and web based image banks.
> 
> At Home in PS Moose
> 
> -- 
> What if the Hokey Pokey *IS* what it's all about?
> -- 
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