Lightroom 3 - WOW!!

[dt86vyss]

Just finished installing my Lightroom 3 upgrade, I upgraded from V2.6. Let me say... WOW!! I am sooo pleased with it. One particular feature i love is the 'Noise Reduction'. Because i use the kit lens and dont have the greatest DSLR Body, my images are offen let down by a noisy background. With Lightroom 3 i am able to illiminate around 90% of noise in seconds.

As im still finding my way through all the new features of Lightroom 3, it'd be awesome if others who have also upgraded could help by pointing out some of their positive experiances with the software. Share the Love!! :th3:

[flash]

I must admit I dont use lightroom much but probably should, I still have the old version 2.6, photoshop does everything for me, I have just been offered an upgrade from cs2 to cs5 for around $300, i think I will go that way!

[etherial]

Yes I agree Daniel, LR3 is great. I really like the improved noise reduction and sharpening tools. The other big winner for me is the watermarking on export. I have set up a heap of presets and found it very easy to use. I haven't noticed much of a speed improvement over LR2.6 though. The new import screen is ok as well; and the camera calibration for correcting distortion is great.

[dieselpower]

The watermarking was what won it for me. I really wanted to do watermarking without having to go through an external application or multiple export processes. The availability of Flickr and Facebook uploaders was also a winner.

I'm still only finding my feet with it but am quite impressed - I can do basic edits to most of my images to a state where I'm happy to upload them without touching another app, and I'm still not doing everything Lightroom is capable of. I only wish that it had a levels adjustment like photoshop as that's the one thing that I miss the most.

[kiwi]

It does have levels adjustment, it's just called tone curve.

[dieselpower]

Kiwi - can you use it to adjust individual channels?

[kiwi]

dunno, how do you mean ?

[joeyvaldezjr]

Same here! The watermarking and flickr uploading is very useful. I did not know you can also upload it in facebook though. Need to learn that.

[dieselpower]

dunno, how do you mean ?
In photoshop if you add a levels adjustment layer (this is different to the curves adj layer but I believe you can do it with curves as well), you can either adjust RGB (the default) or choose the individual channel that you wish to change - with the D50 I was using for a while I often had to drop out the midrange blues using this method - saturation was fine but the levels were slightly skewed. I occassionally do it with the D90 if I feel the balance of a certain colour is a bit over. I'd like to be able to mimic this in LR by being able to use the tone curve over just the blue channel, for example.


Same here! The watermarking and flickr uploading is very useful. I did not know you can also upload it in facebook though. Need to learn that.
I don't use the built-in flickr uploader. I use the flickr uploader written by Jeffrey Friedl - it allows smart collection-like publishing, full sync with flickr, automatic addition to sets and groups (though the group function isn't working for me). He also has a facebook (and many other) plugins. http://regex.info/blog/lightroom-goodies is the place to get the goodness! :)

[kiwi]

ahh ok, you can individually manage all the colour levels through individual channels for each colour via a saturation slider, not quite what you describe but probably achieves a similar outcome.

[dieselpower]

Thanks Kiwi - not quite but might have the same effect (maybe). Will have a play and see how it compares to doing it in PS.

[piXelatedEmpire]

The NR is greatly improved in LR3, so much so that I don't need to move my images into Photoshop for this any longer, which is excellent. I like the Flickr integration as well, very useful.

[ryshhh]

Sorry for teh n00b question. Is there a way to get a simple border in LR3? Ive been looking around but cant find an option?

[OwenS]

Sorry for teh n00b question. Is there a way to get a simple border in LR3? Ive been looking around but cant find an option?

Do you mean for print or for web? Depending on which just go to the appropriate tab and it should have border options.

[ryshhh]

For web. Cant seem to find it still. Unless I'm blind! haha

Thanks for the reply anyway, I'll have another look.

[dieselpower]

It's in the tabs along the top (Library, Develop, Slideshow, Print, Web). Click on the Web tab and about halfway down the tool panel is a section to add borders. Similar on the print tab.

[campo]

Sorry for teh n00b question. Is there a way to get a simple border in LR3? Ive been looking around but cant find an option?

there's a default preset in LR3 i believe that uses the effects/vignette at the maximum to give a solid border with rounded corners.

From memory, i believe Scott kelby's LR2 book also shows another technique to get a border, using the watermark/logo feature and a transparent image

[kiwi]

if you want "proper" borders as you export jpegs use lr/mogrify plugin

[Top]

The noise reduction is possibly the best on planet!

[ryshhh]

Thanks guys! LR3 rocks! :D

[bigdazzler]

The noise reduction is possibly the best on planet!

ooooh ... big call mate.

[wattsgallery]

I also like the constrain file size on export feature which helps to meet website uplink requirements etc (just note that it seems to be a little out if you add watermark etc so just need to select a bit smaller than you need - ie. if the max file size you need is 250kb then maybe restrain to 200kb as I have noticed it can add a bit).

[kiwi]

Personally I still use Nik Dfine for NR - it's better in my opinion

[Lani]

The noise reduction is possibly the best on planet!

Hmmmm.....a little bit of an overstatement perhaps? :D

It is definitely much better than LR2, but 3rd party applications such as Neat Image have a lot more control, I reckon.

[Top]

Hmmmm.....a little bit of an overstatement perhaps? :D

It is definitely much better than LR2, but 3rd party applications such as Neat Image have a lot more control, I reckon.

Haha, definitely an overstatement, however I have tried numerous 3rd party applications including Neat Image, Noise Ninja, Topaz Denoise and Imagetonic Noiseware Professional.

Noiseware is the one I kept until recently after purchasing Photoshop CS5 and LR3

I agree they have more controls but IMHO their effects are not as good as the LR3.

Although I tend to use the noise reduction algorithm in ACR6 a lot more often now as it appears to be the same as the one in LR3.

[etherial]

I also like the constrain file size on export feature which helps to meet website uplink requirements etc (just note that it seems to be a little out if you add watermark etc so just need to select a bit smaller than you need - ie. if the max file size you need is 250kb then maybe restrain to 200kb as I have noticed it can add a bit).

I thought this feature was good, but I'm having a little trouble with it. I have set a maximum of 250kB for files to upload to AP but they come in at 255 or 260kB. Even dropping the setting to 200 still gave me the 255. The only way to get it down was to reduce the pixels on the longest edge from 1024 to say 800.

[Lani]

I thought this feature was good, but I'm having a little trouble with it. I have set a maximum of 250kB for files to upload to AP but they come in at 255 or 260kB. Even dropping the setting to 200 still gave me the 255. The only way to get it down was to reduce the pixels on the longest edge from 1024 to say 800.

Yep, I have noticed that with the export for email function last night, maybe it is including some exif info that is nudging up the file size?

[etherial]

It seems to me that it can only compress the original to a certain point when you specify 1024 pixels, hence you have to drop the dimensions to get the file size down.

Sometimes it comes up with an error to say "can't meet your settings" (or something like that) but not always. I'm not sure how I managed to get that. Anyway, it is a great program and I love it. To get around this I've set up an area in my Smugmug site for forum posts that his private/hidden from the public and I will just upload to there and link to photos, so the 250kB limit isn't an issue then.

[sanpedro667]

I'm thinking of upgrading to LR3, I current use noise ninja for noise reduction is the built in feature in LR3 equivalent? If it is would save heaps of time.

[AdamR]

I love LR2 I think its brilliant. Since LR2 came out 99% of my photos are edited only there. Looking forward to LR3

[kiwi]

I'm thinking of upgrading to LR3, I current use noise ninja for noise reduction is the built in feature in LR3 equivalent? If it is would save heaps of time.

I find it pretty good really, much improved anyhow. I think for the majority if uses it replaced the plug-ins incl ninja

The big difference probably is that it does not analyse the image for noise and then autoapply
Easy enough to download a trial and do some testing side by side

[dieselpower]

As kiwi said - no noise profiles so it doesn't auto detect what the noise levels should be. It's all dependent on the user touching up the sliders to suit. That said, you could set the noise levels for each ISO appropriately and save that into a preset and load that on to each image. Not as fast as noise ninja but should be quicker than manual adjustments.

[bigdazzler]

Im about to upgrade to LR3 shortly .... any issues with migrating your catalogues ??

[kiwi]

As kiwi said - no noise profiles so it doesn't auto detect what the noise levels should be. It's all dependent on the user touching up the sliders to suit. That said, you could set the noise levels for each ISO appropriately and save that into a preset and load that on to each image. Not as fast as noise ninja but should be quicker than manual adjustments.

You can actually use the ISO info in the EXIF on import to adjsut the default NR settings used


Im about to upgrade to LR3 shortly .... any issues with migrating your catalogues ??

No issue at all, of course the LR3 beta catalogues I had did not migrate and I had to export/import

[bigdazzler]

OK good ... I didnt install the beta so no issue there for me.

[dieselpower]

You can actually use the ISO info in the EXIF on import to adjsut the default NR settings used


Well, there you go. I will have to investigate this more thoroughly as that will make life easier for me!

[essaytee]

I'm a new user to LR3 and still to learn all the editing features, if that's possible. I was first looking for a catalogue type system and in the end LR won out.

I started a thread here (http://www.ausphotography.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=60748) regarding a file renaming bug. The below effectively summarises that thread.

Just be aware that there is a bug in the current version (LR3) regarding file renaming on import (I stress 'On Import' NOT when file renaming subsequently). In short, if you rename photos which incorporate a date, the date will be advanced by your time zone value. Therefore, here in Melbourne, 10 hours are added. So for any photos taken after 2 pm will in fact be renamed with a date one day later. To confirm this, import photos from a card, incorporate a time value in the name, this will clearly show an incorrect date/time in the file name. The solution or workaround is to rename after import. I'm hoping this will be addressed in the next update.