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| Moderated by: chrisbet, | ||
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Robert
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When I started my desktop Mac Pro up last night I was greeted with an announcement from Adobe that they are introducing a web based version of Lightroom. Between other tasks today, I have been updating my desktop Mac Pro Adobe software, Photoshop and Lightroom. The list of improvements is quite long and will take some time to work through. My most longed for improvement is to Lightroom's Map section, it had become somewhat sluggardly and silly. Every time you moved the map or resized it, the map image was replaced with a black and white 'whole world' projection and a message proclaiming "Offline"! This annoyed me because I am most definitely NOT offline. This has been fixed and the map is now stable, behaves as expected, responsively and without delay or silly messages. Apart from that I had few complaints about Lr. It will remain to be seen how it will measure up in use. Right now I don't have time for 'testing'. I'm more interested in making a panorama tripod head. The questionable change as I see is the apparent morph of Lightroom, to an 'online' version. I haven't attempted to download or install that as yet, it seems it revolves around storing all image files on Adobe servers. I have up to 20 Mb storage available included as part of my existing contract, it currently contains two Excel spreadsheets and one image! LOL. The 20Mb can be upgraded to 1Tb at an additional charge. There is no way I will tolerate Adobe managing the storage of all (or any) of my master image files, no matter how they plead that it's efficient, convenient, cost effective, faster or any other claim. I do store *some* low res, reduced quality, JPEG image files on Flicker, purely for convenience of publishing them on forums such as this. Other than that my master image files will remain on MY computer where I can manage them as I want them. At the moment I could manage with 1Tb but with my creation of star trails, time lapse and 360º panoramas that could change soon. If I had a D850, overnight!!!  One thing which I am quite excited about is the inclusion of 'Adobe Portfolio', It's a 'free' (no extra charge) facility to create a web based presence, a free website if you like, where you can showcase your images. I have explored it briefly and will take another longer look this evening, you have an exclusive .myportfolio.com URL. My only reservation so far is the apparent lack of caption or image data (brief EXIF) facility, per image, the user can apparently title the sections or classifications. From what I have seen so far it provides a structured, slick, high quality layout, into which the user can insert their images, unlimited capacity, with seemingly varied layouts and themes. |
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Iain
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Like you my images stay on my HD. I've looked at the new lightroom and at the moment am not impressed so will stick to the classic LR for now. |
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jk
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Not interested in any way. My answer to Adobe questions is......... Adobe who? Greedy greedy company. Time for these large corporates to understand that their positions of dominance is due to customer loyalty and payments and not down to anything special that they are doing to in their offices and coffee rooms. My money goes to other companies who provide software tthat I can purchase rather than rent! Adobe can go down the tubes for all I care. There are other softwares that are equal or better. |
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Robert
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I think I may try the web based software on my MacBook Pro, there are only a few images on there, just in case it starts trying to hoover up my image files and place them on their servers. If I can work the principle to my advantage then I may use it but only if it works for me. If I can find a way of using it to transfer images from the MBP to my Mac Pro desktop and into Lightroom the way I want then it will be useful, otherwise they can shove it, I will stick with Classic, though I expect they will discontinue classic eventually, when they get sufficient people on board. I need to do some more studying of the FAQ's and some reviews before I rush into it. The trouble with the smaller software companies is they get swallowed up by the big boys, who then spit them out devoid of any product. I believe it's called asset stripping. Trouble is we loose the software. Look at Bibble and NIK... Both been bought out then discontinued. At least when Adobe bought out the content aware software they have developed it further and incorporated it into their products. I wish they had bought out NIK Filters and incorporated the selection principle into Ps and Lr. It's by far the best, quickest and easiest way I have found of applying selective adjustments. Back to designing my panoramic head. |
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TomOC
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I'm still trying to figure out how to use LR mobile ! So far all I seem to understand is that it's slurping all the images in my iPhone Camera Roll  I have the Photography subscription for LR and PS...I'm too old to change now |
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jk
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For those of you looking for alternatives see here. Some Lightroom Alternatives – Updated MacPhun Luminar is coming big in the last few months, with versions for Mac and Windows. Definitely worth to check it out. And a new version is coming soon. Capture One is a great alternative, especially since they recently improved the X-Trans support (but we still wait for a few more things sich as Fujifilm GFX support and film simulation profiles). Check out also this Fujifilm-centric Capture One webinar. Also ON1 has made progress in the Fuji X-Trans world. They improved the X-Trans demosaicing first on February 15 here, and then on June 7 here. They promised film simulation profiles on July 21 here and On1 Photo Raw 2018 is coming with a lot of new features. Iridient is a much-loved RAW demosaicing software by the Fuji X community. The “RAW Power†App brings Aperture style interface & functions to MacPhotos. We reported about it here. Another appreciated alternatives are Lightzone and Darktable. They are free and full of features (now also for windows). Moreover, the sourcecode is opensource and if the development stops, other people can go on with it. PhotoNinja Alien Skin Exposure X3 |
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Robert
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Thanks JK, do any of the suggestions have a viable Digital Asset Management module? GPS Location (Maps), Face recognition, hierarchical keywords and metadata searches? These are key to my using Lightroom. I will not use multiple software titles to perform the basic DAM functions and the basic image processing functions. I accept specialised things like star trails, focus stacking and sophisticated panorama processing demands specialised software but the vast majority of image management and basic processing should be within one software application program. I have been reading up on the forums about the NEW Lightroom CC (cloud based), not unexpectedly there is a lot of reaction. I have to preface this by saying I have not yet actually downloaded the NEW Lr CC myself. I intend to D/L it to my MBP this week but it's not going anywhere near my main library! I have some images on the MBP which I can use to experiment with. It seems the new Lr CC no longer has the map module, nor face recognition per se, hierarchical keywords and folders have also gone. From what I can gather ALL image files are dumped into one giant container. NO folders. That said I have read that you can use local file storage, but how that works I'm not sure yet. Again from what I can gather they are emulating what Apple has done with Photos and using Artificial Intelligence to sort out the mess. It should be able to find buildings, waterfalls, boats and rudimentary stuff like that but wether it can identify specific instances of boats, like 'fishing boats at Morecambe' or South American waterfalls, I very much doubt. If Adobe CAN overcome this obstacle and get the AI to make sense from chaos then I have no doubt they are on a winner, however, I rather doubt AI is up to the level needed just yet, I am getting way too many wrongly named faces in the face recognition module, even good clean likenesses, or inanimate objects are being wrongly named. The sheer impracticality of uploading large numbers of very high res NEFs to the cloud servers will put most people off. Most professional and serious photographers have many Tb of image files to which they are liable to need quick access. While I an understand (perhaps) the convenience of having finished images available on-line, I don't see the point in having hundreds of images which are stacked to create either panoramas, HDR images or star trails on-line, on the other hand they are not to be thrown away either. Anything which is oof, movement blur or badly exposed gets short shift, but well exposed sharp images which comprise a stacked image are kept. Much to think about here. |
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Eric
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I am totally resistant to the further propagation of cloud use. I've even got icloud storage switched off on our iPads! I have no need for synced devices anymore. We have a 3tb WD, WIFI portable hard drive which stores a complete copy of our select (currently 37,000) photo archive (also backed up at home) that we take with us. It is easily accessed by any device logged onto its MyCloud app. It's mains or battery operated, has an SD card slot, can even be used as a power source to charge other usb devices in the field. So we can not only take with us all our photos for viewing on our iPad but we upload new photos and movies on location without internet or even mains electricity connection. Movies clips CAN be compiled into short films, photos edited and catalogued ...before we get home....if the mood takes us. In fairness, with a battery life of only 8 hours, we would normally need to plug into the mains for extended access use. Perhaps we are different, in that we have no need or desire, to share our images with people around the world. We can bore friends and family by simply showing them the iPad. If they are drunk enough to want a copy of an image, it can be airdropped to their iPad or alternatively emailed. I prefer to cherry pick the parts that I want, from the increasingly Orwellian world we live in.  |
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jk
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Got to say I agree. Cloud computing is a fad that had been propagated out of Silicon Valley, CA where they have high resilience ultra fast internet access. This is not the case for the rest of he world. In fact I think the statistic is that 99% of the planet has less than 1Mb internet. What use of cloud computing to them! |
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Eric
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jk wrote:Got to say I agree. My epiphany came sitting in a campsite in the middle of nowhere....well it was actually the Cevennes...but it was quite remote. No cellular or WiFi internet connection ...and I wanted to show some Belgian people shots of a place they were planning to visit. But even in deepest, darkest Yorkshire I get frustrated. My father's connection is very cheap and very slow (he has no need for speed) but it drives me to depths of despair, waiting for simple connections to deliver. |
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highlander
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I live in Scotland. In Scotland, we are lucky to get any mobile signal. Forget 3G, 4G? What the F is 4G? Oh, yeah, the thing you get in some small bits of cities. With this in mind, and therefore the lack of connection to the net for anything more basic than occasional checking of the weather and getting your emails, minus attachments, for much of the countryside outside of your own home, adobe has scored an own goal. I was thinking about dropping it in favour of Affinity but would miss the keywording and lightbox use I have with Lightroom. I don't use Photoshop, I don't do that much manipulation. This could be a decider. For the moment, there is a downloadable desktop version, Classic, but for how long will they support both? I can see if being short lived because of the encouragement to move to the cloud. I don't want to cloud. I can't connect to it half the time so what is the point. I have told Adobe what I think, not that they give a s*** |
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jk
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Well I am waiting for 26th October for LR v6.13 It will be downloaded and used for as long as I have no suitable alternative. I do have an alternative but LR while it supports all my current use cameras will satisfy me. 4G there is now 5G but I barely get 3G in Spain and 4G only near Madrid and Barcelona! |
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Eric
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highlander wrote:I live in Scotland. In Scotland, we are lucky to get any mobile signal. Forget 3G, 4G? What the F is 4G? Oh, yeah, the thing you get in some small bits of cities. I can understand your over familiarity with cloud problems...living in Scotland. |
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Eric
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I can't help thinking that the time for Photoshop, Lightroom, Desktops and Laptops is coming to an end. Our descendants will look back at our quaint bulky computers and software in the way we look back at the mainframes of the 60's. I was recently considering a MacBook Pro for our computing away from home. But at less than half the price, the 12.9" iPad Pro is literally an eyeopener. In fact the screen definition is far better than my desktop monitor (admittedly now 8yrs old). With all the excellent apps for all requirements I am seriously wondering why I NEED a desktop anymore. Can't get rid of it just yet....got an unexpected catalogue update to do which was originated in Quark. No rest for the retired it seems. |
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jk
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The laptop computer is a good solution for most people. However the iPad is not powerful enough to run the new full sized applications. Things like Photoshop, Quark, etc., take a huge amount of cpu power which makes them fundamentally unsuitable for ipad-like devices. |
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Eric
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jk wrote:The laptop computer is a good solution for most people. At the moment!  |
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jk
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Eric wrote:jk wrote: My Microsoft Surface Pro 4 (i7 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD) is the closest hybrid to an laptop/tablet. It has a pen which is very good and accurate. The biggest problem is its cost which is £1500. No cheap or free lunches these days. |
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Eric
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jk wrote:Eric wrote: I am managing perfectly well to compile movies and edit photos on a 12" iPad Pro at half that price. In saying that, it's important to accept that I probably wouldn't be able to compile a 1hour epic...but that isn't required. Most people would fall asleep during a long film of our outings. We produce mini movies ...5-10min max..subsets of our adventures. These don't need super duper CPUs. And despite being a long time Photoshop officianado ....the occasions when I NEED that amount of manipulation capability are really few and far between. At the end of the day, it's down to how the final files will be viewed and used. Right now iPad editing is more than adequate....but I've still got the raws if another situation recommends pro editing.  |
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highlander
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jk wrote:The laptop computer is a good solution for most people. I have to disagree, a bit. I have got an iPad Pro and since then, I have got rid of my laptop. I can use my iPad Pro for all my raw processing on the go, and for updating anything net wise. Everything else can wait until I get back to my desktop and the joy of a proper sized screen. |
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highlander
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And, I like using the Pencil for editing photos |
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highlander
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Eric wrote: I am managing perfectly well to compile movies and edit photos on a 12" iPad Pro at half that price. In saying that, it's important to accept that I probably wouldn't be able to compile a 1hour epic...but that isn't required. Most people would fall asleep during a long film of our outings. We produce mini movies ...5-10min max..subsets of our adventures. These don't need super duper CPUs. And despite being a long time Photoshop officianado ....the occasions when I NEED that amount of manipulation capability are really few and far between. At the end of the day, it's down to how the final files will be viewed and used. Right now iPad editing is more than adequate....but I've still got the raws if another situation recommends pro editing.
Trust a man to have to get the 12" version. The 9.5" serves me just as well |
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Robert
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My goodness, second page and were'r still on topic! LOL That was my thought Jan, I have now downloaded the Lightroom 'lite' onto my MBP. I have uploaded 5Gb of images to the Adobe servers. Took a little while despite being on a 200Mb/sec fibre link because the upload is limited to 12Mb/sec. I am beginning to think the search facility in the new Lightroom 'lite' isn't so daft as some people make out. It found bridge, sea, Louise, boy, girl, water, sea in a number of other descriptive words from about 900 images almost instantly straight after completing the upload. OK, it didn't get them all right, but the correct offerings came first, followed by the less correct offerings with the junk selections last. I have to admit I haven't been a great fan of keyboarding because of the work involved creating them. Despite that, probably 80% of my main images are key-worded. Far more useful to me are names of faces and GPS locations because I can usually find any image I need from the date (year) and location. I accept all the practical issues with uploading vast numbers of massive very high resolution images but with my modest D3 images it's not too bad. I don't plan to rent the optional 1Tb extra storage, when I have the images on my Mac Pro desktop, I will probably delete the bulk of the images from the Adobe servers. Up to now It's working OK. I want to experiment with the new selective tools in Lightroom Classic next. I have some challenging night time images taken with the 16mm fisheye with a very wide exposure range, I have manually bracketed up to five exposures of most shots. I think I may have to erase some blown out areas of the longer exposures to reduce fogging. |
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jk
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I agree that the ipad provides convenience and low weight but the apps lack the power of full blown app on the computer. |
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Eric
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highlander wrote:Eric wrote: Trust a man to have to get the 12" version. The 9.5" serves me just as well
Not guilty! The wife was the one who wanted the 12" for her movies....rather than a MacBook. Then she fell so in love with the pro screen she also bought a 9.5 to replace her iPad 4 mini. I got handed down her iPad 4 mini.  |
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Eric
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jk wrote:I agree that the ipad provides convenience and low weight but the apps lack the power of full blown app on the computer. Still waiting for that to be an inconvenience. |
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Robert
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One of the complaints I often hear is the excessive depth of unused features in the full blown desktop software. No doubt Adobe monitor which parts of the software is used regularly and which rarely, if ever gets used. The iPad Pro is a pretty capable and very fast processor, take out the dross from the software and concentrate on streamlining the rest, result will be a perfectly delightful and usable device. As Mrs. Field has found. |
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Eric
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Robert wrote:One of the complaints I often hear is the excessive depth of unused features in the full blown desktop software. No doubt Adobe monitor which parts of the software is used regularly and which rarely, if ever gets used. I believe these days there are far more people who do only minimal processing, now that they have expunged the initial excitement of digital editing. At the same time there are app developers that seem to zero in on the basic editing needs. If I need to do cutouts...I still use Photoshop on my desktop. But as I only really do these for commercial publications which then use InDesign or Quark or Illustrator, the desktop is still required. I suppose the 3d frame and step outsIve used in the past may also require more processing....not to mention my Photoshop Actions! That said there are some more advanced apps that have layers and cut out techniques. I fully intemd to try some ...to see if the iPad is capable. |
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Robert
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For general photography the modern DSLR turns out very good, well balanced image files, usually only needing minimal tweaking 'to taste'. |
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Robert
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As part of the updated offerings which now come as part of the Adobe photography package, besides Photoshop, and the two versions of Lightroom, you also get Adobe Portfolio. Portfolio allows you to create a showcase website with your own URL, unlimited images and various layouts with some flexibility to customise the layout and content. I have been wanting to do this for some time, I have a Flicker account but I only use that for hosting and posting images on forums such as this. I feel Flicker is too utility to act as a showcase. Up to now my only issue with Portfolio is the apparent inability to add captions and comments to individual images. That MAY be my ineptitude using the slightly peculiar interface. No doubt some smart teenager would accomplish it in seconds! I find some of the web based software hard to understand and not at all intuitive. The URL for my Portfolio account is: https://seapy.myportfolio.com/ It's very much work in progress, I'm groping around trying to get it set up as I want it so don't expect much. I have simply dumped a collection of images from Lightroom classic into Portfolio whereupon it created an album with the title from the Lightroom Collection. I am going to try adding captions to the images in the hopes that that may propagate to the Portfolio album. |
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jk
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2018 will see the emergence of many 3-5 new offerings that will seriously challenge Adobe Lightroom CC not only on price but performance, features and will offer either subscription or purchase. Adobe will fond that they have lost a lot of customers and over time this may cause them pain. |
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blackfox
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changing the subject matter slightly but has anyone considered that the i.pads and I phones are actually listening in to our conversations ,I play a online game that my wife got me hooked on ,and quiet often say to her that I could do with xxx xxxxx to help me out and lo and behold it happens . to many times for coincidence in fact .BIG BROTHER IS REAL !!!!!! |
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Robert
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You don't need iPads or iPhones, look what happened when I thought about you last night... I will sometimes tink about somebody and up they pop. It can't always be coincidence. OK perhaps I'm talking rubbish but sometimes it can be uncanny. |
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Eric
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Robert wrote:You don't need iPads or iPhones, look what happened when I thought about you last night... I knew you were going to say that. |
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Robert
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Well I have said it before... I better keep quiet about it, they used to hang people who had 'mystical' powers at Lancaster gallows. |
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Eric
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Robert wrote:Well I have said it before... When I running my business I was told to use a technique to get more work. 'Write a list of your top 10 customers and pin it to the wall. At the start of each day stare at the list and think about each individual in turn for a few minutes. Within a couple of days, one of the people will call you.' Sounds spooky and unbelievable, but it worked for me several times. At one point I had to try NOT to think of them when I was snowed under with work. |
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| A small amount of member data is captured and held in an attempt to reduce spammers and to manage users. This site also uses cookies to ensure ease of use. In order to comply with new DPR regulations you are required to agree/disagree with this process. If you do not agree then please email the Admins using info@nikondsl.uk Thank you. |