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| Thread ID: 145684 | 2018-01-04 19:34:00 | Lightroom or photoshop | jcr1 (893) | PC World Chat |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 1444419 | 2018-01-04 19:34:00 | The last few years I've developed an interest in photography - actually, probably more correctly, taking photos, as I'm pretty ordinary most of the time. Anyway, to learn something I joined the local camera club (real nice helpful people) and pretty soon got advised by one of the "gurus" that photoshop was what I should be using for getting good results. I got an older version (PS5.5) and with some coaching have found it does a great job- plus I think it has improved my understanding of what can be done to improve a photo, particularly from raw. I've also been told that for photo processing, Lightroom is the way to go and many people use it - a photographers tool in fact. I've given LR a spin but find the menu a dog, whereas photoshop (even though I'm only using a tiny bit of it) I find, for saving processed images etc, easier to understand. I wonder whether I should be more persistent in getting to grips with LR? Any budding photographers, who use either or both, with some thoughts on this? |
jcr1 (893) | ||
| 1444420 | 2018-01-04 21:00:00 | I've been with a camera club for some years. Many of my peers just use LR. I note that you have a older PS, the older PS may not open your RAW files off your digital camera. What camera do you have? The rave everywhere is shooting RAW in the camera and have more potential in post processing. Recover your shadows etc ... Some might shoot JPEGs but few by comparison. Maybe stuff like documentary stuff or street photography and your own casual family friends stuff. LR is easier. Make sure you have the normal LR. There is a tablet style LR that is available on normal Windows 10 etc.. which is designed to be used on the go etc. The normal LR will have the top sections on the right that you can access. Like Library, Develop, Print and others that I don't use like slideshow, map, and web. I download them. Then in the library I can see my folders and files and keyword or color code etc or search by exif. After you have chosen your picture, you click develop and then you go from top to down with the right side panel pulling the bars etc. I generally - add some contrast, pull the highlights back so they are not too bright, more shadows so they are no too dark, pull the blacks back a bit and more on the whites. Bit of clarity and vibrance and saturation. I leave the white balance generally untouched but I set my camera to normal daylight when shooting in generally daylight conditions. Then down further not on the photo you can enable lens corrections which is the software have profiles already set up that aims to fix some of the flaws of your lens that you used. Also some sharpening. However you can do as much or as little as you want. Picture attached. PS would be ideal if you get into more advanced stuff like skin brushing for portraits, blending images together like star photography, compiling images with other images. Just be aware that for now Adobe had discontinued all PS and LR and they only support subscription based now. The same price will give you access to LR and PS. LR will have the tablet portable version (less features) as well as the desktop version. If you look around you might be able to purchase the last standalone version esp if it's just for LR and your camera RAW should be supported but going forward as of 1 January 2018 any more newer cameras won't be supported nor updated with the previous version. If you intend to use PS as well, then the subscription makes sense because standalone PS is quite expensive. I think it's about $15/month or something for subscription (LR and PS) which you can end any month's notice. What I like about Lightroom is that it is easier to use than PS. Also when I import my images like a session from the botanical garden for eg, I can download all images into this folder and I can keyword them so they are batched downloaded, I can also attached a "develop" setting which is a preset that I set up like a general preset so the images look a bit nicer than just straight out of camera (and it saves me the time of editing them afterwards but obviously for the few that you like you may wanna spend more time afterwards). With LR - don't go to Windows Explorer and start moving or deleting files manually because your LR library catalog will be out of sync - use Lightroom to do it instead. |
Nomad (952) | ||
| 1444421 | 2018-01-04 21:05:00 | Financially speaking if you intend to hold onto a camera for many years buying the last version of LR might be OK. 1yr subscription that gives you PS and LR is about the same price as the last standalone version of LR. If you intend to use PS as well, then get the subscription. With LR you can edit one, select that and others with control or shift key and hit SYNC settings. You can also edit one, and then save this as a custom preset. I forget the term, maybe virtual copy or snapshot. You can select one, create this thing. Cos you are unsure if it looks good in color or b/w or this crop or a different crop. |
Nomad (952) | ||
| 1444422 | 2018-01-04 22:05:00 | Thanks Nomad, A bit the same with our club, some use LR and do highly recommend I should too. The more artistic one's (who do all sorts of clever things which I admire, but is not really my thing) are right into PS. My camera is an Olympus e-m5 about 4 years old (my wife gave it to me for Christmas). I have the kit lenses - 14-42 and 40-150. Plus I bought the 12-40 pro lense a couple of years ago and just this year I bought the 17mm f1.8 lense. There are others who say that they can do all their basic processing in LR and if they want to get extra "tricky", they'll finish in PS. Interestingly, I was at a PSNZ convention recently, and one of the guest speakers recommended shooting just jpeg and not processing and his rationale was that modern cameras jpegs are just really, really good. One of the experienced photographers in our club (who knew him well) said "that's all well and good for him to say that, and he does make a good point, but, he's hugely experienced and he has excellent gear". But thanks for that advice on LR workflow, I should persevere. |
jcr1 (893) | ||
| 1444423 | 2018-01-04 23:40:00 | There are some freebies around that can do heaps of things. Raw Therapee is a good one to get going on which will enable for you to see what computer editing can do. Nomad has given good advice re PS and LR but I use ACDSee Photo Editor 10 which I find satisfactory for my stuff. Considerably cheaper than PS and LR and still a one off licence, ie not subscription. I paid $29.99USD for it. I started out using Canon's DPP which came with my DSLR. Not bad, as far as packaged software goes but ACDSee can do so much more. RAW is definitely the way to go as the original image is not touched. Editing is done in layers and then a jpeg is saved when you are happy with your results. Ken :) |
kenj (9738) | ||
| 1444424 | 2018-01-05 00:50:00 | Thanks Kenj, I have actually got LR & PS at the moment. But not the subscription versions. I have in the past tried other editors too, Sagelight was one I got a few years back and I also tried Gimp, which was nigh on impossible for me to get to grips with. |
jcr1 (893) | ||
| 1444425 | 2018-01-05 03:41:00 | Thanks Kenj, I have actually got LR & PS at the moment. But not the subscription versions. I have in the past tried other editors too, Sagelight was one I got a few years back and I also tried Gimp, which was nigh on impossible for me to get to grips with. I found Gimp to be strange as well :banana Ken |
kenj (9738) | ||
| 1444426 | 2018-01-05 08:43:00 | Most of the pros on Youtube video reviews and tutorials mention Lightroom all the time. I must check it out soon. I'm only a keen amateur with an entry level DSLR Nikon D5500 |
Digby (677) | ||
| 1444427 | 2018-01-05 20:17:00 | Most of the pros on Youtube video reviews and tutorials mention Lightroom all the time. I must check it out soon. I'm only a keen amateur with an entry level DSLR Nikon D5500 Me too. There's some real ability in our club though with 2 ladies in particular with artistic flair - both managed local art gallery at various times. Their images that they enter into club comps etc. can be really creative. I just want good clear images that portray the scene as I see it (or my mind sees it) . My camera, as I remarked earlier is an Olympus mirrorless - a good compact size to carry when we travel, or when I'm walking on mountain tracks etc.. I did get an extra grip for it which increases size a bit but gives it more balance when I'm using the pro lense, which is fairly bulky. I entered a unique view of the mountain once, taken with my android phone, as I didn't have my camera with me. After the photos were evaluated, and the one I entered was considered not too bad (but not the greatest either), I mentioned it was taken with a phone, the evaluator said "good on you John, the best camera is always the one you have on you". |
jcr1 (893) | ||
| 1444428 | 2018-01-05 20:40:00 | Here's that Android photo I mentioned; it's been cropped from the original, but nothing else done to it (from memory) - done in the days before I knew about LR & PS. I liked it because of the way the rainbow frames the bad weather coming in from the south which in turn obscures a chunk of the mountain. 8613 |
jcr1 (893) | ||
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