Photshop v Lightroom

[GhostDriver]

Have been using photoshop for many many years, and know my way around it very well.

I see on tutorials most pros use lightroom for editing RAW and then use photoshop for composition, touching up etc.

I presently do everything in PS, is it worth learning LR? Are there better tools in there or should I just stick with what I know?

Thanks

[Mr Will]

Photoshop can do everything that Lightroom can do and more. Everything that Lightroom can do, it does a lot quicker and easier than Photoshop.

Want to edit one photo to perfection for printing? Photoshop.
Want to edit one thousand photos for proofs/flickr? Lightroom.

[MysteryLemon]

Lightroom is very good for grabbing a batch of images and processing them.

What Lightroom can't do is edit photos. This is where Photoshop comes in.

If I'm processing a batch of photos I've just taken, I go straight to Lightroom. Here I adjust the levels and saturation etc. to how I am happy. I then take the images I want to edit and put them into Photoshop to tweek.

As above. Photoshop can do everything lightroom can do and far, far more but Lightroom makes what it does far easier than it is to do in Photoshop.

I often see people comparing these two programs and they aren't really comparable Imo. Both intended for totally different uses. It's like comparing MS word to MS Publisher. Publisher can write a letter and far, far more but its far easier and quicker to write a letter in word as that's what it's designed for.

[peter tdci]

For me, the big benefit of LR is how it lets me organise my images by using its catalogues, collections, key words etc. All this is independent of any system I might use to store them on my computer/network.

[RobbieKB]

I find LR avoids banding where PS doesn't, that's my primary motivation. The image quality of RAW files edited in LR rather than converted and edited in PS is generally a lot higher, albeit not always the case.

[StuH]

RobbieKB said:

I find LR avoids banding where PS doesn't, that's my primary motivation. The image quality of RAW files edited in LR rather than converted and edited in PS is generally a lot higher, albeit not always the case.

They both use the same Adobe RAW processing engine, so output should be identical.

I use both in my workflow, but with the increasing ability of LR5 to carry out edits that I would previously have done in PS, I spend a lot more time using it now.

[SonicShadow]

Lightroom is essentially Adobes Camera Raw converter wrapped up in an excellent interface, with library management and some basic brush / spot healing tools included.

If you mainly make adjustments in the Raw converter, apply tone curves, adjust colour balance etc in Photoshop, then you should consider switching to Lightroom.

If you do a lot of cloning, brushing, mult shot work (HDR, Panos, etc),heavy editing etc, then stick to Photoshop.

Its worth mentioning that the two applications integrate with each other, so you can do all your management and Raw editing in LR, then export straight to PS from LR for any heavy editing.

[flat-planedCrank]

GhostDriver said:

Have been using photoshop for many many years, and know my way around it very well.

I see on tutorials most pros use lightroom for editing RAW and then use photoshop for composition, touching up etc.

I presently do everything in PS, is it worth learning LR? Are there better tools in there or should I just stick with what I know?

Thanks

As folks have said, it's a good tool to use in conjunction with PS.

If you take 1000 shots over a weekend, need to sort through them, rate them, then do some 'global' changes like contrast, exposure, curves, etc. then Lightroom is great. I'd guess it does 90% of what most people want...

If you need fine-grain control: layers, complex masking, etc. then PS is obviously the tool to use.


If you're used to PS then I wouldn't imagine it'd take you long to learn most of LR. Lots of free videos online, think Adobe do a free 30 day trial too? Might as well give it a go

[GhostDriver]

Many thanks for all the replies.
I think for where I am now, its not needed, but in the future will definitely look to use it

[Mattt]

Worth considering the deal on at the moment for $10/month for both Lightroom and Photoshop CC.

[budfox]

RobbieKB said:

I find LR avoids banding where PS doesn't, that's my primary motivation. The image quality of RAW files edited in LR rather than converted and edited in PS is generally a lot higher, albeit not always the case.

The banding of which you speak is probably quantizing caused by working at 8 bits/channel in Photoshop.

Take a graduated sky. 8 bits/channel *only* allows for 16million colours, but surprisingly that isn't enough to produce a perfect graduation on a very subtle change of a large area.

In Lightroom you're probably working at 12 or 14 bits/ channel and the problems go away.

Note two things though: This might be monitor/graphics card related instead, but the point about 24 bit colour is a valid one. Also, when saving as a .jpg, only 24 bit colour is possible, so even if you're not seeing banding in Photoshop, the resultant .jpg can still exhibit the problem.

[tenohfive]

StuH said:

I use both in my workflow, but with the increasing ability of LR5 to carry out edits that I would previously have done in PS, I spend a lot more time using it now.

I'm exactly the same. 95% of my photo's stay in Lightroom 5, it's only for more complex cloning etc that I switch across to PS.

[Phunk]

Or, get both for less than £9 a month:

https://creative.adobe.com/plans/offer/photoshop+l...