wrk1234 Loc: Russellville, Arkansas

Like a lot of people, whenever I go on a photo trip where I am spending multiple days photographing, I like to take a lap top with me. Every night I will copy the images to my lap top to review the photos. I don’t spend much time tweaking them, but I review to see what they look like and if, maybe I need to reshoot at that location. I do most of the work on the images on my desktop when I get home. My lap top has failed and needs to be replaced. My family is suggesting that I buy an iPad instead of a lap top. I have found out that Lightroom will work on an iPad. Has anyone used an iPad in this way and/or what would be your recommendations concerning this issue?

tramsey Loc: Texas

I don't use an IPad that way. The small screen concerns me, how much am I missing that I really should be seeing?

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Why are they suggesting an iPad?
Benefits?
Because they use one? Why do they like it?

Bill_de Loc: US

I use Amazon tablets which work fine. The iPad is probably even better. A friend of mine used to have a 10" LapTop which he carried everywhere.

Try a few different things and you will find what suits you best.

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Sylvias Loc: North Yorkshire England

I always use my IPad Pro when away and at home and never a computer/laptop. I enjoy being able to move around from different rooms and sometimes sitting in the garden under a sunshade. It’s so easy to slip into a small bag and very lightweight too for travelling. All my posts here on UHH have always been processed on my IPad.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Use one and see how it works for you compared to a laptop.

Hip Coyote

It is totally possible to use an iPad (or iPhone or probably any smart phone) by using the LR mobile, creating albums (which is oddly about the same thing as collections on LRCC on your desk top), uploading photos from your regular camera to that album using a dongle device, editing the photo on the iPad which places it in the "cloud". You can then turn on your connected desktop when you get home, and retrieve that album, download those photos and your edits just as if they occurred in LRCC, and they will be resident where ever you keep all your other photos.

I am working on a lesson plan for my photo club on doing exactly this...it worked like a charm for me on my last trip...i got home, brought everything into my LRCC, via the cloud, and most of the edits were done-ish. Of course, on a large screen, you get better edits, but for many of the photos, there was nothing to do.

The thing about Apple is that they do everything in their power to make you reliant on their ecosystem, including photos. So you have to be careful not to upload from your SD card into iPhotos...you can do it into the LR mobile.
I am sorry i don't have a cheat sheet on this yet.

Why use an iPad? There are some cool editing programs, such as snapseed and a few others that you can use as well as Adobe product. But, now that masking is now avail on the LR mobile, it is a very powerful editing tool. if you are using the cloud then you could go back and forth between your iPhone and an iPad for edits on the same album...say you are out for the day and get some down time and only have your phone. It is an option.

Suffice to say, it is very doable.

mikeroetex Loc: Lafayette, LA

I sat next to a pro sports shooter, having him flip through 2-300 images on his iPad. He had LR and Photo Mechanic installed and months of work on the iPad. He was able to cull quickly and mark those that he wanted to edit further. Sure seemed a lot easier than carrying around a laptop. Although in the media room, there were MacBook Air and Pro at several workstations. But I'm seriously considering a higher-storage Ipad for vacation trips.

Jrhoffman75 Loc: Conway, New Hampshire

Check out this site. Brian works exclusively on iPad now.

https://www.matiash.com/

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

I vote for you, not your family. People do all sorts of things with tablets, and that's fine. I prefer a keyboard and a desktop over a laptop.

Architect1776 Loc: In my mind

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

And I prefer a laptop over a tablet.....

KillroyII Loc: Middle Georgia

Have used both… my 2cents…

iPad, if you get the model/option that includes “cellular “ has a connection to the internet when WiFi is not available. That is not widely available on laptops at a good price… with features you may want.

There are laptops available (my wife has one) that are sort of “convertible” fold they are light, keyboard folds under, touchscreen… use it like a tablet/iPad… she wishes it had built in cellular access… and I would buy one soon and trash my OLD iPad if it did. Yes, we can get access by sharing cellular from phone… not ideal… especially for her.

For long time PC users, the iPad is frustrating… not having a clear/simple access to files like Windows file explorer… regardless of what program is intended to access/edit them (I am sure Apple users will disagree… but I started my sentence with “ For long time PC users, ”) . Apple products seem to be built around access only by the planned program/app… not by a flexible/visible file structure on your storage media.

I am typing this with an iPad but I struggle with file visibility/access/understanding every day.

47greyfox Loc: on the edge of the Colorado front range

Ditto…. I have used an iPad a couple times for temp storage and as a result never made the mistake of not having a pc laptop or ssd or extra cards with me when I think I’ll need storage.

JBRIII

Depending on where you go, i.e., trips up Amazonian rivers, WiFi or cellular may not be available or very limited. Of course, so is the baggage limit. I have seen grown adults nearly go nuts when the one hour of open time for WiFi was late. If you were hogging the whole thing loading to the cloud and were discovered, you might become very unpopular quickly. Not all trips are in the modern world. Even charging things can be impossible, take many spare batteries. Cruise ships also often provide very slow WiFi at best. There are or were hard drives which could directly read chips, no computer required.