In comparison the public
beta, and as forewarned, the release
version of Lightroom 2.0 doesn't contain many new features.
Nonetheless, there
are a good number of enhancements to those first seen in the public
beta. Most of the new features were probably already in
development but
weren't ready for the public beta. As for the enhancements, well, some
were planned, but in some cases Adobe
obviously took on board user feedback. This
latter point may come as surprise to some readers, but it shouldn't,
especially when some of the Lightroom and Camera Raw engineers were
active participants in the beta forum.
During the public beta
period Adobe were particularly keen to receive feedback on: the
Local brush adjustments,
the Library filter tools,
and the refinements to output
sharpening. So, it should come as
no surprise to find that the
new and improved features since the public beta are:
-
Improved local adjustment brushes (including a
sharpening brush)
-
Gradient tool with custom toning
-
Enhanced Folder and Collection view
-
Enhanced keyword filtering
-
Lightroom Web, Export and Metadata SDK
-
Significant Camera Profile enhancements including a
dedicated profile editing application
Since much of the material in my earlier public beta
preview is still current
it would be worthwhile reading it along with this feature review. You can
access it by pressing the link button below. The preview will
open in a separate window, so it shouldn't interfere with reading this
page.
Note: A Swedish translation of this feature
review is available at:
http://www.ekdahl.org/kurs/lr2_review/lr2-review-1.htm. The
translation was undertaken by Lars Ekdahl who has undertaken a similar
exercise for other material on this site.
The following table lists the new and enhanced
features found in Lightroom 2.0:
|
Workflow: |
Simplified organisational tools in Library |
| |
Volume Management View |
| |
Smart Collections |
| |
Keyword Suggestions |
| |
Enhanced Keyword List |
| |
Enhanced Search and Filter Panel |
| |
Dual
Monitor Support |
| |
64-bit native on Mac and Windows. |
| |
Output-specific Collections |
| |
Metadata SDK for custom metadata |
| |
|
|
Develop: |
Post
Crop Vignette |
| |
Local Adjustment Brush and Gradient Filter for: Exposure, Brightness,
Contrast, Saturation, Clarity, Sharpening and custom toning |
| |
Support for new camera profiling technology via DNG Profile Editor |
| |
Additional detail view window for Noise Reduction and Sharpening |
| |
|
|
Output: |
Slideshow Export to JPEG |
| |
Enhanced colour selection dialog box for backgrounds and borders |
| |
Output sharpening for print and output to screen |
| |
Print Package with automatic cell layout |
| |
16-bit printing on Mac |
| |
Web
SDK for third party gallery support |
| |
Export SDK |
| |
Lightroom Exchange for community plug-in interaction |
| |
|
So, of the features most requested both before and
during the public beta, which didn't make the cut?
At first glance little appears to have changed within
the Library module. The Library still remains the heart of Lightroom in
so far as it's the module that provides most of the tools for managing
your photographic assets. Imported photos can be viewed in the Library
in various modes or views, which include: Grid view (G), Loupe view
(E), Compare view (C) and Survey view (N). Each of these
views is intended for a
specific purpose in your workflow, but you may find one view more
useful than others. Grid view allows you see large
numbers of photos as thumbnails whilst at the same time providing a
workspace for applying labels, ratings, keywords, flags and even quick
development adjustments to photos in bulk. On the other hand, Loupe
view restricts these actions to a single photo. Compare and Survey
views are designed to make the tasks of rating and flagging easier,
although some users will find the absence of a 1:1 view in Survey view
still limits its usefulness when a trying to decide between more than
two near enough identical photos.
Figure 1 - Library module Grid view (Click image for larger view)
If you have been using
Lightroom 1.x for any length of time you'll no doubt be aware that the
handling offline photos was particularly painful. In fact, pretty much
any task associated with moving your photos into, within or out of
Lightroom could be painfully slow when large numbers of photos were
involved. The process of moving photos around was also made more
complex by the fact that there was no obvious visual link to how they
were stored on your computer hard disks. Enter the new Volume
Browser (figure 2 below).
|
 |
|
Photo Count |
Disk Space |
Connection Status |
Figure 2 - Click image for larger view
The new Volume Browser displays your folders by volume
(disk drive) in alphabetical order. Sadly, there is no user sort order
for volumes or folders, maybe next time. From the screen shots shown in
Figures 2 and 3 it should obvious that this new approach to displaying
and managing folders is a significant improvement on Lightroom 1.x. Not
only is the Volume Browser more intuitive to use, but it's also much
faster in operation.
 |
 |
Figure 3 - Volume Browser with context menus for
Volume information and management
|
In capturing the screen shots for figures 2 and 3 I
have attempted to show as many of the mini features as possible. For
example, Figure 2 shows the various volume statistics (photo count,
disk capacity, connection status) along with the status LED. When a
disk is connected (online) and has plenty of spare capacity the LED
will show green. But, when a disk is disconnected (offline) the status
LED and menu bar will be dimmed. The volume status bar can be
configured via a context menu
Other changes and improvements from the old Folder
panel include:
-
It's no longer possible to rename a folder by double
clicking its name, however, a Rename option is provided in the folder
context menu.
-
Subfolders can be promoted by clicking on the
Promote Subfolders command. For example, in figure 3 above the
subfolders located within DNG Photo Library can be arranged so that
they are directly below the volume name MacPro RAID. They still reside
with the DNG Photo Library folder, so no actual folders have been
deleted or photos relocated. This command is only available in the
context menu when the selected folder is displayed as the top level or
parent. The Add Parent Folder command can be used to reverse
Promote Subfolders command.
-
Save Metadata allows you to save metadata to all files
within a selected folder without having to first preselect the actual
photos. This can help reduce the lag we many users experienced in Lightroom 1.x
because it avoids having to first accumulate the metadata for the
individual photos.
-
The Update Folder Location command is used to
point to a new or alternative location for the selected folder. It uses
the a dialog broadly similar to the Finder (Mac) or Explorer
(Windows) to locate the new/alternative location. I show an example
of how this command can be used in a tutorial mentioned later.
Import
I
closed off "What's
new and improved" above on a negative
note. So, let's look at a few positives.
First up. Adobe have managed to further
increase the size of files that can be imported directly into the
Lightroom catalog. Remember, with version 1.x the limit was 10,000
pixels on the longest side, this was increased to 30,000 pixels in
the public beta. However, with the final release the maximum dimension
for the longest side has been increased to a staggering 65,000 pixels (i.e.
a 512 Megapixel image). No doubt the Gigapixel brigade will be
disappointed, maybe next time.
The item next may come as something of a surprise. As noted above Lightroom 2.0 does not
support CMYK files, which is no doubt a disappointment to
many photographers. However, to coincide with the release of Lightroom
2.0 I have published a
tutorial
that explains how CMYK files can indeed be imported into your Lightroom
catalog, albeit indirectly. I should warn that the method discussed
in the tutorial is unofficial. So, please remember that you use it at
your own risk. The following screen shot shows a selection
of CMYK files within my master catalog.
Figure 4 - Grid view displaying CMYK files (Click image for larger
view)
Export
As was the case with the public beta Lightroom 2.0
includes the ability to automatically export your photos back
to their original folder. You can also export photos back into your
catalog and stack them along with the original. You can even apply
adaptive Output Sharpening for print or screen. For example, in
the Print module you can define the paper type (Glossy or Matte)
and Lightroom will automatically adapt the amount of sharpening that is
applied to the photo being spooled to the printer or saved to the
JPEG print-file.
Figure 5 - Export dialog with new ICC profile options
The main changes from the public beta relate to
the controls for sharpening and a much improved SDK for
creating export plug-ins. In the case of output sharpening we still
have three settings but Medium has now been replaced with Standard (i.e. the default). Also by popular request, Lightroom 2.0 via Export
dialog now has the ability to select from any RGB ICC profile installed
in your ColorSync or ICC Color folder. Simply select "Other" in the
File Settings pop-up and check all those ICC profiles you want
access to from within Lightroom. I have shown ColorMatch RGB as an
example in figure 5 above.
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