Lightroom seems too intrusive, suggestions?

<p>I have almost always used the raw conversion software that came with the cameras, but recently, wanting more advanced lens corrections and other enhanced tools and flexibilities, I decided to try Lightroom. Unfortunately, it seems difficult to work with, although that may be due to my ignorance, which I hope you can cure.</p>

<p>First, I absolutely <em><strong>do not</strong></em><em><strong> want</strong></em> Lightroom interjecting itself as an organizer of my images. I want to (1) open a (typically raw, but sometimes TIFF or JPEG) file for working on, by using a fairly normal Open-type dialog box; (2) when I'm done, I want to use a fairly normal Save As dialog box to choose a name, location, and file type for my edited work; and (3) close the file and have Lightroom forget it exists. However, Lightroom seems to insist that I add images to its catalog before I can work on them, and the export process is painfully cumbersome if I want to, e.g., create two or three different versions with differing names that mean something to me.</p>

<p>Second, Lightroom appears to refuse to apply a lens profile to a TIFF. I ought to be able to apply any lens profile on my system to any file I want. But when, for example, I tried to apply the Sony DT 16-50mm f/2.8 SSM lens profile (which applies just fine to the raw files) to a TIFF I created in Sony's Image Data Converter, the profile is not available.</p>

<p>With so many of you seemingly so happy with Lightroom, I figure it must be me. But so far, I've found it an officious nuisance. Please tell me why I'm wrong / how to make it behave. Thanks!</p>

 

<p>I do find a few of Lightroom's characteristics a bit annoying. Overall I'm satisfied enough to keep using it for my photo editing needs, which are pretty minimal. It helps give my photos a consistent appearance even when I switch between five different digicams among three different brands. The white balance, noise reduction, basic color/tone adjustments, etc., all suit my needs. And it interfaces well enough with the external editors I occasionally use. Overall it's a very good value.</p>

<p>But for organizing I'm still ambivalent about it even after a year.</p>

<p>For organizing chores, Lightroom feels painfully slow and cumbersome compared with Picasa. Picasa is much quicker and more efficient for sorting through photos, finding misplaced photos, and deleting unwanted photos. Occasionally when I'm frustrated with Lightroom's interface I'll use Picasa and deal with the mess later - Lightroom doesn't play nice with attempts to circumvent its interface for deleting photos, so it leaves the dreaded "?" boxes.</p>

<p>Lightroom's video viewer is also too sluggish to be useful. Again, Picasa is much more efficient for quickly reviewing my video clips, including the short videos created by the Nikon V1 motion capture mode (which is occasionally useful for stringing together a sequence of short slo-mo clips).</p>

<p>Most aggravating of all, Lightroom's tagging is inconsistent compared with everything else I've tried. If I tag photos in Picasa, Windows Explorer, Irfanview, etc., each recognizes the other - it's standardized. But not only does Lightroom not consistently recognize tags/keywords applied by other standard Windows tools, the tags/keywords I apply in Lightroom often aren't recognized outside of Lightroom.</p>

<p>That tag/keyword inconsistency is enough to make me hesitant to fully commit to Lightroom as a photo organizer, even after a year with LR4. And I'm still on the fence about upgrading to LR5, even though the clone/heal brush editing tool is much better.</p>

<p>Adobe seems to expect users to adapt to the Lightroom way of doing things, and even after a year the fit still isn't entirely comfortable for me. Overall it has the feel of a product that tries to impose its own sort of operating system rather than fully integrating itself into the Windows way of doing things. Granted, Windows isn't perfect and has its own quirks. But at least when I switch between various other Windows based photo editing tools, they all respect and cooperate with Windows file handling, for better or worse. Lightroom just feels odd, non-intuitive and cumbersome, like switching between two entirely different operating systems on the same computer.</p>

It's simply the wrong product for your demands. Try something else...

<blockquote>

<p>"It's simply the wrong product for your demands. Try something else..."</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I'd be tempted, but it's just too damned good as a basic photo editor. I really do appreciate the consistency it gives me between my Nikon, Olympus and Ricoh digicams.</p>

<p>But for the first time since the 1980s working with CompuGraphic typsetters and Xerox's publishing system, I feel like I need a meatspace workshop or other tutorial to fully grasp Lightroom's organizing system. I've watched a few video tutorials by various instructors, but some of it still doesn't feel intuitive to me.</p>

<p>Here Lightroom is showing its ancestry and "running home to mama" -<br>

You want a pure, non-mischling image editor.</p>

<p>Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, either with Adobe Camera RAW<br>

or try <a href="http://www.gimp.org/downloads/">GIMP</a>, it's free and has a steep learning curve (for me anyhow), but did I mention that it is free?</p>

<p>Tried 'em. I prefer the workflow of tools like Lightroom and Picasa. I don't have much need for a pixel level editor. Usually I'm working on several images from the same session and find it easier to maintain consistency when using tools like Lightroom and Picasa.</p>

<p>My only serious gripe is the organizing, particularly the inconsistencies between Lightroom and every other Windows photo editing/file organizing tool treats tagging and keywords. And there may be some obvious step I'm overlooking to resolve that problem, but after a year I haven't found the trick.</p>

<p><em>à chacun son goût</em><br>

just responding to the OP's desire to avoid LR<br /><br>

I go back to Photoshop 2.5 so I have a hard time imagining anyone preferring anything else.<br /></p>

<p>I experienced the same frustrations with LR! I have been using PS and Bridge for organizing since it came out, so I have all my files sorted in folders just how I like them. I signed up for the PS CC $10/month and I find the new ACR tools really great. Much better noise control than my CS4 version. I ended up deleting LR altogether, since I don't need it for raw conversion or file handling. Unlike Lex, I do a lot of pixel level editing, and I find the global controls for shadows, highlights, color balance, etc. to be superlative as well. DXO optics pro seems to be pretty popular too.</p>

The OP has brought up so many issues from being sluggish and cumbersome to not being able to use it in

a way that was not intended in the design of the program. Really, I think he'd be happier using something else.

 

For myself, I cannot imagine using anything else. It's a delight every time I use it...

<p>LR is an amazing product but it is not the tool for you. It would be best for you that you use another tool. </p>

<p>My son uses LR so I have tried all the versions up to LR4. I had exactly the same feelings about it as the OP. I'm a Nikon guy so I use CNX2 and PSE.</p>

Unfortunately there's no way to use Lightroom by avoiding its workflow, that consists in importing and organizing photos

inside its catalog.

 

Anyway, Lightroom uses the Camera Raw engine to develop/edit RAW files (and also TIFF and JPEG ones). If you open

the same RAW file in Photoshop, the Camera Raw plugin will show up automatically with the very same

developing/editing tools you find in Lightroom, and you'll be able to work with the usual open/edit/save workflow. Remember that while

with RAW files Camera Raw opens automatically, with TIFF and JPEG you must explicitly choose it in the "open file"

dialog box of Photoshop.

 

Camera Raw is not Photoshop, it's the RAW processing engine that runs before the developed image is passed to it.

Then you can choose to do also a pixel by pixel editing or just save the Camera Raw developed/edited photo.

<p>Unlike Elements which I have in addition to LR3, LR cannot open an image file for editing without first making it part of its organizer. With Elements, you right click on the file and open in Elements and edit away. However, I like the flow and ease of editing of LR so I'm stuck too with making images part of their Organizer before I can edit it.</p>

<p>But you can name saves to whatever you want so I don't know why that's a problem. Also, you can create as many virtual copies each edited differntly with no need for a final JPG's or TIFs unless you want them. You can even make a virtual in the middle of an edit and have two copies to edit differently afterwards. And name them all differently.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Picasa is much quicker and more efficient for sorting through photos, finding misplaced photos, and deleting unwanted photos</p>

</blockquote>

<p> <br>

I suspect there are features you aren't using. I find it blazingly fast for sorting and deleting. I don't misplace photos, so I'm not sure what the options are.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>It's simply the wrong product for your demands. Try something else...</p>

</blockquote>

<p> <br>

Good advice, just find something else, although it does sound like you are unfamiliar with a lot of its features. However, putting things into a LR catalog or collection changes nothing. It's just a way of accessing images.</p>

"First, I absolutely do not want Lightroom interjecting itself as an organizer of my images. I want to (1) open a (typically

raw, but sometimes TIFF or JPEG) file for working on, by using a fairly normal Open-type dialog box; (2) when I'm done, I

want to use a fairly normal Save As dialog box to choose a name, location, and file type for my edited work; and (3) close

the file and have Lightroom forget it."

 

Organizing your images in a searchable database is a prime function of Lightroom. I suggest you use Adobe Camera

Raw + Bridge instead.

 

The export process can be automated . Just creat a user preset.

 

As to your lens profile issue , Sony is embedding their lens profile correction info into the in-camera produced TIFF and

JPEG documents. For Lightroom to come back and apply a second profile would probably do more harm than good.

Shoot raw instead.

<p>Try Making export presets with the settings that you need for your typical photo uses. You may not be able to export them to the folder where your file came from with out opening the export file dialogue box, but if you don't mind dropping them into a folder and then moving them later you can export with just a right click and chose the preset you want or use the keyboard shortcut to export with the previous file. I'm not sure but check your exif info on your tiff files to see if lens information is still included. It may be stripped out when converting to tiff. Lightroom will import your files without actually moving them on your hard drive. It just records the location for future reference. As far as differing names on exported files you can do it through the export dialogue box but its a bit cumbersome and easier with Windows Explorer. Check out the Lightroom Facebook page and YouTube has many tutorials that are very helpful. Lightroom's file system works well for me as it organizes by date taken. When I need to find an older photo I can narrow down the location pretty quickly by knowing when the photo or one from the same shoot was taken. Its not perfect but it works. Also your keywords that are applied in Lightroom are searchable in Windows explorer.</p>

<p>Wow, seems like I hit some nerves. Thanks all! Now to elaborate:</p>

<p>Re: 'Try something else.' What? I've always heard that Lightroom actually has the most powerful raw conversion processing of the Adobe products, even having a couple of features that the version of ACR that comes with Photoshop CS does not (and whose cost I could not justify anyway); and that the version of ACR that comes with Elements does not have all the tools, like curves. The Adobe products have much more sophisticated lens correction that, e.g., GIMP (which I use), and a much wider range of lens profiles and other plug-in tools than anything else.</p>

<p>As to Sony and the TIFF issue: on some cameras (not my A580) with some lenses Sony applies lens corrections to the JPEG's. What I want to do is (1) use Image Data Converter to create a 16-bit TIFF, because for the time being at least I can get better results, especially with tools like its Dynamic Range Expansion; and then (2) use Lightroom to apply (a) lens corrections, (b) perspective control, and © probably noise reduction to the 16-bit TIFF.</p>

<div></div>

>>> Re: 'Try something else.' What? I've always heard that Lightroom actually has the most powerful

raw conversion processing of the Adobe products, even having a couple of features that the version of

ACR that comes with Photoshop CS does not (and whose cost I could not justify anyway);

 

Yes, try something else. Among other things such as how profiling does not work the way you want it to, according to

your original post you find Lightroom sluggish, painfully cumbersome, and *absolutely do not want*

Lightroom imposing any organization.

 

Why keep on trying to use a product that does not meet your needs? That makes no sense...

 

>>> Wow, seems like I hit some nerves.

 

No. Makes no difference to me. Just wondering why you insist on using a product you've put through its

paces, are not happy with, and in the end does not meet your requirements.

<p>CaptureOne Pro, 60 day trial, you won't go back if you learn to use it.</p>

 

<p>There's nothing so special about Capture One Pro 7 that it's "<em>try once, use forever</em>" - and in image quality terms, Lr still has the upper hand over Capture One in several important areas, like highlight recovery and noise reduction. And if you use the Lightroom price-compatible version of Capture One ("Express"), you're forced to import into a catalogue, just like you are with Lr.</p>

<p>(Yes, I use Capture One - and Lightroom 5, and Photo Ninja, and DxO Optics Pro 9).</p>

<p>Photo Ninja and DxO Optics Pro are catalogue-free - the former sounding closest to Dave's requirements, workflow-wise - but my best advice to Dave is <strong>just get used to Lr</strong>: I'd prefer it without a catalogue too, but I don't let it bother me - I import, I process. The fact that Lr has a record of what I've imported is something I simply didn't think about - but with that said, I've come round to its benefits.</p>

<p>Simply put, it's too good a converter <em>not</em> to use.</p>

<p>Lightroom is not intended primarily as a simple 'raw convert then save as tif/jpg' program, though it contains those functions. <br>

Also, the raw conversion of LR has always been the same--or practically the same-- as the contemporaneous version of ACR.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Also, the raw conversion of LR has always been the same--or practically the same-- as the contemporaneous version of ACR.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Very true - but Lr's a lot cheaper to keep current with.</p>

<p>Brad is right. He wants something else. As some have mentioned photoshop or elements or one of other such programs.</p>

<p>Depending on budget, given the way of working described in the OP, I'd go to either Photoshop Elements, PaintShop Pro or Photoshop - they do "open file, work, save file".<br>

While like most people so far, I do appreciate having a catalog (and for this reason with some other, switched to CaptureOne 7 Express some time ago), I do find that more often than not I am still working per folder (import), and that the catalog-features are more for a later date to add organisation. CaptureOne at least still gives me a normal view of my file system hierarchy, and that allows me very much to work the way the OP describes. In the background, things also move into a catalog, but that's hardly invasive.</p>

<p>As for the image quality, maybe Lightroom is better, but for all I've seen most certainly not leaps and bounds better than CaptureOne - in fact, I think for the cameras I use, it's mostly a matter of preference. Every time I use Lightroom, I am slightly turned off by the lack of speed, plus the split in the 4 areas (esp. library versus development). The UI of CaptureOne to me is far more direct and faster. But, this is largely a personal preference, for sure.</p>

<p>In the end, it's hard to decide for any of us what works for you - preferences for a User Interface, workflow etc. can be highly personal. I'd download some trial versions and try for yourself.</p>