Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2
by Adobe
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Software Reviews of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2
Customer Review: Plain and Simple using Lightroom 2.0 for the Mac
Summary: 4 Stars
Using Lightroom
Heal photo spots and blemishes with Photoshop Lightroom. Check out the excellent help menu in Photoshop Lightroom. The Remove Spots tool lets you repair a selected area of a photo with a sample from another area. In the Develop module, select the Remove Spots tool from the Lightroom Toolbar.
Lightroom is Nondestructive
Your photographs are not changed by Photoshop Lightroom. Your photo changes are stored in metadata as a series of instructions. This saves your hard drive space because you do not have to save your edited photographs.
Lightroom applies instructions to the original photo file. This allows you complete control over your photographs. Changes you make to your photo images are reversible.
Pro Reaction
Photoshop Lightroom 2 contains the same features on both Mac and Windows platforms. Lightroom 2 includes dual-monitor support, Library Filter Bar, and streamlined search capabilities.
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2.0 application is quick and easy to use for editing your digital photographs. Now, you can create your own digital photo style and look.
You have elegance and power in your hands when you use Lightroom application. The Photoshop Lightroom tool suite is powerful. You can use Photoshop Elements or Photoshop CS applications for your difficult photo editing work.
Con Reaction
Keyboard shortcuts is incomplete. The following are the missing letter functions: N - Remove spots, D - Loupe view, Control-Click Virtual Copy.
There is no mention of Function Keys F5 to F8 on the help menu. Lightroom needs more fill color themes in the preference file would be a good addition since Photoshop Lightroom's interface is black.
Final Notes
Photoshop Lightroom 2.0 allows you to spend less time sorting and organizing images. You have more time to shoot and edit your digital photos.
Lightroom 2.0 is for on-the-clock professional photographers.
Customer Review: An outstanding piece of work
Summary: 5 Stars
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 is a major tool I use in developing images I have taken with my Canon DSLR camera. The main reasion I obtained this product was to convert RAW images to editable images then to print them properly in color, B/W or sepia. It is easy to use and helps to produce professional presentations. I have been pleased with all of Adobe's products!Customer Review: Excellent for Digital Photography Management and Production
Summary: 5 Stars
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 was designed to assist photographers in two areas:
1) photo management
2) post production
Lightroom 2 introduces localized corrections (letting you edit specific parts of an image), multi-monitor support (finally!), and DNG Camera Profiling.
I've used Photoshop Lightroom 2 (henceforth refered to as Lightroom 2) for the past few months to organize, view, and manage my digital photos.
I'm reviewing this application from a consumer point of view. Does it make sense to use Lightroom 2 when other applications like iPhoto already exist?
Let's take a look:
There are 5 workflows in Lightroom2:
1. Library - in this mode, the work area is divided into 3 panels: Catalog (on the left) - which shows a list of all the folders containing the images you're working with. In the center, Library Filter, which lets you find images based on text, attributes, or metadata that you've provided. On the right-most panel, you can enter keywords, make quick white balance adjustments and see the overall color histogram for your image.
2. Develop - this mode lets you make granular adjustments to your image. You can fine tune white balance, exposure, brightness, contrast, saturation, vibrance and clarity. There are even buttons that let you correct red eye, and an adjustment brush which lets you retouch the photo as needed.
3. Slideshow - this mode lets the user view images in a slideshow, and gives several modes of control - from adding overlays (your name for example), border strokes, and even adjusting the drop shadow that's cast behind each image.
4. Print - this mode lets you adjust parameters for printing your image. You can group images into collections and make one adjustment fit all. A picture package mode is also available, which lets you see smaller versions of the image (similar to what you see when purchasing prints from a professional photographer).
5. Web - this mode takes your images, places them into one of several gallery templates for web output. The resultant thumbnails, HTML code (or Flash, depending upon the 'engine' you select, etc. are generated - minimizing the complexity from coding everything from scratch.
Lightroom 2 has a lot of power under the hood. The layout and modes are easy to access and well thought out. The interface is clean, though some of the finer aspects to the program can be overkill for consumers.
Performance-wise, Lightroom 2 felt a little sluggish. There's a perceptable lag when switching between modes. My test system is a Mac Pro with 6GB of RAM.
Lightroom 2 may be overkill for many 'point-and-click' photographers - at least compared to iPhoto. But this application is primarily targeted towards professionals. But consumers who are serious about photography and are looking for a powerful tool to help them manage, correct and organize their images will find themselves rewarded by learning and harnessing the power and versatility that Lightroom 2 offers.
Recommended!
Customer Review: invaluable for photographers
Summary: 5 Stars
I've been using Lightroom for a little while now and I'm definitely hooked on it. It really helps you organize your photos so much better than you'd be able to do without it. Not only that but it integrates the power of "camera raw" right into Lightroom so that it becomes an integral part of the workflow.
Lightroom is a great tool to have, but it doesn't replace Photoshop. Photoshop is still essential to have, especially if you don't work in camera raw.
Customer Review: It's a Home Run! But I still need Photoshop, too.
Summary: 5 Stars
There's no doubt that Photoshop, the full version, is a photographer's best friend, but what happens if you take Photoshop, remove some of the features that more casual digital photographers rarely use, and streamline the interface... AND add some great organizational tools.
That's what they've done with Lightroom. In fact, there is very little, if anything, that I need to do with a serious photo editing process that isn't available in Lightroom. I especially like the ability to compare different "takes" of the same shot, mark the ones I love and mark the ones I don't. All of your editing is basically "non-destructive", so you can come back next week and change the color balance back and then make it different. You can create some great "Gradient ND filter"-like effects, and make an "almost there" photo into something you can hang on your wall and be proud of.
The layout is complete, the controls are pretty intuitive. The program doesn't ship with a manual, and frankly, probably doesn't need to. I'd venture to guess that it takes me longer to learn everything because I'm used to Photoshop than it might for you if you aren't an old Photoshop user.
Serious photographers take note: You might still want or need all the extra stuff that you get with the full version of Photoshop (I still MUST have all that stuff), but once you acclimate yourself to the workflow of Lightroom, you might find yourself able to get it done faster and better here. That said, in the time since I've gotten Lightroom, as great as it is, I haven't been able to bond with it for the quick "I-just-want-to-get-this-one-photo-edited" moments. Nope. I go to Photoshop for that. And I still love the way Photoshop layers. I gave the program 5-stars, but that's conditional. For me, it's only a 3- or 4-star program by itself, but 5-star combined with the full version of Photoshop. For you, this might be all you ned.
One more note, if you're a RAW shooter, you're gonna love Lightroom even more than if you're a jpeg shooter.
I tested this program on a PowerBook G4 1.67GHZ and a MacBook 2GHZ. I thought it was fast enough on both, so if you have an older machine, you will be JUST fine with this!