New page on overgaard.dk about Lightroom 3 and Lightroom 4 and editing in general

[Overgaard]

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I have added a new page to the worlds (possibly) longest camera review, a page 18 dedicated to editing of Leica M files.

 

We did a video-podcast the other day as I had Alan from Los Angeles with me, and he is a Beta-tester for Adobe and had some insight I missed in finding out what happened from Lightroom 3 to Lightroom 4

 

 

leica.overgaard.dk - Thorsten Overgaard's Leica Pages - Leica M9 Digital Rangefinder Camera - Page 18: "Editing Leica M9 and Leica M Monochrom images in Lightroom"

 

 

Enjoy, and feel free to comment!

[Jeff S]

Perhaps you'll find this LuLa article more useful in describing the improved tonal controls in LR 4.

 

I haven't converted all images, but as your guest suggested, LR 4 can work wonders with difficult pics in LR 3. For new pics, I no longer bother with LR3 (although I still have both catalogs available).

 

I use LR 4 very differently from you, though. Having come from the darkroom world, I start with a RAW file, first apply global adjustments (the new LR4 controls you mention in the video), and then use local controls (adjustment brush, graduated filter, etc.) as I would in the film days. LR 4 offers so much more than what you discuss, all of which is easily learned and used.

 

I'm surprised you didn't take one of your video pics and process it in LR 4 (using the available controls) to approximate and compare with your LR 3 pic. You do realize, I hope, that with one click on your Develop History list you can easily revert to your original LR 3 pic, or to any prior point in the processing chain. That's a key feature available with all LR versions; it's just a bunch of non-destructive instructions.

 

But whatever works for you is key. I just think that you haven't scratched the surface if you ever want to really fine tune a pic for display or print.

 

Jeff

[Rolo]

I respectfully suggest you need a lot of training to take advantage of the features of Lightroom 3 and 4.

 

To "use just these 4 sliders" is hardly a working knowledge of this system.

[Jeff S]

A couple of more thoughts after my late night post above...

 

Besides using the Develop History as mentioned, you could also have easily created a virtual copy of any pic to separately process in LR 4 for comparison to your LR 3 version; in fact you could create dozens of virtual copies to process and compare any way you like. All can be easily deleted if desired.

 

More importantly, though, I find it interesting that one would spend to own (or spend time to write about) a Monochrom, presumably for its potential incremental benefits over a M9, yet fail to take advantage of the PP actions likely necessary to optimize those differences.

 

Jeff

[Overgaard]

Perhaps you'll find this LuLa article more useful in describing the improved tonal controls in LR 4.

 

I haven't converted all images, but as your guest suggested, LR 4 can work wonders with difficult pics in LR 3. For new pics, I no longer bother with LR3 (although I still have both catalogs available).

 

I use LR 4 very differently from you, though. Having come from the darkroom world, I start with a RAW file, first apply global adjustments (the new LR4 controls you mention in the video), and then use local controls (adjustment brush, graduated filter, etc.) as I would in the film days. LR 4 offers so much more than what you discuss, all of which is easily learned and used.

 

I'm surprised you didn't take one of your video pics and process it in LR 4 (using the available controls) to approximate and compare with your LR 3 pic. You do realize, I hope, that with one click on your Develop History list you can easily revert to your original LR 3 pic, or to any prior point in the processing chain. That's a key feature available with all LR versions; it's just a bunch of non-destructive instructions.

 

But whatever works for you is key. I just think that you haven't scratched the surface if you ever want to really fine tune a pic for display or print.

 

Jeff

 

Thanks for the comment Jeff. The aim was not to do a tutorial of LR4 but to look at what the change from LR3 to LR4 means for existing catalog and what to do with the fact that the upgrade files look different (which was not the case from LR2 to LR3).

 

We use LR different, I use it to get a load of images through with just 6 controls for b&w and a few more for color - and rarely use what I will call the 'correction tools' (vertical adjustment and such).

 

On can, and some do, use LR as a darkroom/ps tool to perform changes in details and local light in an image. I would rather use PS for such things if really needed, or better yet, shoot it as final as possible in the camera. But it's good LR provides more and more tool, and eventually PS will not be necessary for specialized edits.

[Jeff S]

and eventually PS will not be necessary for specialized edits.

 

I have PS, too, but with LR 4 I rarely use it anymore.

 

I do agree that the default settings between LR 4 and LR 3 are not as close as they were between LR 3 and LR 2. However, once one migrates to LR 4, the develop actions can easily be set as preferences and one can quickly establish a routine.

 

Different strokes...literally.

 

Thanks for the follow-up.

 

Jeff