Lightroom vs Photoshop

[chipy]

OK, i apologize in advance i don't know how to search the new forum. basically, i'm getting more serious into photography as a hobby.

i thought Adobe Photoshop Lightroom was an editing software but it sounds like it's more of a photo organizing/cataloging software with some editing features.

1) if i want to edit my photos (e.g. make it lighter or anything else) can i rely soley on Lightroom or do i need Photoshop?

2) in what cases would i want both Lightroom and Photoshop or eclusively one or the other?

thanks,

Chipy

 

[Kaido]

Lightroom = album software (plus basic edits)
Photoshop = editing software

I use both. Most of my photos get basic treatment in Lightroom, then I go into Photoshop for anything reall advanced. For basic treatments like color correction, effects like sepia tone, and so on, Lightroom will do awesome. If you want to get into things like putting on digital makeup, swapping people's heads around onto different bodies, all that sort of fun stuff, then you'll want Photoshop. Or get both If you're starting out, Lightroom is really killer and is a lot cheaper than Photoshop, and you can always graduate to Photoshop when you're ready! Although Photoshop is awesome to start out with as well, but it stinks as a photo organizer.

 

[soydios]

Lightroom is designed for workflow: sorting, organizing, batch processing, and basic edits.

Photoshop adjusts images one-by-one, but allows you to use masks.

 

[fuzzybabybunny]

1. Yes, you can rely solely on Lightroom for photography. Lightroom by itself is already quite powerful for photographic editing (increasing/decreasing brightness, contrast, exposure, sharpness, noise reduction, saturation, hue, white balance, and using brushes to do localized versions of the aforementioned plus some cloning). It is NOT recommended for "photochop" work - stuff where you need to select an object, masking, layers, cutting things out of images and replacing it with other stuff. It is not a good solution for, say, making logos or transplanting a person on a different background.

2. Use Lightroom for traditional photographic edits and to speed up your workflow when dealing with numerous photos that you need to edit and catalog well. Use Photoshop for heavy edits as mentioned above.

 

[jamesbond007]

1. Yes, you can rely solely on Lightroom for photography. Lightroom by itself is already quite powerful for photographic editing (increasing/decreasing brightness, contrast, exposure, sharpness, noise reduction, saturation, hue, white balance, and using brushes to do localized versions of the aforementioned plus some cloning). It is NOT recommended for "photochop" work - stuff where you need to select an object, masking, layers, cutting things out of images and replacing it with other stuff. It is not a good solution for, say, making logos or transplanting a person on a different background.

2. Use Lightroom for traditional photographic edits and to speed up your workflow when dealing with numerous photos that you need to edit and catalog well. Use Photoshop for heavy edits as mentioned above.

Exactly this! Lightroom is awesome for blanket edits (making adjustments to white balance or tint to hundreds or thousands of photos) and workflow. Photoshop is for heavy editing and detailed work like airbrushing, skin processing, etc.

 

[chipy]

cool guys, thanks a mil. i used Photoshop years ago and am aware of it's great capabilities but wasn't sure how Lightroom fit in. thanks for the insight... i think Lightroom will fit the bill for me. i just want to lighten some dark pictures and what not... not photochoppin yet. couple more questions:

1) if i already have Canon's Digital Photo Professional or Picture Style Editor, will Lightroom be redundant?

2) can Lightroom handle CR2 raw files?

thanks again!

 

[PurdueRy]

cool guys, thanks a mil. i used Photoshop years ago and am aware of it's great capabilities but wasn't sure how Lightroom fit in. thanks for the insight... i think Lightroom will fit the bill for me. i just want to lighten some dark pictures and what not... not photochoppin yet. couple more questions:

1) if i already have Canon's Digital Photo Professional or Picture Style Editor, will Lightroom be redundant?

2) can Lightroom handle CR2 raw files?

thanks again!

1. Depends how much you like the DPP interface. I would say, no its not redundant but other could disagree. They are two entirely different programs in terms of interface so each takes some learning. I find that DPP's edits are too "coarse" for me and don't give me the control lightroom does nor the ease. Why not try out Lightroom 3 beta? It's free right now.

2. Yes it can. However, newer .CR2 files are always coming out and it takes a bit for these to be integrated into LR. For instance, last I checked the 7D's RAW files work with lightroom but lightroom doesn't have a true 7D profile built in. So some people right now are using DPP until it does.

 

[Shimmishim]

1. Some people really like the DPP interfrace. I do not. I'm really used to Lightroom 2.5 and trying out LR 3.0 beta.

2. Yes. LR 2.5 does work for 7D but only the original raw. mRaw and sRAW are not supported by the 7D but do work in LR 3.0.

I can do 95% of my editing in LR.

 

[chipy]

great! thanks for answering my questions... i'll go try LR3 beta.

 

[chipy]

sorry to revive this thread but i was reading about LR3 beta and saw the term "Nondestructive editing". what exactly does that mean?

 

[Shimmishim]

the raw file doesn't get manipulated in anyway. the raws stay intact. so if you were to take the raw file and open it in another program, the file would look the way it did before you did anything in lightroom.

lightroom uses a catalog system that keeps track of all the edits you make to a photo w/o losing the integrity of the original...

that's the best way i can explain it.

 

[Dark Penguin]

LR is basically free if you use it to replace some photoshop add ons. For instance I prefer it to Qimage for printing. I also use LR instead of Photokit Sharpener. Between not needing to purchase those two items it basically pays for itself.

One comment about metadata editing. Athough you do not HAVE to bake those into an image you should. Over time Adobe makes subtle rendering changes. If you do not bake your RAW into a Tiff (or whatever) your metadata edits might result in a slightly different output than you expected.

With LR3 they have added a process version that should help that. Wholesale changes to rendering will likely get the version bumped. Not so sure about more subtle ones.

I'd have both products. I rarely open photoshop but there are those times you really need it.

 

[littleprince]

Non destructive editing means exactly that, you can make edits but revert to the original image. This was already present in LR 2 and many other programs.

For instance if you want to adjust brightness, and 2 months down the road realize your monitor was too dark and your photo is too light now you can revert back to the original.

 

[chipy]

awesome, thanks for the explanation. DarkPenguin gives us an interesting point about LR changing the edits slightly... i'd have to look into that further but thanks for the explanation on NDE.