Bought Lightroom 3 and have PS CS4. Upgrade to CS5?

Hello,

I'm using Photoshop CS4 Extended at the moment and I recently bought Lightroom 3. I plan to open RAW files in LR then move to PS if necessary. Do you guys think if this combination works well? Do I even have to consider upgrading to CS5?

BTW I'm not a pro; photography is just a hobby.

Thanks in advance!

You don't need the current version of PS. I'm still using CS3.

If you don't have the matching version of PS - or in particular ACR - then when you choose the "edit in Adobe Photoshop" option, you get a message:

mrcultureshock said:

This version of Lightroom may require the Photoshop Camera Raw plug in version 6.3 [currently] for full compatibility

Click to expand...

It gives you the choice to "Render using Lightroom" or "Open Anyway". Choose Render using Lightroom and everything works.
--
Simon

Thanks for the reply!

Simon Garrett said:

If you don't have the matching version of PS - or in particular ACR - then when you choose the "edit in Adobe Photoshop" option, you get a message:

Simon Garrett said:

This version of Lightroom may require the Photoshop Camera Raw plug in version 6.3 [currently] for full compatibility

Click to expand...

It gives you the choice to "Render using Lightroom" or "Open Anyway". Choose Render using Lightroom and everything works.
--
Simon

Click to expand...

What is it with Adobe? Why do you have to buy multiple software packages to do what you want. Put it all in one package.
--
I never forget a face, but in your case I'll be glad to make an exception.

Lightroom and Photoshop are complementary programs, even though they do share ACR. The major advantage of LR is its file management capabilities, and the major advantage of Photoshop is, well, Photoshop. If you are not into serious editing of your photos, then LR may be all that you really need. If, OTOH, you do occasionally want to do some major image editing, PS is still a much more powerful and flexible tool. I would suggest that you try living with your current set-up for awhile. If you do find yourself using PS occasionally, then I would recommend upgrading to CS5. It is much faster and better than any prior versions.

BTW, does anyone know when CS6 might be released?

Rob

Robgo2 said:

BTW, does anyone know when CS6 might be released?

Click to expand...

No, but:

• CS2: 4/05
• CS3: 4/07
• CS4: 10/08
• CS5: 5/10

So, CS6: 10/11? Not before, I'd imagine.

--
Simon

Simon Garrett said:

If you don't have the matching version of PS - or in particular ACR - then when you choose the "edit in Adobe Photoshop" option, you get a message:

Simon Garrett said:

This version of Lightroom may require the Photoshop Camera Raw plug in version 6.3 [currently] for full compatibility

Click to expand...

It gives you the choice to "Render using Lightroom" or "Open Anyway". Choose Render using Lightroom and everything works.
--
Simon

Click to expand...

I have CS3 and was planning to upgrade to CS5.

Are you saying there is not enough difference to warrant an upgrade?

Thanks...Alan

Ahender said:

Simon Garrett said:

If you don't have the matching version of PS - or in particular ACR - then when you choose the "edit in Adobe Photoshop" option, you get a message:

Ahender said:

This version of Lightroom may require the Photoshop Camera Raw plug in version 6.3 [currently] for full compatibility

Click to expand...

It gives you the choice to "Render using Lightroom" or "Open Anyway". Choose Render using Lightroom and everything works.
--
Simon

Click to expand...

I have CS3 and was planning to upgrade to CS5.

Are you saying there is not enough difference to warrant an upgrade?

Click to expand...

No, only that you don't need to upgrade simply in order to be able to use it with LR3. I was planning to upgrade CS3 to CS6 (when it appears) as you can normally upgrade the previous 3 versions. However, I think my wife is getting me a CS5 upgrade for Christmas!
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Simon

Interesting. I have a camera that isn't supported in acr5. If I purchase the most recent lr will I also receive acr6 and be able to open raw files then transfer to Photoshop for further editing if I want?

The conversion engines in ACR 6 and Lightroom 3 are the same.

I currently use Photoshop CS2 and find it has all the functionality I need, however I purchased LR2 for it's RAW capabilities as it was a cheaper option than upgrading Photoshop – I have Illustrator and InDesign in my package. I will be upgrading to LR3 in the next few days along with a new laptop, I only held off because my old computer was ready for replacing and didn't have enough grunt.

Definitely - ACR 6 is the raw converter that LR3 uses.

Better still, convert to DNG and there are no issues at all with older versions of Photoshop.

You can convert to dng with LR3 on import and at the same time send a second copy of the original raw to archive.

Simple!

peter konzuk said:

Interesting. I have a camera that isn't supported in acr5. If I purchase the most recent lr will I also receive acr6 and be able to open raw files then transfer to Photoshop for further editing if I want?

Click to expand...

As other said, LR3.x has the raw conversion functionality of ACR6.x. However, you don't actually get ACR6.x. You will be able to read raw files for new cameras only in LR, and then edit them in the older PS only by "Edit in Photoshop" in LR.

--
Simon

I have light room 3 and PS3 on the mac and use lightroom first everytime and convert to photoshop only if I have to. I have PS5 on my laptop and find it very handy with some neat upgrades. Issue i face now is the Lightroom and PS3 do not read the new raw files on my 7D which makes them useless. PS5 on the other hand does read them. I guess it depends on what you are doing but CS4 is probably more than sufficient and not worth spending more money to upgrade. Wait for CS6 and you may notice more upgraded features. I love Lightroom.

As far as photo editing is concerned, Lightroom and Photoshop work under completely different approaches. Lightroom is a parametric editor. That means that all changes made in Lightroom are stored as parameters in a database or in a sidecar file, the original image is never modified by Lightroom. The advantage to that is that the original image is always there. And adjustments can easily be removed to restore the ability to see the original image.

Photoshop, on the other hand, is a pixel editor. It makes changes directly to the pixels of the image. In dealing with raw files Photoshop cannot save changes to the raw image. A copy has to be made at some time that reflects both the changes made in ACR as well as the changes made in the Photoshop.

My standard workflow is to do as much as possible in Lightroom. I use Photoshop primarily for heavy-handed adjustments that are sometimes difficult to make in Lightroom. And I use Photoshop to create panorama images. 95% (at least) of what I do is now done in Lightroom only. And because of that, I find that Photoshop CS3 is sufficient. Yes, I realize the panorama feature is better in the new version. But for what I do, CS3 is fine.

Because Lightroom does not modify the original image, when it's time to share those images with others or to send them to a lab to be printed it's necessary to export a copy from Lightroom that contains all those changes. I consider those exported images as disposable images. Once they have served their purpose I usually get rid of them.

The Lightroom workflow is a little different, and somewhat difficult to get accustomed to. I didn't like the idea of having to export copies at first. But now that I have used Lightroom for several years and have adopted that workflow I find it very easy to work with.

For me the upgrade from CS3 to CS5 was well worth it. Three things stand out:

Content aware fill that miraculously removes stuff like telephone wires from images. Adobe demonstrates one image where a person was removed from in front of a wall. While this is a bit extreme, the fill program saves me hours. I can remember the first time I tried to remove a couple of people and some telephone poles from an image using Photoshop 7.0. It took several hours. Now it takes minutes.

An HDR program that is so good that most people I know don't use plug ins any more.

A panorama stitching program that also obviates the need for plug ins.

The HDR and pano programs are so good that they remove ghost images of cars moving from the final image.

By the way, I also upgraded LR to 3.3 and use it even more than I used to.

Simon, hope that your wife does buy you CS5 because Adobe is not allowing upgrades from CS2 to CS5 so odds are that CS3 > CS6 may not be permitted either.

I'm now eagerly looking forward to Christmas!
--
Simon

Richard Ullakko2 said:

What is it with Adobe? Why do you have to buy multiple software packages to do what you want. Put it all in one package.

Click to expand...

This is increasingly what is happening. ACR and Lightroom were once considered "add-ons" to Photoshop. But after a couple of versions, now you read about more and more people (and I'm one of them) saying that 95% of their images go through Lightroom and never touch Photoshop. If Adobe is making it possible for us replace their $700 new/$200 upgrades app with their $300/$99 app, I'm not going to complain too much...

Oh, and there is one more thing, the two sides of the same complaint.

"What is it with the multiple software packages, put them all together in one!"
(three weeks later)
"What is it with the feature bloat in today's software, make it simpler!"

As long as there is more than one type of user, users will always fight amongst ourselves about what is essential and what is bloat, what to combine and what to split off.