Photoshop Elements 6 or Photoshop Lightroom

nickatnite

Just as the posts reads, which one?

I've never used any type of digital software for my pictures; but...

It seems like my hobby that I have had since high school in the late 80's and died off for several years has came back with vigor. I'm looking at a new DSLR now and software. Also, all of my pics that I take and the ones I posted on here so far have no editing done to them and I would like to keep that to a minimum. Is that sounding to harsh?

Aside from all of that, I've been reading posts on here regarding the above 2 PS applications and have narrowed it down to those. Then I am also considering a Smugmug pro account.

Any professional comments?


Thanks,

Nick

Icebear

Well if it's either/or
I'd say PSE. Lightroom is a fantastic program, and I spend more time with LR than I do PS, but there are just too many things you can't do with LR. Seriously, if I were you, I'd get both. If you can only afford one now, get PSE.

Giphsub

I'd go the other way and choose LR if you are wanting minimum tweaking. LR can do most of the basic stuff like for quick light adjustment etc. and very easily. It also helps manage your files very well. PSE won't do that for you. I find LR is mostly enough for my needs and I don't tend to tweak a huge amount.

SloYerRoll

Lightroom.
Period.

Icebear

Period?
Sounds like a religious conviction to me

davev

Elements.

If you want to send a bunch of time trying to get the white balance just right, Lightroom's the program for you.
If you just want to resize, sharpen, lighten or darken a shot a little, I think you can do it much faster in Elements.
If you take 300 shots, that all need the same tweaking, then we're back to Lightroom.

So really, the answer is get both.
I have both programs, I use Elements more, but Lightroom will fix a shot that I can't fix in elements. (I shoot in JPG mode) If I shot in RAW, I don't think Lightroom would be as important.

W.W. Webster

SloYerRoll wrote:

Lightroom. Period.

I have both. However, since first using Lightroom nearly two years ago (initially as a beta), and after processing and managing around 12,000 images with LR in that time, I can count the number of times I've used Elements on the fingers of one hand - with plenty of fingers left over!

photogmomma

SloYerRoll wrote:

Lightroom.
Period.

Unless all you really want to do is make signatures and composite photos... Seriously, Lightroom is truly the way to go. You would have to pry it out of my dead rotting fingers....

WWW wrote:

I have both. However, since first using Lightroom nearly two years ago (initially as a beta), and after processing and managing around 12,000 images with LR in that time, I can count the number of times I've used Elements on the fingers of one hand - with plenty of fingers left over!

Same with me and CS2

Icebear

Really???
So all you folks who are saying "Lightroom only" do all your sharpening in LR?? Don't you ever do any selective sharpening? Any cloning? Any skewing (rectifying)? No layer work?

I find LR to be the best single piece of software I've ever bought, but can't imaging doing without a program to edit pixels. I started with PSE and it served me very well for quite a while. I still take most of my work into CS3 after doing the fundemental work in LR.

For a person just getting into digital post-processing, I still think PSE is the wisest first step, even tho I don't use it any more.

~Jan~

Icebear wrote:

So all you folks who are saying "Lightroom only" do all your sharpening in LR?? Don't you ever do any selective sharpening? Any cloning? Any skewing (rectifying)? No layer work?

I find LR to be the best single piece of software I've ever bought, but can't imaging doing without a program to edit pixels. I started with PSE and it served me very well for quite a while. I still take most of my work into CS3 after doing the fundemental work in LR.

For a person just getting into digital post-processing, I still think PSE is the wisest first step, even tho I don't use it any more.

I agree. I would have a really hard time using ONLY Lightroom. I was quite happy w/ a shoot RAW then process w/ Lightroom and touch up SOME (not all) images w/ PSE 5.0. I bought 5.0 for $40 though so it certainly wasn't a pocketbook killer compared to some things.

CatOne

~Jan~ wrote:

I agree. I would have a really hard time using ONLY Lightroom. I was quite happy w/ a shoot RAW then process w/ Lightroom and touch up SOME (not all) images w/ PSE 5.0. I bought 5.0 for $40 though so it certainly wasn't a pocketbook killer compared to some things.

Well that's the thing... there are a select few (in my experience, VERY few) images that need the enhanced abilities of Elements. LR is best for 98% of the shots. So the question is, do you slow down the workflow for 98% of shots so you can tweak ALL of them, or do you go with the best for 98% and lose a bit with the 2%?

Or get both, given that Elements is less than $100

Icebear

Yup . . .

CatOne wrote:

Or get both, given that Elements is less than $100

Best answer.

photogmomma

CatOne wrote:

Well that's the thing... there are a select few (in my experience, VERY few) images that need the enhanced abilities of Elements. LR is best for 98% of the shots. So the question is, do you slow down the workflow for 98% of shots so you can tweak ALL of them, or do you go with the best for 98% and lose a bit with the 2%?

Or get both, given that Elements is less than $100

Once I got LR, my editing in PS/PSE dropped to about 2%. The only time I go into PS is to soften skin and clone things out. But because i hate going into PS (read: very lazy), I try harder to take photos to minimize editing if at all possible. Not always possible, but mostly.

I think one question that wasn't asked, though, is what kind of photography do you do? Do you like to do a whole lot of post processing?

I do candid, casual portrait photography - mainly outdoors. My clients will buy anywhere from 10-40 photos at a time and I can't imagine touching each of them with PS! (I do with all the large images, but not the smaller ones. But that's for my style of photography! )

But if i were a landscape photographer or fine art photographer, I'd probably opt for PSE first as you don't end up processing as many photos, but do delve further into them. In the end, though, you'll probably end up wanting LR....

Just some more thoughts!

(And yes, I do all my sharpening in LR and don't do any skewing. And I do a small amount of cloning in LR all the time. I rarely use PS for cloning unless it's complex!)

thephotographysmith

Curious, does LR offer all the basic editing features that Picnik.com and/or Picassa 3.5 offer?

Elaine

LR! And then if you find you need some other editing features, pick up PSE. I began with PSE 3.0, upgraded to 5.0, upgraded to CS3, then added LR to the mix. I've been using LR since Feb of this year, and have gone over to CS3 just a few times. I got into it thinking I would use LR for the sorting and organizing capabilities and still use PS for the details. Not the case for me. But even if it were, having my photos available to me in LR first has just been smoother and less tedious and frustrating than having to deal with them in PSE.

PS - I saw PSE 8 available with a Costco coupon for $49.99. So, starting with LR and adding that later wouldn't have to be a huge expense.

colourbox

CatOne wrote:

So the question is, do you slow down the workflow for 98% of shots so you can tweak ALL of them, or do you go with the best for 98% and lose a bit with the 2%?

That's a trick question. You'd never do it that way. You'd run 100% of the pics through Lightroom and take them as far as you can, and because of Lightroom's powerful batch editing that Elements can't match, you'll be done with that stage rather quickly. THEN you use Lightroom to mark the 2% of shots that still need work that can't be done in Lightroom, and you pop them open in Elements. There's no workflow slowdown at all, because there is no way that you would get that far, faster, using Elements alone.

Rhuarc

colourbox wrote:

That's a trick question. You'd never do it that way. You'd run 100% of the pics through Lightroom and take them as far as you can, and because of Lightroom's powerful batch editing that Elements can't match, you'll be done with that stage rather quickly. THEN you use Lightroom to mark the 2% of shots that still need work that can't be done in Lightroom, and you pop them open in Elements. There's no workflow slowdown at all, because there is no way that you would get that far, faster, using Elements alone.

I think he was says specifically if you only had Elements, and NOT Lightroom.

One thing to keep in mind is if you want to do either HDR or Panoramics you will need some sort of third party software. In my case I use CS4, but I believe Elements can do it as well.

W.W. Webster

colourbox wrote:

You'd run 100% of the pics through Lightroom and take them as far as you can (then) use Lightroom to mark the 2% of shots that still need work that can't be done in Lightroom, and you pop them open in Elements.

YMMV.

For me, 2% is a gross over-estimate - 0.2% would be closer to the mark. But if pixel-pushing is where you get your jollies, 2% may be a significant under-estimate.

However, colorbox is absolutely right in stating how incredibly easy it is to move from LR to PSE and back again when you want to access specific functions that PSE offers.

pathfinder

For the shooter who limits themselves to studio work, where the lighting contrasts can be controlled and varied by the shooter, LR may account for the vast majority of their editing needs.

If you find yourself needing different luminosity curves in different parts of the image, like with different portions of landscape images, or if you need sophisticated noise reduction, or if you want your own precise control of B&W conversion, you may need Photoshop in addition to LR. For me, at least 1/2 of my images get some sort of pass through PS to allow editing of selections and layers. That also means about 1/2 of them never leave Lightroom. Works for me.

BradfordBenn

I don't know PhotoShop Elements well, however the library management tools for me in Lightroom is one of the things that makes it an essential portion of my work flow. Being able to "paint" keywords on quickly, being able to create collections, the batch processing, the ability to do find and search using the metadata, date, location... etc. those are things it does very well and allows me to manage my collection of images very easily. I still use Photoshop for cloning, healing etc.

To take a bunch of snapshots out of either my PowerShot or XTi and just load them in, accept/reject, put on keywords, copyright info, print contact sheets, and do a batch "development" in mere moments is a great time saver. There are often times I am taking snapshots not photographs, but being able to track them all in one place is great. I have over 8,000 images in one catalog and I can still search and manage it well.

anonymouscuban

Another vote for LR.

CatOne

I'm looking at what I wrote, and thinking "Man, I sure don't remember writing that! But it sounds like me!"

Then I saw this thread was resurrected from over 2 years ago

I think my point is even stronger today toward Lightroom. Lightroom's sharpening is very, very good now, and with the selective brushes you can do selective/creative sharpening, color correction, dodging/burning, gradients, etc. There are very few reasons to need PSE. But still, if you absolutely need a pixel editor, you can have it with PSE.

anonymouscuban

CatOne wrote:

I'm looking at what I wrote, and thinking "Man, I sure don't remember writing that! But it sounds like me!"

Then I saw this thread was resurrected from over 2 years ago

I think my point is even stronger today toward Lightroom. Lightroom's sharpening is very, very good now, and with the selective brushes you can do selective/creative sharpening, color correction, dodging/burning, gradients, etc. There are very few reasons to need PSE. But still, if you absolutely need a pixel editor, you can have it with PSE.

Agreed. And you didn't even mention all of the features it has to catalog your images. This to me is just as important as the editing features. LR2 is simply the best money anyone can spend on photo editing software.

Grainbelt

I'm not familiar with Lightroom, but as a hobbyist, I've found Elements 8 very effective. Like many here I don't open them all in the Editor workspace, and can do alot of simple things and organization in the Organizer workspace.

I shoot RAW + JPEG, and tend to open everything in the Organizer, review, see if I need to go back to RAW for any files, make the conversion to JPEG for those in the Editor, then back to Organizer. Easy peasy, but I only process batches of less than 50 photos a couple of times a month.