D200 worflow

[raymond_petty1]

I'm new to digital and trying to sort out this "workflow" issue, which is

completely new to me. I'm working my way through "Real World Digital

Photgraphy" to give me some baseline information.

I'm trying to decide whether to purchase Nikon Capture NX or Adobe Lightroom

for intial sorting/conversion. I currently have Photoshop Elements 5, but have

used it very sparingly. I assume once I get into this I might want to think

about upgrading to the full Photoshop.

 

Searching the archives, it seems that there has been some movement from the use

of Capture NX to Lightroom. I'd rather purchase one or the other.

Any ideas on an easy answer?

 

Thanks.

[ronald_moravec1]

LR is for mass changing and sorting large numbers of photos and doing global changes to

one.

 

NX will do more detail work to limited areas and also global changes. It has some capacity

for working with more than one. In the past there have been reports of it being slow.

Google for Nikon NX tutorials and you will get to Nikon sight with all kinds of info on it

and how to operate it.

 

Photoshop will not do a whole lot that Elements will not do. Mostly you are paying for the

other graphic arts programs bundled with it, Illustrator, In Design, and some others. They

are not for photography.

[rob hopkins]

I have lightroom and photoshop, and now that i have lightroom i rarely use photoshop unless i need to do major changes, i would recommend lightroom.

[jill_gately1]

Hi Raymond,

I have often asked this question and searched this forum for the answer. I found in the end the answer is really just to use the system that you are most comfortable with and gives you the quality images you are looking for. Vague, right? But I have read so many Lightoom vs Capture debates that I ended up even more confused so I just had to test drive them both to see what worked for me.

 

My workflow looks like this.... I have two D200's and about six 4gig cards to work with. I also shoot RAW plus JPEG.

 

I download my images and sort them with Capture NX. I rename all of my files in date and time order with one click of a button in Capture. That way the images from both cameras merge nicely and are in order. This is HUGE. Then I back up everything a few times (on discs and another hardrive and eventually delete the bad ones) But I will leave the obvious steps out of my response and stick to the question. I make most of my initial edits (sharpening, auto levels, resizing...not necessarily in that order)using the batch process tool in Capture. I understand that not all of the images will require the same corrections, but I have a good idea of what work for me most of the time. And I can always go back and tweak the steps of the images after the batch process. I also find, for some reason, that I like the sharpening and contrast/brightness tool in Capture better than Photoshop. Capture seems to do a better job for me. I can then convert the images to jpegs/tiff's using the batch process tool as well.

 

Then when I am through with my initial editing I go to Photoshop for the enhancements.

 

Photoshop CS2 and CS3 goes over and above the Capture NX capabilities. I find that there are many aspects of Capture that I like and many aspects of Photoshop CS2 that I couldn't live without. I use both programs in equally.

 

Maybe get the trial versions and play around with both of them.

 

I have also read complaints about Capture being slow, however I haven't found that to be the case. I have a lot of memory on my computer and I freed up even more space by having all of my images on separate external hard drives. I got a 500GB harddrive on sale at Best Buy for $119. Totally worth it.

 

My answer to your question, of course, is totally up for debate. There are so many different ways to achieve the same results. In my search for the answer I found that both systems worked for me.....

 

Jill

www.jillgately.com

[joseph_smith3]

This link provides you with some info on this question that is often asked:

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00N3Q6

 

You can do your own search and find a lot more posts on the same subject: "Capture NX or other RAW processor" .

 

I shoot in RAW and NX is the only raw processor that will read the settings you have set for the images you have captured in your camera. Why start over at ground zero with other RAW processors? If you are a Photoshop user, then your workflow would be to first open the NEF files in NX, to preserve all of the image capture settings, create a TIFF, and move the TIFF into PS.

 

See this for more info: http://www.cleanimages.com/DDBlog-NikonCaptureAndThe%20D2x.asp

 

If you are not familiar with U point technology in NX, go to www.Nikonusa and click on Capture NX and look at the tutorials. It is a great tool.

 

Joe Smith

[dave_makin]

Raymond, I own both and have developed (am developing) my own work flow, but my sorting/culling work is done in Lightroom, to me itseasier to use and browse large batches of pictures. Adobe write nice software with a pretty intuitive interface, IMHO the Nikon software is a little clunky, but thats just me maybe. I primarily use the Nikon software for my RAW conversions, I think it does a better job

 

If you want my advice, download trial versions of both and install them. You then have 30 days to decide what you want to buy, I think its very reasonable that they allow you to download trial versions.

 

The Nikon trial version of NX is hard to find, so google something like "30 day trial download" and you can get to the link that way, its burried some place in the online Nikon USA store

 

Dave

[liljuddakalilknyttphotogra]

I have not tried Lightroom, but I love NX. I recommend downloading both & trying them out for free. I know you can do that with both. Make sure you watch the tutorial videos for NX as it will get you up & going fast. I do believe both will allow you to test them for 30 days free of charge. I had only used NX for about 10 days when I bought it. I do most of my pp'ing in NX & only use CS3 or Elements 4.0 for touch ups of portraits really as I feel NX works better for the type of pp'ing I do.

 

But that's just my humble opinion.

 

Lil

[raysgallery]

All you have to do is google Nikon, click on Software Downloads and walla your here. http://support.nikontech.com/cgi-bin/nikonusa.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=61

 

I haven't bought lightroom yet, but if it's any better at sorting or filing images then ViewNX (free on Nikon's site. Nikon Transfer is good to as for as I am concerned, also free) then I definitely will.

 

I color correct & batch process in Capture NX and edit in Photoshop.

[raysgallery]

P.S. If anyone is familiar with Vertus's Fluid Mask I just got an email today that they have came out with a new version called Bling! It for $99.00. It's marketed toward online sales but may just work for us photo nuts to. It has a 30 day trail.http://www.blingit.us/blog/?utm_campaign=New%20Product%20Announcement&utm_medium=Email&utm_source=VerticalResponse&utm_term=new%20blog

[dwight200]

Workflow is the sequence of operations you do to your pictures to come up with a final version.

 

Your workflow will depend on the end use of your pictures. For example, my pictures are purely for my pleasure. I don't sell them. I make them available to local organizations if they're interested, but I don't take commissions. 90% of my pictures are really snapshots. 90% of those are junk and I should toss them (but they seem to build up on my disk anyway). The 10% that are not snapshots are probably 95% junk because I take a lot of pictures in the hope of getting a good one.

 

I shoot mostly RAW/jpg, and my workflow is as follows:

 

(1) download the pictures using Downloader Pro, which I like because it enables you to put useful names on the files, not just _DSC9837.

 

(2) Look at the jpg's. If they're satisfactory, that's it. No more workflow. If they're unredeemable, toss them (I fall down at this step a lot). If they need work, proceed to the next step.

 

(3) I use Lightroom on the RAW files. This enables me to correct exposure problems, do cropping, etc. When I'm done, I write a corrected jpg to the disk.

 

Someone who does photography for a living, or at least derives some income from it, might have a more complex workflow. For my purposes, simple is better.

 

Lightroom does 95% of my correction work. It does not correct for lens distortions. For that I use DxO or the GIMP (an open source photoshop-like program). I have found some things that Lightroom doesn't do well but DxO does better and vice versa. Lightroom enables me to correct for the pictures on which I have screwed up the camera settings. The most recent example was 43 pictures that I took after taking one picture with incandescent light. I changed the white balance setting for that one picture and forgot to change it back. I had taken 43 pictures before noticing the problem. Lightroom enabled me to correct all those blue pictures. Lightroom enables me (to some extent) to make backlit subjects more visible without completely blowing out the background.

 

I use Lightroom because it works for me, mostly. I like the user interface and so I use it. There are things it doesn't do and all the other programs I've tried have something they don't do well, so you may need more than one program to do everything (that is, if you NEED to be able to do everything). Lightroom is also set up as a cataloging program and it can be useful that way. I generally use the file name as my cataloging system because I've been doing things that way for 20 years now.

 

I did try Nikon Capture (not NX) and couldn't get used to the user interface. Lightroom seems to get all the camera settings as far as I've noticed. I have UFRaw with the GIMP, but haven't really played with it enough to see what it does with the camera settings. Haven't tried PhotoShop at all. I'm too cheap to put out the money (I'd rather spend it on GLASS).

 

The bottom line is that the best program is the one that works for you. See if you can download a demo version of several different programs sometime when you have the time to play with them. Good luck.

[morganlashley]

Here's what I do with D200 and Mac:

 

Shoot in NEF (RAW)

 

Import RAW into Lightroom

 

1. Crop

 

2. WB, Color, Saturation, Tonal Curve adjustments

 

Edit in Photoshop CS3 to retouch (I'm just learning how to do composites and framing)

 

Back to Lightroom

 

1. Apply filters ie Velvia, BW, IR, etc

 

2. Sharpen

 

3. Resize JPEG

 

4. Print

[raymond_petty1]

Thanks to everyone for all the great responses!

 

Looks like I'll have to try them both out and see which one works best for me.

[stephen_bay]

I've used both. I think Capture has a slight edge in rendering the RAW as the camera

presets are interpreted correctly and the color is usually spot-on. Lightroom I find I have

to do a little tweaking. In the past, I thought capture NX was also a better renderer at the

pixel level but haven't compared the two recently.

 

However, in all other respects lightroom is far superior to capture NX for managing,

editing, comparing, selecting, batch-processing, and working with images. Capture NX

just blows for editing a shoot in comparison to lightroom (or aperture for that matter).

 

Whichever you choose, it will take a while to get used to the raw developing tools. So if

you try one and switch, make sure to allow enough time to become familiar with the tool

before evaluating it fully.