Lightroom and Mac

lilmomma

I am recently a new Mac user, also downloaded trial of Lightroom 2. I'm having issues when I get done editing a photo, I want to keep my original and save the new one but I can't find a save button period? (i'm used to the "save as" in my windows pc). I don't know what to do with the pictures when i'm done. they just stay there in lightroom the way i left them. Also, how do you convert them from raw to jpg?

Anyone with experience in lightroom 2 and macs?

Tiziano

LR 'saves' your edits in an automatically created XML file. This is a separate file from the image.

To save an edited image in the traditional way, goto file > export.

Since you are using a trial version, exporting may not work. I don't know.

Changing from RAW to jpg is handled through 'export' as well.

RogersDA

lilmomma wrote:

I am recently a new Mac user, also downloaded trial of Lightroom 2. I'm having issues when I get done editing a photo, I want to keep my original and save the new one but I can't find a save button period? (i'm used to the "save as" in my windows pc). I don't know what to do with the pictures when i'm done. they just stay there in lightroom the way i left them. Also, how do you convert them from raw to jpg?

Anyone with experience in lightroom 2 and macs?

Changes made within Lightroom are stored as part of the photo, but are not "permanent". If you want to go back you can click the Reset button.

You can use snapshots to create "points in time" of the changes made, in case you are doing different changes and want to see what you've done

When you are done you can export (File - Export) the photo with the changes to another file; e.g., a JPG, a PSD, a TIFF, a DNG.

colourbox

Actually, Lightroom works the same way on Mac and Windows. Lightroom stores your edits continuously as you make them, so you don't need to save.

Lightroom stores your edits in its database without altering your originals. Because the edits are not inside the originals, you can undo them at any time (check your History for each image).

Whenever you want an image that has the changes "baked" into it, you need to export. When you're finished with an image, you don't need to save because the edits have been recorded. When you need JPEGs, use the Export dialog to set up what kind of JPEG you want, and export them. Lightroom takes your original, applies the edits you made, and generates the JPEG with the edits.

pathfinder

You can go back into the History steps in the left panel, and create a virtual copy of your image at any step along the way, including the very first step importing the file intially. These virtual copies can then be edited differently, and compared to each other, all without affecting the real shot file.

This way you can have as many copies of your file within Lightroom that you want, B&W, color, large, small, upside down, etc. Each can then be individually exported as a jpg or other file type.


Since you don't have to "save" anything after you are done editing a file in LR, at first it doesn't feel like you are really "done".

You will get used to it.

cmason

Lightroom also means that you do not have to covert to JPEG when you are 'done'. Since you can export to JPEG at any time, you don't have to save a copy of the JPEG as your "final'. This can be tough at first, but it is a huge hard drive space saver. I do what Pathfinder suggests, and create virtual copies, one being my 'final' and others being other processing trials. Quite often a given image will have 4 of 5 virtual copies: one processed normally, a grayscale, a desaturate, etc.

In fact, if you download Jeffery Freidl's Lightroom plug-in (and you should), then you can simply export to Smugmug, WITHOUT creating a JPEG on your harddrive.

This plug in will do the JPEG conversion, and send them to Smugmug, but it won't, by default, save a copy of the JPEG. You can if you want, but there really is no need to.

lilmomma

Ok...i see how it works! I played with it some more after reading your posts and I actually like that better than saving every image! Thanks for the help!

arodney

LR 'saves' your edits in an automatically created XML file. This is a separate file from the image.

Its a real good idea to set the preferences to Automatically Save XMP.

If you're working with DNG, you also want to occasionally manually save (update) the embedded previews (command/control S does this). If not, opening the DNG in ACR or on another machine will produce a preview that's not matching/up to date.