Lightroom 1.0, Are you Buying?

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Bryan Lee

Expat Street Photographer
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With the news Lightroom 1.0 will ship on February 19th for the price of 199.00 U.S. I was wondering how many have been using the beta version and will now purchase this software? Ive recently heard some talk that it is stand alone photography software and one who is used to traditional darkroom work can adapt to using this program without the bother of Photoshop, any thoughts on this would be great.

I will be getting a new computer with 2 gigs of ram in the next month or so and Im looking into the latest software, all answers and insights will be apreciated.



1857_lightroom_boxshot_left.jpg
 
I bought the Raw Shooter for 50 bucks last year, so I think Lightroom 1.0 is free for me.

I tried the beta version, not impressed. The interface just takes too big of margin on screen, unless you have a large LCD. In addition, when compared to RS, for the same function, lightroom seems to over complicate the controls.

If I were you, I would save the money to get photoshop cs3
 
I like Lightroom alot ... $199 I don't know about

especially since I was going to get Elements to make up for the features that Lightroom doesn't have
 
As someone who shots a LOT of RAW files during weddings and for someone who preferred Lightroom over RawShooter I will be buying LR 1.0 once it is released (at least before the "introductory" price of $199 is gone).

I find it easy to use and turns out files that are a lot more, how do I say, "smoother"? than most other RAW processors. YMMV.

Cheers
Dave
 
dcsang said:
As someone who shots a LOT of RAW files during weddings and for someone who preferred Lightroom over RawShooter I will be buying LR 1.0 once it is released (at least before the "introductory" price of $199 is gone).

I find it easy to use and turns out files that are a lot more, how do I say, "smoother"? than most other RAW processors. YMMV.

Cheers
Dave
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I agree ... its good in fact its what helped me ease my way back into shooting RAW again; the processing and organizing abilities are just great.

So I officially have 2 weeks to make my decision :eek:
 
I don't have a problem with CS2, plus I use Zoombrowser EX and Nikon View and Adobe Bridge and Opanda and, well I don't want anymore software, thank you.
 
Personally, I'm confused by all of the different photo processing options from Adobe. Is there a site that gives a straightforward accounting of them?

I have been using Lightroom and like it very much. The learning curve is not steep and once you get the hang of it, it is quite capable. I will probably buy it.

/Ira
 
I like Lightroom. It's wonderful for managing dozens, hundreds of photos taken in the same location, managing consistency, etc.

But its performance. No way. They must fix the responsiveness, lag and the lack of higher customization before I go that route.

I'll sit on the fence for this one and wait for what the first grabbers have to say about it.

The new ACR version (found in CS3) borrows heavily from a lot of functionality found in Lightroom. We'll see.
 
I've played with lightroom for a while and more seriously in the last couple of weeks. I like it a lot (I also have CS2). It has most of the basic stuff that you need to process a raw file including crop and starighten and if you want to get in deep, it offers a lot of control. Its not photoshop and if you're into layers, masks etc, etc it won't cut it. However, if you're good enough not to have to spend hours rescuing an image I'd recommend it. I will buy it at that sort of price (it produces the best M8 results from raw in my opinion). Note that you can also use it with jpegs.
 
I don't like it as a RSP alternative, too big, too slow, too cluttered.
For my needs ACDSee Pro is better than Lightroom for filing and Rawshooter was much faster for RAW conversion.
I may play a bit more with my copy, if I ever get it - haven't heard from Adobe recently, but it won't be my main application.
 
I really don't see it as an alternative to PS. It's a workflow product with many tools, but it still sends out to PS and imports back in seamlessly, which implies that they are to be used in conjunction.

I need a new computer first - LR and Apeture just eat up resources - but I will be getting it, no question.

allan
 
I currently own CS2 and use it for all my scanning, editing and printing needs (with the Epson Twain Driver). However I'm going to be getting a digital camera soon, most likely the Ricoh GR-D. I probably won't be using the RAW that much as it's slow but I do want something for organizing all my files (folder hierarchy of analog scans) and managing the new digital files from my GR-D.

Basically my scans lack any sort of meta data or keywords and I'd like to be able to find stuff. I carried the way I organize my negative sheet (binder for each year, each sheet labeled sequentially) into the digital realm making folders for years, sub folders for negative sheets and sub sub folders for PSDs, TIFs, and JPEGs.

Is Lightroom the way to go? I've considered Aperture as well but rumor has it, that unless you have an Intel Mac with maxed out RAM it's too slow. I've got the last generation G4 Powerbook and probably am going to hang on to it for another year but probably max out the RAM at 2 gigs.

Considering Lightroom, Aperture and some of the older organizing apps like iView and Photomechanic, which do you guys like? Seems like Lightroom and Aperture are the future but only if you've got the latest and greatest computing power.
 
I had RSP so will get LR free. I quite like it for rapid processing of large numbers of files (I have a reasonably powerful PC). I don't have the hang of its sharpening functions yet - I prefer USM in Photoshop. I find its colour much better than RSP. Finally RSP is a deadend if you're going to be using any camera introduced after they stopped development as it won't read the raw format, eg. M8.
 
Both Aperture and LR require quite a bit of horsepower to be truly useful. So keep that in mind.

iView, iMatch, etc are mostly for cataloging. Other apps like Capture and RawShooter are for raw conversions. LR and Aperture try to combine both into a single workflow product.

allan
 
I tried it but couldn't get along with it that well...though many have been enthusiastic about it. From my point of view, it was probably just one package too far - my own method of working includes CS2, Silverfast Ai, iView, Capture One, Qpict and several smaller packages. Maybe in the future...
 
kaiyen said:
Both Aperture and LR require quite a bit of horsepower to be truly useful. So keep that in mind.

iView, iMatch, etc are mostly for cataloging. Other apps like Capture and RawShooter are for raw conversions. LR and Aperture try to combine both into a single workflow product.

allan
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So, which handles DNG image manipulation better between LR and C1? I don't shoot hundreds of shots at a time, but I'm not really down with how C1 organizes. If LR is pretty close to C1, then I'm definitely interested.

-grant
 
Nachkebia said:
Can we please have a separate forum or folder for digital raw converters with photoshop! please please....
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Hm, like Rangefinderforum.com -> Miscellaneous Topics and more -> Photoshop - Darkroom -Film ?
 
Socke said:
Hm, like Rangefinderforum.com -> Miscellaneous Topics and more -> Photoshop - Darkroom -Film ?
Click to expand...

P.S.: hope you'll visit this thread again :)
 
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