I just pulled the trigger and bought Lightroom 3! Wooooo! I'll work through all the tutorials but was wondering if any of you had any quick tips for me.
My working style is to work on single photos at a time. I will either save what I do over the original or rename it to preserve the raw image. Just depends on what I do to the picture and how happy I am with it. I loathe having multiple copies of photos and work very hard not to be a picture hoarder. The Library in this program I find to be annoying. I don't want it to try and "help" me by creating catalogs. I'm wondering if I can disable the Library feature and spend my time in Develop.
Anyhooo, I am excited about seeing what I can do with this program. Any hot tips you have are welcome!
Don't be afraid of the Library module! Use keywords to catalogue your images (you can filter by keywords to easily find an image you're after). Lightroom edits affect the XMP (metadata) and embedded thumbnail images only, whereas Photoshop is a pixel editor - Lightroom is not designed to "overwrite" the original file, and that is the beauty of it. It means you don't need another copy of the image, but you still have the option, always, of going back to the original no matter how many edits you've done. You can even have multiple working copies, while in actual fact only having one file stored on your computer. Embrace the Library. :)
Trust - and as jinx has already said - one of the major uses of Lightroom lies in that Library tab. Always start by importing stuff into there, and if you like, having it move images into a sensible folder structure too. I have one folder for photos, under which I'll create specific named subfolders for specific jaunts, or if I'm just generally shooting, have a "general" folder under which I let Lightroom create a dated heirarchy of folders itself. Keeps things speedy, as you never want too many files in a single folder.
When you've got tonnes of images the Library comes into its own for locating them. It's actually replaced windows explorer for me, now, when it comes to locating/organising photo files, which is a pretty big deal, as I love explorer.exe. I too shunned it at first, for the same reasons you are, but time and necessity drew me into it and I've not looked back.
There's a lot in there to learn, but pretty much all of it is worth learning. It's also ace if you have two monitors, as it'll bring up a large version of whatever shot you're working on on your spare monitor, for easier viewing, constantly updating it as you change stuff live.
@eyebrows That's what I'm hearing. I have a buddy at work that is all about using the Library so I think I might sit with him for a one on one tutorial. I will try not to be afraid of it!
@cholbert can't wait to see what I can do with those!
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plus learn to batch edit... saves tons of time...
@icywarm Batch edit. It's on my list now, thanks.
When you've got tonnes of images the Library comes into its own for locating them. It's actually replaced windows explorer for me, now, when it comes to locating/organising photo files, which is a pretty big deal, as I love explorer.exe. I too shunned it at first, for the same reasons you are, but time and necessity drew me into it and I've not looked back.
There's a lot in there to learn, but pretty much all of it is worth learning. It's also ace if you have two monitors, as it'll bring up a large version of whatever shot you're working on on your spare monitor, for easier viewing, constantly updating it as you change stuff live.
@cholbert can't wait to see what I can do with those!