Lightroom tips - DPChallenge Forums

10/27/2007 01:38:25 PM · #2

Go through all the develop presets and set the exposure back down to +0, then resave them.

loseme

Canon EOS-50D

Nikon AF Nikkor 50mm f/1.4D

10/27/2007 01:46:30 PM · #3

I love lightroom! I personally bought Scott Kelby's Lightroom book and it is awesome. Also Matt has a great website Lightroom Killer Tips.

rossbilly

Nikon D200

10/27/2007 03:44:08 PM · #4

Sort through several hundred images in minutes.

Import a folder of files.
Right hand on L / R arrows, left hand on keys 1-5.
Look @ first image, decide how well you like it; press number of your 'score' (1=bad 5=great).
Press Right arrow.
Rate, then right arrow. repeat.
When done, use 'filter images' to show scores with only a rating of 'x', OR show those with a rating of 'x' and HIGHER.

Amazingly fast!

Export .jpg's of the ones you like best, then mass upload to wherever your website is. Done!

dwterry

Canon EOS-1D Mark III

10/27/2007 04:09:49 PM · #5

Originally posted by rossbilly:

Have you been watching me work?!? lol

Yup, that's how I do it. Also, one thing to note: This process moves along much quicker in library mode than it does in develop mode. So I do this in library mode. Once I've narrowed my list of "potential" photos, then I go back in develop mode and start making adjustments (wb, exposure, saturation, vignetting, crop).

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0L USM

10/27/2007 04:13:04 PM · #6

Originally posted by dwterry:

Originally posted by rossbilly:
Sort through several hundred images in minutes.

Import a folder of files.
Right hand on L / R arrows, left hand on keys 1-5.
Look @ first image, decide how well you like it; press number of your 'score' (1=bad 5=great).
Press Right arrow.
Rate, then right arrow. repeat.
When done, use 'filter images' to show scores with only a rating of 'x', OR show those with a rating of 'x' and HIGHER.

Amazingly fast!

Export .jpg's of the ones you like best, then mass upload to wherever your website is. Done!

Have you been watching me work?!? lol

Yup, that's how I do it. Also, one thing to note: This process moves along much quicker in library mode than it does in develop mode. So I do this in library mode. Once I've narrowed my list of "potential" photos, then I go back in develop mode and start making adjustments (wb, exposure, saturation, vignetting, crop).

You can cut out the right arrow bit and make it even faster.. Set the filter so that it says = ***** (5 blank stars i.e no rating) and when you then press either 1,2,3,4,5 it disappears from the screen and moves onto the next image automatically, youonly see the unrated images. Even better, get an old program called game commander, program it (very easy) to recognise your voice for the numbers 1 - 5, and just say the number.. sit back, relax and just talk your way through the shots... magic!!

Message edited by author 2007-10-27 16:15:18.

soup

Canon EOS-30D

10/27/2007 04:26:41 PM · #7

now that sounds like a plan !

Originally posted by Simms:

Even better, get an old program called game commander, program it (very easy) to recognise your voice for the numbers 1 - 5, and just say the number.. sit back, relax and just talk your way through the shots... magic!!

fotomann_forever

10/27/2007 04:32:06 PM · #8

Originally posted by Simms:

That's damn genius :-)

robs

Canon EOS R6 Mk II

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

10/27/2007 05:13:02 PM · #9

Originally posted by rossbilly:

Sort through several hundred images in minutes.
.....
Amazingly fast!

Can I get the version of LR you use? Seriously, mine is still a pig even after the 1.1 update. Close to unusable (and I got it free due to the sell out of RSP) and I certainly don't view/sort/organise using this pig. It is nice for processing if you can put up with the delay on the controls - far from instant.

Just a warning - try it first on your machine cause performance varies dramatically on various configs :-/

Edit: My machine is @4yrs old but still 1.2Gb memory & single 2.3GHz processor, so not a tiny old machine.

Message edited by author 2007-10-27 17:15:33.

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED

10/27/2007 06:37:00 PM · #10

Originally posted by robs:

Originally posted by rossbilly:
Sort through several hundred images in minutes.
.....
Amazingly fast!

Can I get the version of LR you use? Seriously, mine is still a pig even after the 1.1 update. Close to unusable (and I got it free due to the sell out of RSP) and I certainly don't view/sort/organise using this pig. It is nice for processing if you can put up with the delay on the controls - far from instant.

Just a warning - try it first on your machine cause performance varies dramatically on various configs :-/

Edit: My machine is @4yrs old but still 1.2Gb memory & single 2.3GHz processor, so not a tiny old machine.

I'm using 1.1 on an Intel Core Duo 6300 with 1gb of Ram, runs perfectly well.. I will say that Lightroom seems to enjoy being on a fast SATA drive than a standard EIDE.. maybe thats where your problem lies?

Nuno

Nikon D700

10/27/2007 07:48:25 PM · #11

I like lightroom but it runs very slow in my pc.

It's a 2.4Ghz with 1GB of ram and all the files are in a external hard drive.

When I'm shorting the photos in the library mode it takes more than 15 sec. to make the preview of th eimage. Can you explain this? And sinse I start lightroom if I start the task manager it shows that my cpu usage is at 100% all the time!

robs

Canon EOS R6 Mk II

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

10/27/2007 08:01:17 PM · #12

Originally posted by Simms:

Might be the drive but it's fine for most other stuff (could always be faster obviously).... The Nikon scanning software is MUCH faster then LR and it's dealing with 16BitTIFF 120Mb slide scans..... I am not game to load those into LR given the way it sucks the life out of the machine for simple 9Mb RAW files. My MB does not allow SATA but I am thinking about going the firewire 800 external... or buy a new machine :-/

I think my lack of a dual core is a bigger part of my problem.... If I upgrade machines I might do Quad but tough call on slower quad or faster dual - although quads overclock better from what I read, so might be better option.

10/27/2007 08:13:18 PM · #13

ignore

Message edited by author 2007-10-27 20:13:52.

dwterry

Canon EOS-1D Mark III

10/27/2007 09:48:34 PM · #14

Originally posted by robs:

1.2 speeds things up a little bit ... not dramatically.

But repeating what I said earlier... if you can do your sorting and rating in library mode, it's a _lot_ faster. As soon as you switch to develop mode, it takes a lot longer loading up the controls. I have *no* idea why. The image displays the same way. But the controls suddenly lag and it's no longer an instantaneous movement from one image to another.

dwterry

Canon EOS-1D Mark III

10/27/2007 09:51:00 PM · #15

Oh, one more tip... let LR generate the previews as it imports the files. Walk away and go do something while it imports. When you come back, all of the previews will already be made and performance will shine.

violinist123

Canon EOS-6D

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0L USM

10/28/2007 10:15:00 AM · #16

Originally posted by dwterry:

Now that's a good tip.

soup

Canon EOS-30D

10/28/2007 10:42:15 AM · #17

what's your boards FSB, and whats the speed of the memory?

my old machine - similar to yours - caused me to continue to use RSP. i upgraded my machine - and lightroom 1.2 runs slick now...

Originally posted by robs:

Edit: My machine is @4yrs old but still 1.2Gb memory & single 2.3GHz processor, so not a tiny old machine.

cdrice

Nikon D7000

Nikon AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8G IF-ED

11/03/2007 10:19:32 PM · #18

Originally posted by Nuno:

I like lightroom but it runs very slow in my pc.

It's a 2.4Ghz with 1GB of ram and all the files are in a external hard drive.

Nuno, do you have "Automatically write changes to XMP" selected (File -> Catalog Settings -> Metadata)? If so, you *definately* will see some improvement from the 1.2 upgrade. Otherwise, I'd strongly recommend turning that option off until you can upgrade. There was a serious performance issue with the logic LR used to keep those files up to date previous to 1.2, and on slower, network or external drives, LR would perform like a dog (getting worse and worse as your collection grew in size).

1.2 was primarily a bug-fix release, and that bug was arguably one of the most important issues they addressed.

I run (1.2 now) on an Intel Pentium M 1.6G laptop; 2G RAM; all RAW files on network-attached storage. I actually run my Winblows session as a virtual machine (Linux native), but LR is snappy and very responsive.

I heartily agree with generating 1:1 previews on import. This is especially important if your RAW files are on slower storage; you want to hit those originals as few times as possible -- the previews are stored in the same directory as your catalog file itself (which you want on the fastest, local storage you can put it on). Also, review the expiration settings for your 1:1 previews for each catalog and set dates to match your workflow.

Another related tip, if you are using slower storage for your collection... If you keep your RAW files on slower storage (external/network/etc), be sure your actual LR catalog is on *local* storage. Set your backup policy to back up your catalog as often as you want (and place it on your slower storage as well) if you like, but you'll see much better performance overall if you keep that catalog on the fastest storage possible -- that's were the LR database will reside, as well as all of your preview/generated files.

Concerning the question for why the develop module takes so long -- when you enter the develop module, LR loads and caches the entire RAW file from scratch. In all other modules, the previews are consulted, and RAW only consulted as needed to rebuild the preview. When you "flip" from photo to photo in develop, you are loading each RAW file in it's entirity every time you select a new file. I definately save the "flipping" or photo comparsions for the library module and only enter the develop module when I'm ready to make changes to a specific set of photos, etc.

Back to the original post -- NICE list of cool tips and shortcuts. I'll add one that was just on lightroomkillertips a few days ago (and one that made me say "ohhhh" myself...)

It's an actual use for the "Navigator" pane (I had collapsed mine a long time ago, thinking I'd hardly ever use it, since it seemed only moderately useful when working on 1:1 or closer zooms) --

Expand the Navigator pane (top of the left-side pane, above the Library/Find/Folders/etc. panes), then hover your mouse over various settings or presets (i.e. in the Develop module, the develop presets, snapshots, or even your history). Ta-da! The Navigator pane will show a quick preview of what you photo would look like if you were to select that item. You can expand the left-pane (click and drag on the edge) to increase the size of the Navigator pane.

I use it most often with my history list; to easily "go back" a setting or two and see if I've really made the improvements I want. A better way to accomplish that same task could be with snapshots, but the history + Navigator pane is a really quick and easy way to do those comparisons and saves a few clicks.

- edited for speellling, and probably needs some more... :P -

Message edited by author 2007-11-03 22:24:29.

cdrice

Nikon D7000

Nikon AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8G IF-ED

11/05/2007 07:35:55 AM · #19

Originally posted by Simms:

Holy snikeies, I loved this idea so much I had to play with it myself. I ended up installing something called "Shoot" v1.6.4, which is a freeware program that appears to have the same functionality as Game Commander.

WOW -- that's some super-cool-stuff.

I've built a Shoot XML profile for most of the keyboard commands and shortcuts in LR, if anyone want's a quick base profile to edit for their own needs.

My wife is sure I've lost my mind for good now, though -- I just sit in front of the computer all day and mumble into my headset mic: "develop... adjust white balance... up... up... down... grid... four... right... right... left... loupe... grid... right... reject..." :P