CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

OMG. Did someone just say Adobe knows more about photo editing than the community on UHH?

DICK32

I use both. I start with Lightroom. It's a data base that organizes my photos. And let's me do this better and faster than Photo Shop. I shoot product shots for 4 different divisions. I organize into a master file. Then product files and then sub files. I shoot JPEGS and TIFFS that LR sorts for me. I can look at pics that are the best shots to develop easier in LR. I can mark them and LR will sort my picks. I can white balance in LR easier to use that PS.

PS will sharpen my photos better and I can see the results so I don't over sharpen. PS lets me create layers. For catalog shots; I remove the back round from a layer in PS and replace it with another back round to make a product look better. I can move objects around and rotate them. I can change text size and edit it and move or warp it to suit. I can change the opacity of objects or text single or multiple layers.

Photo Shop was invented by the Knoll brothers John and Tom from Ann Arbor, Mi. I learned PS from John Martin who taught how to use a car design software--Alias Sketch. He taught in the class room next to where their mother taught nursing. You never stop learning software. PS was developed when computer monitors were in black and white. The Knoll brothers worked with Hollywood movie studios to improve movie picture quality.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Different people have different needs and nothing serves them all.

Malarkey, plain and simple. Regardless of how many times you say it it'll still be malarkey.

I've worked on commercial projects with art directors. I've been the art director. I think it's hilarious that the markup image you supplied is grabbed from a Capture One tutorial. C1 of course like LR is strictly a parametric raw processor.

Photoshop has tools that LR doesn't. Photoshop has more tools than LR. If you need the tools in Photoshop then use Photoshop. If you don't need the tools in Photoshop your photo isn't unfinished because you didn't use the software that has tools you didn't need. That's malarkey.

The photo below is processed in LR and only in LR. It is finished. There is nothing that requires further professional quality finishing. Photoshop can't make it any better. The tools in LR got the job done.

The photo contains cloning and spotting work.
Five areas of the photo have been individually selected (placed on layers if you like) and independently adjusted for tone and color. LR is able to do that in many cases as well as it need be done.

And because the processing is completed in LR there are some advantages over using Photoshop. Don't need to save a huge TIFF/PSD file and maintain more files to save my work. In a raw workflow the cloning work done in PS is a destructive element -- PS is not 100% non-destructive but LR is.

(Download)

Miami39 Loc: Florida

Lightroom is faster but it does not have all of the features of photoshop.I generally use LR unless I want to use some features of PS such as fill. It is fairly easy to go back and forth.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

First, as others have said, you need to understand that the processing engine in ACR and the processing engine in LrC are one and the same. You can perform the same functions in each processing application. Where LrC and PS diverge is in the other portion of PS, the edits that can be made outside of ACR, and in the other ways that LrC can be used.

LrC offers more than processing features, it's virtually seven programs in one. The Library Module offers a fairly complete DAM system, with filters and various marking tools (keywords, flags, stars, color borders) for separating out images as well as the ability to use metadata and text to filter images: this module also allows me to view all of my image folders in one easy place and to use a system called "collections" to combine images from multiple folders to use in a project. Then there is the Develop Module, offering a full range of tools to develop probably 95% of the images that most people take (usually it is not the application that falls short here but the user's inability to understand and use all of the various tools effectively) which includes the ability to processes an unlimited number of images at once, after that it offers a Book-making module, a Slideshow module, a Map and Web module (which I don't use at all) and then an excellent Print Module. The Print Module is hard to beat once you understand how to use it. It does have some short-comings, as do all processing programs, and that is where PS excels. The two applications together can cover 100% of all needs. There are also many other applications one can use, but so far LrC excels with what it offers. In answer to your question above, this is why I use LrC.

bwana Loc: Bergen, Alberta, Canada

90+% is about the same here. I like Lightroom for its simplicity of doing the same changes to a group of images using the Sync feature and Presets. Lightroom is also easier to use with its sliders, etc. It also does a great job of Panoramas and HDR's. Also, it leaves the original image untouched for potential future editing.

bwa

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

Why are you being so defensive and hostile - totally unnecessary.

Your image is a lovely image. I'd love to see what it looked like before you worked on it, and I don't know what it will be used for, so I can't tell if the image is truly finished.

Yes, I found the C1 woman's portrait markup to be a good example of a set of edits required by a creative director given to a retoucher to develop a "look" - but I can tell you that while it "can" be done to a reasonably good result, I find it far easier to work an image like that in Photoshop, and the results slightly better. Particularly in the area of skin texture retention. There is nothing comparable to frequency separation when it comes to many of the adjustments in the notes. I like to work in C1 because it has better tools for local editing than LR does. While it is true that you can do a lot with masks in LR, the range of adjustments is not the same as the ones you apply globally. Duplicating a mask will help to build up an effect, but it gets messy if you do a lot of that, and when you have a lot of local edits on a raw file, LR gets really slow. I find C1 considerably better in that respect as well.

When you state that cloning in Photoshop is destructive leads me to think that maybe you aren't all that familiar with Photoshop and cloning. I do cloning and use the patch tool on a blank layer with a layer mask on top of a layer stack which contains the stuff I want to clone or patch. I can even select what layers I want to sample for the operation and which ones to exclude. It's not hard to do in PS at all. The "cloning" tool in LR is not much more than a patch tool. I prefer to use a brush that is more easily configured with respect to hardness, opacity, flow, blend modes, etc - something that is well beyond the crude patch tool provided in LR.

Don't get me wrong - every image I've taken since 2006 has gone through LR and I rely on it heavily for many things. Some of the early images were first taken through C1 or Raw Shooter or BibblePro, because I had not yet adopted LR. But by LR 3 I felt comfortable enough to standardize on LR, and consequently adopted it as my go to raw converter. It was certain crude by today's standards, but it was fast at getting a set of proofs to a client. I still rely on Photoshop for finishing - because it is easy for me to do so.

I recently purchased an enterprise quality 12 TB hard drive (Hitachi Ultrastar) for under $200. Drive space consideration is not even on my radar. And in my workflow, I keep raw files and those that I choose to edit as psd files - and generate files for delivery on demand - I don't usually save jpegs or other output files.

I am glad that you have figured out how to use LR and C1 to your advantage. For me they both fall short for many obvious reasons. I suggest you put your "attack dog" back in it's cage with a muzzle on it. No need. You disagree, and so do I - so lets be professional and leave it at that.

Why did you quit your job as a creative director?

Basil Loc: New Mexico

I also use Lightroom Categories as a great way to organize photos (I use Scott Kelby's SLIM method)

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Well I wouldn't call it hostile but because of this: "And regardless of what many believe - incapable of true professional quality image finishing."

You're basically dismissing LR as not usable to complete a professional quality image. And you do it on this forum repeatedly. So I would ask what's your hang up that every time the question is asked you have to dismiss LR as not really "professionally" capable?

There are things it can't do. But where it is capable it's just as capable as PS of delivering a professional quality finished image.

I know how Photoshop's cloning tools work. I said that in a raw workflow the PS cloning tools add a destructive element. We've been through this before and in a raw workflow LR's admittedly less effective cloning/healing tools are 100% non-destructive while Photoshop's are not.

If you create a raster layer in PS to do cloning/healing work it will not update a change made back in ACR to the raw file. As such in a raw workflow that's destructive. Make a change back in ACR and if you have a clone/heal raster layer in PS you get to do that work over.

There you go -- that's all you have to say. For you and the kind of work that you do they fall short. Great. That's very different than making a general pronouncement that LR is incapable of producing a professional quality photo.

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

Aren't we all entitled to our opinions? As I said, I disagree. Cloning on a blank layer and its corresponding mask is very much reversible/non-destructive by the generally accepted concept of non-destructive editing, but clearly not by your narrow definition.

Nearly 100% of the images that I've seen that were produced entirely by a raw workflow, could have been helped by a trip through a raster editor.

It's your contention that because according to you, since Photoshop is a destructive workflow it has no merit - that I will always challenge.

BTW, how are you making out on the image restoration or creative director's edit - challenge? Can you produce the unedited version of the image you posted? I'd still like to see any of these.

You do take yourself far too seriously dude. Chill. Being an absolutist is not a good look. Keep an open mind. Oh, and BTW, that comment about parametric editors not capable of truly finished images was bait - and you took it hook line and sinker. It was a slow day here. Just having a bit of fun . . .

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

I want to thank all who replied to this post. I had meant it to be a serious question and thank you for for turning it into a thoughtful, serious and useful, at least for me, discussion. I am sorry to see it degenerating in the last few posts.

I use Photoshop for PP simply because I always have. PS does everything I ask it to with more in reserve than I will ever learn to use. I think we use what we are comfortable with in and meets our needs. Honestly I think LR would meet all my needs but with so many things to learn taking on a new learning curve to replace something I am already comfortable with just doesn't make sense to me.

Thank you again for thoughtful comments

Jack

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Reversible by deleting the layer and re-doing the work which by the generally accepted concept of non-destructive editing you just got bit by a destructive element. Cloning/healing work can be tedious. It sucks if you have to do it all over.

"Oh, and BTW, that comment about parametric editors not capable of truly finished images was bait - and you took it hook line and sinker." OK, so you're a troll -- got it. So the next time you do that I can just flag you as a troll. That works.

I've never said that. You're putting words in my mouth.

I have also acknowledged at every turn that tasks require the right tools. There are things you need PS for. Here's the most recent restoration job I did as a favor. Of course I used the tool that was appropriate, PS.

(Download)

bwana Loc: Bergen, Alberta, Canada

bwa

Spirit Vision Photography Loc: Behind a Camera.

Slim method?

Basil Loc: New Mexico

Sorry - Simplified Lightroom Image Management. https://youtu.be/NvHSq8b1_8M

(I'm a member of KelbyOne so I have access to this and thousands of other great tutorials)