This part 2 of Jon Lightroom 3 review. You can see the introduction in is first post and the second part here.
ACR 6.1
The newest incarnation of Lightroom uses the new Adobe Camera Raw 6.1 for it’s RAW conversion. Since this is a review of Lightroom and not ACR, I’m not going to get into the nuances of the newest ACR suffice to say that overall it appears to be an improvement over previous versions. One of the first things new users will notice is an exclamation point icon on the bottom of some images. This message is that LR wants to apply the new ACR default settings to the image. Upon allowing the update, you will notice a slight change in the handling of shadows, color rendition and a few other areas and overall, it looks good. If you’re someone who prefers the camera manufacturers software for RAW conversion, you’re probably still going to prefer those. The color rendition, quality of detail and overall fidelity provided in those programs (Canon Photo Professional, can’t speak for NX2) still has an edge over Adobe’s CR. This should be expected, given that ACR accommodates almost all types of RAW images and therefore isn’t quite as specialized as those from the Camera makers. That said, for those who do prefer ACR for it’s convenience and options will be very pleased with the new engine overall.
The only downside to the new engine is that you need to have ACR 6.1 running on your system, meaning you need to be running Photoshop CS5. If not, than you will need to render RAW images in LR before opening in Photoshop, which means an extra TIF (if that’s your selected preference for external editing) on your drive and more time spent waiting for an editable-image to be created before being re-opened. Of course, LR offers the option of “open anyway” rather then “render using Lightroom” but the results are inconsistent and frankly a bit unreliable for accurate rendition and conversion. So, if you’re not running CS5 be prepared for a little extra leg work to reap the full benefits of Lightroom3’s develop Module.
Noise Reduction Improvement
Adobe is pushing heavily the improved performance of Noise Reduction in LR3, which is no surprise since Noise Reduction is an item of large interest for photographers given the “Noise Wars” being waged between the camera manufacturers to push the high-iso-noise-performance envelop further and further. So the question is, how good is LR’s new noise reduction? The short answer is very good, in fact certainly better than previous versions of Lightroom and Photoshop. Luminance and color noise are handled nicely with details staying largely intact (compared to previous versions) and realistic. To get a sense of the improvement, I’ve set up the comparison below between LR3 and LR2, Aperture3 and noise Photoshop plugins Nik Dfine and Imageonic Noiseware. I’ll be posting the results soon.
Lens Correction Tool
Another crucial addition to the develop module is the inclusion of the Lens Correction tool. The LC too is taken directly from Photoshop, with all of the same parameters with the exception of scale and edge transparency (I would not recommend using the LC tool for scaling anyway). In addition to the default Photoshop parameters, Lightroom has raised the bar by including it’s own camera/lens profiles- similar to DXO software. These profiles, when applied, automatically correct a the image based on the lens and camera preset detected by LR. This is an excellent feature, and works well for most images. I would, as a recommendation use the automatic profiles as a starting point, as different images shot in varying situations will certainly require different levels of correction. Another great feature is the ability to batch lens correct, as the lens correct option has been added to the list of options when syncing develop settings across a number of photographs. Overall, the LC tool is yet another vital work flow time saver especially when trying to stay solely in Lightroom for image editing.
This part 2 of Jon Lightroom 3 review. You can see the introduction in is first post.
Import Dialog
One of the first things you’ll notice about LR3 is the new import Dialog, which is largely different than previous versions. The simple dialog box of old is gone and replaced with a full screen window complete with a large preview area. The preview area is the most significant improvement- you can now preview images and video before importing and can un-check any you don’t want to ingest- a nice feature (and overdue!). However, in exchange for a more sophisticate import dialog we are also given a slightly more complex interface, with essential source and destination information on opposite sides of the screen. This can make a normally simple task of simply importing, renaming, and adding metadata, cataloging and backing up a little more tedious. It also doesn’t help that they’ve now included a few seemingly unimportant options for these tasks, for example the rename images by shoot in addition to custom name. In other words, LR3 will add the words “shoot_whateveryouwant-1”. It would be just as easy to do this with a custom name, and with this option they’ve just made the list unnecessarily longer. Another annoyance of the new import dialog is that you will get it when importing ANY new images, even simply updating a folder. This essentially creates an extra step in the workflow, i.e. importing tiffs or psd back into LR after they’ve been processed in Photoshop. For photogs who require speed and consistency and are used the efficiency of previous versions of Lightroom in this regard may be surprised when they find themselves being slowed up by these little nuances of the new import dialog.
Read the rest of this entry »
This post is from our other contributor, Jon. Jon is a pro photographer with a lot of experience who will be covering the HDSLR movement from a pro perspective. Go take a look at his portfolio, some great rock climbing shots there!
Since Adobe created Lightroom 4 years ago the software has changed the way photographers work in such a profound way that many have wondered if this little gem might just someday replace the need for Photoshop all together- for most photography needs anyway. Anyone who has used Lightroom extensively as the de-facto front line in their digital workflow can attest to the power of the program as not only an essential digital asset management tool, but also as a potent developing and publishing tool.
With the release of LR3, the gap between what is necessary in Photoshop for photographers and what is achievable in Lightroom has once again shrunken. Why do I mention that? Well, in the past Lightroom has been most valuable as a digital asset management (DAM) tool- importing, renaming, adding /editing meta data, organizing, cataloging etc have all been staples of the program since it’s introduction, along with the added benefit of being able to publish images to web galleries, contact sheets, print, or various resizing options. But LR has come a long way since it’s inception and with each new incarnation it’s become more and more relevant as a developing tool as well. While it has not yet replaced Photoshop for the really heavy lifting in digital imaging, for many photographers it may well be a one stop solution for the majority of their work.
The focus of this review will be to cover the most significant new features in LR3 that I will break down by module over the new few posts. In the meantime, here’s a quick overview of the new features. Be sure to stay tuned for a more in depth analysis of each in the subsequent posts.
So what’s new in LR3?
Accelerated Performance via new 64-bit software engine
Adobe claims that the new version has accelerated performance over previous versions, which we can assume comes in large part from the new 64-bit engine. In case you’re unfamiliar with 64-bit, in short it allows for better leveraging of your systems RAM and therefore potentially increases performance. However, to reap that 64-bit lovin’ you’ll need to be running an operating system that supports 64 bit – Mac Snow Leopard or Windows 7. More on this to come..
Support for Video Files
The key word left out here is “limited”, as the support for video does not extend beyond the Library Module, meaning you can import and achieve general cataloging and organizing tasks but that’s about it. However, we’ll be exploring some of the possibilities with this new feature that may surprise you.
Camera Raw 5.7 Processing
LR uses the newest Adobe Camera Raw engine, which is a much improved and powerful RAW converter found in Photoshop CS5. However, if you’re not using CS5 (and therefore ACR 5.7) you’ll have to jump through a couple extra hoops to gain the benefits, which I’ll be covering.
Noise Reduction performance
In short it’s excellent, far better than anything we’ve seen from Adobe to date. I’ll be covering this individually since it’s sure to be a topic of interest for most photographers. I’ll be showing side-by-side comparisons with previous versions, as well as comparisons to other NR software like NIK Dfine and Imagenonic’s Noiseware Pro. Should be interesting.
Improved Watermarking
Perhaps one of the biggest improvements over previous versions is the improved watermarking feature, which is such a vast upgrade from the horrendously limited version that it alone could be worth the upgrade. Forget having to create a droplet in Photoshop and batch export in LR in order to have a custom watermark. LR3’s new engine has full support for custom watermarks and more flexibility for creating a simple text based watermark.
New Import Dialog
A nice upgrade to the import dialog, overall it’s more of an aesthetic change than a complete revamp. Of course, previous versions were great and for those used to the simplicity and speed of past versions it may take some time to grow on you… I’ll explain why in upcoming posts.
Lens Correction Tool
Finally! One of the most useful and essential upgrades in the new software is the all mighty lens correction tool, taken directly from Photoshop. For those of you familiar with this tool it is an absolutely essential tool and a welcome addition. Not only does LR now include the tool but also has built in camera /lens profiles (similar to DXO optics) for precise and automated lens correction.
Tethered Shooting
Another welcome feature, the new tethered shooting option eliminates the need for the camera manufacturer’s propitiatory capture software getting in the middle of shooting tethered and importing to Lightroom. Is it as effective as Nikon Capture or Canons Digital Photo Pro? I’ll let you know when we get to the Library section of the review.
There are a few other less significant new features I’ll be covering that are not game changing per se but still nice features for some folks. These include the ability to add film grain, improved slideshow capabilities (including exporting slideshows to mp4 and support for audio), new publishing options, and some new print options, among others.
I’ll also be breaking down what WASN’T included in the new update, and what we can /should expect from Adobe in the future with Lightroom.
Last week, Chase Jarvis published a very popular article about his workflow/backup strategy. The article was retweeted and by many and commented by Vincent Laforet who gave it his nod of approval.
Well, I am not the kind of guy who is impressed by cool charts and I found two flaws in Chase workflow.
Flaw 1: Archive the cards, not the file!
First, I would remove Aperture from the On Location process. A better way to import data from CF Card is to create disk images of these cards. This is a trick I picked from the book From Still to Motion
Flaw 2: Live work backuped with Time Machine? WTF!
First off, don’t get me wrong. Time Machine is good, very good. It is a set and forget kind of thing: it will backup files that have changed between two drives every x minutes. That is its strength but also its weakness: it does the copy based on time and not on milestones.
Lets take a worst case scenario: Time Machine just copied your project, then you decide to make three variations of one of your file. A few minutes later, you are done and while waiting for the automatic backup to happen, disaster strike: HD failure!
Here is another scenario: in the span of an hour, you modify a file three times then realize that you need version #2 which was not backuped by Time Machine (it saved #1 & #3). What can you do?
These are two example of how time based backup can (and will!) fail. While they are very good a copying stuff when you would not think about it, they dont have a notion of what is important for you to backup. Losing an hour of work on a file does not always mean that you will be able to get it back by spending another hour on it. Creativity and inspiration are not a function of time.
The classical approach to this kind of problem is to “save as” every minute and create a multitude of copies of a single file and manually backup this file on another drive. Not very practical.
Fortunately, there is a better solution. It is free, powerful and easy to use! And you know the best part? You don’t even need a complex IT infrastructure to make it work. I would never dare to say that I am the first to think about it, but according to Google, I am the first to blog about it: using GIT as a version control/backup system for your visual assets!
What is GIT
GIT is a distributed code versioning system. It is used by programmers to keep an history of all the modifications done to each file and distribute these files/change. In plain English, it means that it tracks changes to files, can go back to any milestones in its history and can apply all the modifications done on workstation to all the others.
GIT is the industry standard in the IT field and while its features set is an overkill, its performance and ease of use makes it a mandatory tool for every paranoid virtual asset owner.
How to use GIT
Understanding how to use GIT is out of the scope of this article. I am planning to publish a detailed article on the subject soon. If you can’t wait, and want your work to be meteor-proof, go take a look at the GIT Ready website. While the content is targeted at programmers, it will teach you the basics (tips: just read the sections about the init, add, commit, push and clone commands).
Conclusion
If there is one thing I hope you learned from this post is that a full featured backup solution is not simply about having multiple copy of your (RAW) files in various location. That is only part of the equation (which is fully covered in Chase video). The other part is making sure that you will also be able to access the version (live work) that is important to you (which I will cover in an upcoming article).
Disclaimer: Light Craft Workshop is now a sponsor of Canon5dTips.com. If you read the sponsorship page, you know that I only agree to promote products that I actually use and love. So if it wasn’t good, I would not recommend you to buy one, as my painful Pocket Wizard TTL experience proved.
If you don’t know what a ND filter is or why you need one, take a look at this post on the subject (coming soon).
So, I have been playing with Aperture 3 for over two weeks now. I haven’t explored fully its 200 ‘new’ features yet, but I have played enough to make up my mind about it.
I am not going to go over every new features since a lot of people have already done it. Instead, I am going to talk about the stuff that matters to photographers.
Speed
I am very sorry to say that but the current version of Aperture is slow. Browsing from one picture to the next is slow unless you are in quick preview mode (Press P to toggle). Once you get into the habit of switching between modes, it is not that much of a burden but remember that you can only edit pictures in normal mode.
Before some fan boys reply that it isnt slow, know that I did everything I could to speed it up: rebuild library, use a fast machine with RAID-0 drives, etc… With the same setup LightRoom runs circles around A3. That is sad.
Adjustments
Noise
Aperture 3 noise reduction is good and would stand well on its own if it was not of the spectacular results one can get in LightRoom 3 or with Neat Image. If shooting in low light is important to you and you want to use A3, get Neat Image.
The Presets
I have a love/hate relationship with presets. Amateurs see them as the be all end all of image editing, thinking they can get pro results with a click of the mouse without even understanding what is going on. A3 surfs on the preset wave started with LR to get pretty much the same results (given the same adjustment panels). Actually, I prefer the way A3 handles presets than LR: you can either combine presets by picking them one after the other, or replacing them by option clicking the new preset.
Curve
A3 has a nice curves adjustment tool. You can select a color from the image and it will place an adjustment point at corresponding position on the curve. Quite useful to clean up background or changing cloths color. Remembers me of the way Capture One 4 handle curves.
Brushes
There are a lot of talk about the new non destructive adjustment brushes. Here again, the A3 team fell a bit short. While the brushes work very well, you cannot use the same brush with two different adjustment level. I correct myself, if you click on the option gear, you can add as many distinct adjustment brushes as you want. Cool!
The missing adjustments
Where the hell is the grad filter? It has to be one of the most important filter one can use, yet it is not there. It really makes me wonder if the Aperture dev team actually use the software!
The other missing adjustment is the tone splitting. While I think LR user overuse this tool (especially in presets), it has proven time and again to be a key feature to quickly set a mood on a batch of pictures. Here again, the adjustment isn’t there.
The vignette tool has not evolved at all. I was hoping to at least get the choice of going toward white instead of black as in LR or to select the desired affected corners but we got nothing new.
Import
I love the new import screen and its link to Places. If you have a mix of geolocated pictures and non geolocated ones, once you start to import, the software will ask you if you want to associate the locations. Brilliant!
Conclusion
Unfortunately, A3 is not what I would call a release ready product. While it has some incredible features that I havent covered (slideshows & hybrid stuff) it fails to cover the basic by giving photographers what they need the most: speed and controls. The dev team spent too much time working on ‘new’ features instead of working the app core.
Hopefully, a software update will come in a few months to correct these issues but right now I can only recommend A3 as a slide show editing platform. Actually, pro photographers might want to get it for that feature alone. It is really that great!
If there is one thing no one was expecting this week, it has to be the release of a new HDSLR camera. Yet, that is exactly what Canon did. The new Rebel T2i is, on paper, an incredible package priced ridiculously low.
For the photographer
18mp on a 1.6x crop factor, I will have to see some real life sample shots to judge image quality but it is interesting to see the ISO going to 6400 (extendable to 12k) for an entry level toy. That is quite good if image quality is at the rendez-vous.
It also benefits from a lot of features that used to be restricted to the double prosumer bodies like improved auto focus and light metering. From a photographer perspective, it should be considered a decent upgrade for any 50D or older camera owner (if you dont need the burst rate). At least, from a specs sheet perspective.
For the videographer
Remember how 5DMrkII owners felt when the 7D was released? Well, 7D owners are now feeling the same! The new rebel can shoot video full manual and has variable frame rate (24p, 25p, 30, 50p and 60p), something to make 5DMrkII owners jealous. I know because I am!
Of course, the camera will probably not have the same low light image quality as the 5DMrkII (and maybe the 7D) and it is not full frame so it does have its limitations. Yet, it is a fraction of the cost of its ‘better’ alternatives. Read the rest of this entry »
Finally out! It was about time.
I will not list all the new features (over 200), if that is the kind of stuff you like reading about, head over the official Apple page. Instead, I will list the features that mean the most for us.
First, facial recognition. I already talked about it in my Aperture 3 prediction about 8 months ago. This is a big thing if you are often shooting the same people. I am just worried about how long it is going to take to pass over my 192 gigs of pictures…
Next on the line is Places. Another feature that most travel photographers will love. I know because I had to geotag over 2000 pictures when I came back from Vietnam. Not a fun experience! At the local scale, it is also going to be useful to organize pictures when doing on a location scouting day. I used to import them in iPhoto just for that and it was a real pain.
Video import and playback directly in Aperture! I love this one for two reasons: first because it is going to be useful to do everything in a single operation and also because it shows how Apple recognize HDSLR as a trend and not a novelty. As soon as I finish the download, I will see if it if possible to batch process video files automatically for conversion to ProRes.
Slideshows. I never used these in Aperture. I preferred working within either Lightroom, Animoto or Motion. But, with the new slideshows, I just have one thing to say: wow! I am impressed. 95% of the work I used to do in Motion is doable in Aperture and it looks even easier!
Finally, Brushes. It was about time Aperture got these! None destructive editing at the pixel level has been the reason why I moved to Lightroom (ok, also because it was faster!). I am glad the feature is now in Aperture since it saves a round trip to Photoshop for 95% of the image corrections.
While waiting for my review, you can read what Chase has to say about it. He was on the beta list so he probably knows more than me!
Note: You can upgrade to Aperture 3 from the Academic version of Aperture 2!
Note2: I havent found an electronic version for the full product, so I had to place an order and download the demo.
With all the talks about the 7D, it might be a good time to step back and look at one of the most useful feature of the 5D Mark II: its high megapixel count. While the 7D is very close to the 5D in terms of pixels, the 5D still has about 20% more and, for someone like me, it matters.
Most people will tell you megapixel are just a marketing trick to lure less knowledgeable photographers toward “newer camera models”. While this claim is true for Joe Average trying to buy a new camera, for the serious photographer, megapixels are important. Even if you are not planning to print anything larger than 8×12, the more you have, the more comfortable you will be in your edit.
Since I got my random flipping shutter issue, I have done a lot of Googling to see if other people have had the same issue. During this process, I discovered a few other issues 5D Mark II owners might have and thought it would be a good idea to list them.
While looking at this list, remember that Canon has sold tons of these camera and most of them have no problems. The web is a big ecochamber where one person complaining can generate more noise than a thousand happy customer.
Random flipping shutter
In live view mode (while not recording) the shutter randomly start flipping. I already talked about it here. My camera is still at Canon for repairs. I will write back on this once I receive their incident report.
Burned sensor
This issue has been identified by extraordinaire photographer Sam Hassas. The guy is well known for framing the sun with his subjects to create big and nice sun flares. Go look at his stuff and see how cool it is. The downside of this technique is that it seems like he burned the sensor in four spot. Since he has been doing this for a while and probably shot thousand of stills framing the sun, there are probably no reason to panic but it is better to be aware of this.
We are still waiting for details but you can follow the thread here.
Black dot
While still present after the 1.1.0 firmware update, this issue is not getting a lot of press anymore. I guess people accepted the limitation and moved on to complain about the lack of 24p. You can read about it here.
24P
Some user have reported that they cannot shoot in 24p, citing this as a major issue. We are still waiting for an update from Canon to see if they aknowledge the problem.
