Lightroom vs Photoshop cs5

<p>So I was using Lightroom CC for a while, but decided that a monthly membership after a year or two adds up. I own a copy of Photoshop CS5 with Bridge and was wondering if there was a need for Lightroom. I looked at Alienskin Exposure X on a free trial and its nice but mostly for portrait type work with a lot of presets. Is Lightroom even available for purchase anymore or is the cloud version the only way to get it?</p>

<p>Lightroom 6 disc available on Amazon for $143.</p>

<p>Are you an art photographer, dealing with very few images (a few dozen a year), or are you more prolific, with thousands or tens-of-thousands a year? Photoshop is for processing individual images. Lightroom is far more efficient when there are many. This is not only true of the processing itself, but for cataloging, grouping into collections, exporting (including uploading to web sites), printing, book making, slideshows, geotagging, and much, much more.</p>

<p>As I'v said here numerous times, compared to the investment in camera and computer equipment, the $10 a month is peanuts. No, actually, less. I think I spend more than that each month for peanuts.</p>

<p>You're spending too much on peanuts. I buy three bags a month at Trader Joe's for $2.99/bag.</p>

<p>I agree that the CC package is a reasonable deal and Adobe is starting to add features in CC that aren't in non-CC LR, at least not yet. I also agree that LR is most useful for large shoots but know people who find it far easier than PS for some types of operations.</p>

<p>I use LR and PS with lots of help from Topaz, but my fundamental processing tool is LR. I have CS5 and see no reason to change.</p>

<p>I also use Lightroom as my primary editing tool , albeit that I use little of its organisational capability. There are some tasks where I just prefer the Photoshop tool though the number of these is declining as LR improves. Typically I'll start in LR & carry out a couple of operations in CS5 before declaring that I'm done. </p>

<p>Yeah, I know. $10 a month doesn't seem like much, but the whole CC marketing model just irritates the hell out of me. I also wonder when Adobe will start raising the price. You just know it's coming.</p>

<p>To answer the question, I have Lightroom (stand alone) and Photoshop CS6 (stand alone). I use Lightroom all the time, but hardly ever open Photoshop, so I would say get Lightroom and blow off Photoshop. My understanding is that you can still get Lightroom outside of CC. If you find you need more than Lightroom can do, take a look at Photoshop Elements. That's my plan anyway. I'm planning to go to the Dark Side (switch to Mac) once Skylake comes out and running Lightroom won't be a problem. If I can't buy a transfer license for Photoshop CS6, I'll just do without or buy Photoshop Elements. Besides, there are other companies out there developing photo imaging software and some are getting pretty good.</p>

<p>Good luck.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I own Lightroom and never use it. I use Photo mechanic for my DAM software and Photoshop for editing. I work with large numbers of files and find Photo Mechanic to work better for what I need and Photoshop works just fine with up to 200 RAW files at a time.</p>

<p>I have found Photoshop CC to run a little faster on my machine then CS6. </p>

<p>Thank you, I will look into Lightroom 6 stand alone. No body mentioned Adobe Bridge along with Photoshop as the organizer. They work seamlessly together, my only drawback has been how long it takes to learn Photoshop well.</p>

<p>I'm not too familiar with Bridge, but I'm confident Lightroom is much better at organizing and managing your images. Lightroom is both an organizer and an editor. </p>

<p>I really have nothing to add except I use LR and PS and think the $10 a month is a great deal. Also, LR is much more streamlined and effective platform than Bridge and ACR, its in some ways those programs combined and enhanced.</p>

<p>I use Bridge for choosing the images I want to edit. It allows me to see all of the images with out having to put them in a catalog. Bridge gives me fast access to Camera Raw and from there into Photoshop. The only thing I use LR for is building camera profiles using the X-Rite color checker.</p>

<p>You can't drag & drop an image from anywhere within the OS desktop and folder directory into LR without getting the modular designed "Import" multi-panel dialog display which offers a myriad of options on how you want to deal with and/or organize the image within the catalog system.</p>

<p>So if you're used to the way the OS allows you to simply move files around from desktop to folders, LR may require a re-learning curve from an intuitive standpoint.</p>

<p>You can drag & drop in Bridge into Film Strip mode which is what I have it set to (don't know about other mode) so I have the thumbnails horizontally displayed at the bottom of Bridge's single bounding box display. There is no separate Import, Library, Print or Develop panel displays to have to distinguish between. So IMO Bridge has a more intuitively simpler layout design. A double click on one of the images opens ACR pretty quick which offers a preview panel with tools that can be moved to the side to show Bridge's interface.</p>

<p>With LR you have go from Library panel and Develop back & forth left to right but LR may offer a new window where you can have Develop open and Library open at the same time but I couldn't find it in LR4.4.</p>

<p>You don't have to put your images into a catalogue in LR as Tim says. But the catalogue system is a little different, most people I know place their images where they want to store them, and then import in place, they aren't moved, they aren't hidden etc. Bridge is nice too, but does CS5's version of bridge have local adjustments? and will you ACR update to the newer cameras? What is the standalone price for lets say CS6? </p>

<p>CS5's ACR 6.7 has an adjustment brush for local adjustments, but LR4 and up has a more robust selection of editing sliders and features for color and tone.</p>

<p>Mixed lighting giving you green stains on warm tones in area of the image that white balance or split tone can't fix? Adjustment brush color picker will fix it with a combo of desaturation slider. I bet most folks haven't even heard of using that tool for that purpose. Both LR and CS5 ACR offer those tools.</p>

<p>Lightroom is an image management system that also includes Adobe Camera Raw and parametric (non-destructive) image editing. It is (as far as I know) still available as a stand-alone with a perpetual license. It supports the latest version of Adobe Camera Raw, along with the latest cameras; that support will continue until Adobe releases a new version of Lightroom.<br /><br />Photoshop is an image editor (among many other things), available only on a subscription basis. The subscription also includes Lightroom. I understand that CS6, the last perpetual-licensed version, is still available (if you can find it), but Adobe Camera Raw updates are no longer compatible with it. Adobe really wants you to make your monthly contributions to its revenue stream if you need Photoshop.<br /><br />The two programs complement each other, though many users find that Lightroom provides all the image editing capability they need. But the thing to keep in mind is that Lightroom is primarily an image management system. A professional photographer who needs to keep track of thousands of images may find it an invaluable tool. A non-professional photographer who doesn't need the image management features may conversely find it unduly cumbersome.<br /><br />For what it's worth, I use CS5. When I got a new camera that CS5's version of Adobe Camera Raw did not support, I carefully considered the options of either renting CC or buying Lightroom. I concluded that I did not want to rent CC, and I did not want to ascend the learning curve of Lightroom image management at this time. Instead, I opted for the DNG converter. It works well with CS5, and also has the advantage of DNG files that are roughly 20% smaller than the native raw format. Adobe claims other advantages for DNG files, but the jury is still out on that. For now, it's a workable and cost-effective solution (for me, if not for Adobe).</p>

<p>I used to be a Photoshop only user but in recent years have added Lightroom to my workflow and it has helped dramatically even though I don't shoot thousands of images at a time. LR's organizational capabilities are unrivaled IMO and excellent for basic RAW processing (that's what I use it for). I wrote an article about the <a href="http://lovetolight.com/what-is-the-difference-between-photoshop-and-lightroom">differences between the two</a> and how I use them which might be of interest.<br>

I guess it comes down to your needs and price.</p>

<p>Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6 Full Version (Mac / Win) is available in stores:<br />https://payhip.com/b/rtFY<br />I bought here for $ 130 and the seller gave me an account to download adobe serial key attached after 10 minutes. Great, excellent, wonderfull !<br />At first I hesitated to think, but because they get paid via Paypal, so if they scam, i will hit the disputed item. But after more than 5 minutes, they sent me one email account. Too fast and professional !</p>

<p>A quick heads up. B&H has the combo on sale for $100.00. I just ordered mine. Make sure you use the promo code PSWBH16</p>

<p>I have been using CS5 and Lightroom 3 for as long as when they first came out. Like others, I too was stupidly upset that I could no longer ''own'' the software, but as was noted, I never really owned it anyway. I also remember paying over a grand for the entire CS5 suite. So like Barry says, this is a really good deal. <br>

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