Lightroom & Photoshop

[Tito87]

:
I'm pretty sure this would qualify as a silly question, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Not knowing is bothering me quite a bit. Why do I need to have both, Lightroom and Photoshop? Is there something I'm missing by using only Photoshop? Thanks.

[SusanH1970]

You don't need to have both. Some use only LR, some use only Photoshop. I only use Photoshop. I tried Lightroom several times and hated it. Others I know adore LR and can't live without it.

PS: Not a silly question at all, either.

[Jim Poor]

Originally Posted by Tito87

:
I'm pretty sure this would qualify as a silly question, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Not knowing is bothering me quite a bit. Why do I need to have both, Lightroom and Photoshop? Is there something I'm missing by using only Photoshop? Thanks.

There is no "have to." I suggest downloading the trials of each of the various options out there and see which ones work best for you.

[zona5101]

Photoshop comes with Bridge and Adobe Camera Raw... those two tools are Lightroom , just a bit clunkier...but for the most part the LR functionality is there.

[Tito87]

Originally Posted by SusanH1970

You don't need to have both. Some use only LR, some use only Photoshop. I only use Photoshop. I tried Lightroom several times and hated it. Others I know adore LR and can't live without it.

PS: Not a silly question at all, either.

Thanks a lot. That makes me feel a lot better; I thought I was doing something wrong by not using LR. Now I can go on learning Photoshop. I was thinking: oh no, one more program I need to learn-- I'm having enough trouble as it is, learning Photoshop. Thanks again everybody for your input.

[NicolaB]

I agree that you don't 'need' both, but I would argue if you are going pro that having both will make your life much easier. LR seems to be a love it or hate it application.

I do most of my 'cleaning up' in LR. I find processing such as iris enhance, skin softening etc so much quicker and easier than in CS5. I also use it as my filing system and to create slideshows to load to the web and to send images to flickr without having to create jpegs that would add up on my hard drive.

Virtual files are a great idea (you can have duplicate copies of an image in RAW format and each one can be processed differently without taking up disc space). The history button is great - you can delete one adjustment you made at the start leaving all other changes in place. This is the tip of the iceberg, but I think it is an amazing program.

I use CS5 to do the final adjustment layers eg soft light, graduation filter etc and content aware for getting rid of stuff.

If I could only have one, I would START with LR then add CS5.

oops - your post dropped in whilst I was typing! Feel free to ignore my post ;-) Have a look at the Scott Kelby books. They are great for getting you into the programs. (I should be on commission for these books - lol)

[inkista]

Everything you can do in Lightroom you can do in Bridge/ACR/Photoshop. The reverse is not true. But Lightroom keeps you from having to bop between Bridge, ACR, and Photoshop's different interfaces all the time; the controls are a little more direct, and every edit is reversible, and you won't be wasting space on .PSD versions of the files if you aren't making the kind of adjustments that require Photoshop (e.g., masks and layers).

Lightroom is more streamlined and better suited for specific kinds of photography. The more you head towards digital art, the better off you're going to be spending all your time in Photoshop. The less area-specific/pixel-level manipulation you do, the better off you may be spending all your time in Lightroom.

[Doug Pardee]

Originally Posted by inkista

Lightroom is more streamlined

I think that right there is a big differentiator. If you're processing a couple hundred photos from a shoot, doing them in Lightroom will be so much faster than in Photoshop. But if you're retouching a few special images, Photoshop gives considerably more power.

[Izzy]

I use LR3 for all of my general stuff. Photoshop is for my black and white (silver efex pro) conversions and heavy lifting.

LR3's transferable catalogs, non destructive edits, and keyword tagging just can not be beat.

[DanielLane]

I actually use Bridge for all of my general editing. It includes the same Photo Raw tools as Photoshop. And the edits are non destructive since it's all done in the raw world. Cool thing is, you can even use the raw tools through bridge on a jpeg and it's still non destructive. Bridge stores the data with the jpeg file and you don't have to worry about a thing. Also keyword tagging, copyright embedding and all the other metadata stuff for sorting and cataloging the photos in Bridge is fantastic. I go into photoshop after for any little fine tuning needed, resizing, fine touch ups, etc.