Lightroom and CS3

rpcrowe

I have just purchased but, have not had time to install Photoshop CS3. Given the capabilities of Adobe Bridge included with CS3; is there any advantage to using Adobe Lightroom along with Photoshop CS3 and Adobe bridge?

Izzy Garavito

Hey there. I don't have much experience with lightroom yet--i JUST started working with it last week--but i can do more in LR than i could in bridge. it took a while to get used to it, but I like it much better

Swartzy

The more
I use LR, then more I like it. There are a zillion presets out there for free download as well to quicken initial processing. Many images you can do (albiet global) in LR and you're done. For selective sharpening, coloring, layers and masks, etc...then PS is important. The overall workflow has sped up considerably and you can get those images close, apply them to numerous files all at once and be on your way. Simply put, I think LR ROCKS.

Having used DPP for sometime and really liked it, ACR offered more features....now with LR, its ACR kicked up a few notches.

BradfordBenn

that one comes down to personal preference and use
I have LightRoom and Adobe CS3. I user LR for my "batch processing" as I like it's speed and ease of use. Part of this might be that my previous work was with Bridge CS2 and it was not as nice in my personal opinion.

So far me doing the keywording using the spray paint tool, flagging for accept reject, converting to DNG from RAW, exporting to SmugMug... etc was easier and faster in LR.

When I want to do more than the "management" and want to move to retouching (I do not count cropping and red-eye) I go to PhotoShop.

I am by no means a great photographer, but I make it up with volume and fun. So to me having the speed and ease is part of the fun.

Now I am waiting for me new camera to be delivered cause I wore out the last one.

KED

BradfordBenn wrote:

I have LightRoom and Adobe CS3. I user LR for my "batch processing" as I like it's speed and ease of use. Part of this might be that my previous work was with Bridge CS2 and it was not as nice in my personal opinion.

So far me doing the keywording using the spray paint tool, flagging for accept reject, converting to DNG from RAW, exporting to SmugMug... etc was easier and faster in LR.

When I want to do more than the "management" and want to move to retouching (I do not count cropping and red-eye) I go to PhotoShop.

I am by no means a great photographer, but I make it up with volume and fun. So to me having the speed and ease is part of the fun.

Now I am waiting for me new camera to be delivered cause I wore out the last one.

I recently basically dumped Aperture in favor of LR. I am really comfortable with the LR UI and I like the structure implicit in the Develop module. However, my whole reason for doing any of this is for the purpose of posting printable images to SmugMug (essentially on a non-profit basis), and my belated discovery that there is no soft proofing in LR means that every single keeper has to go through CS3 too. That was an unwelcome revelation, because I do NOT know my way around that app!

colourbox

With Lightroom you get an always-saved undo history for every image, immediate printing capability instead of having to shove images through Photoshop just to get a print, a much easier way to see and work with images across many folders at once (Bridge is a browser, not a database), and a smoother workflow. I'm pretty comfortable with Photoshop actions, but the deep featured export in Lightroom is just so much easier and faster to deal with. But Lightroom is weak on output sharpening, so sometimes they need to be batch processed through Photoshop anyway.

But if you don't have a lot of money, Bridge CS3 is capable of the same image quality through Camera Raw, and Bridge keywording and filtering is much improved over CS2 although still not nearly as fluid as in Lightroom. The new multi-select image compare and multiple-loupe capability also make Bridge much less annoying than Bridge CS2 when trying to find the best in a massive pile of images.