Hello all,

Sorry for the bonehead question, but I have Photoshop Elements 5.0 but keep on hearing great things about Lightroom 2.0, which is about four times the price. What does Lightroom give me that PE doesn't?

Also, I've been shooting in highest quality jpeg but plan on tinkering with RAW soon. Anyhoo, I wanted to add two shots of a cardinal i took from my bedroom. The first is just cropped (a bit off the left and bottom) and resized; the second is post-processed by lightening shadows and adding sharpness. What else am I supposed to be doing in post-processing? All I ever do really is lighten shadows/darken highlights when needed, and add sharpness (and sometimes remove a distracting branch, speck of dirt, etc).

Thanks all!

Original, plus resized and cropped:


Lighten shadows, sharpened:

Well there are tons of threads on various forums about raw vs jpg. just keep in mind that with raw you have a lot more information to start with. Whether or not you use it or need it is your choice. I recommend raw, but ymmv.
If you do shoot raw, then I highly recommend LR. It does a lot with jpg too, but really shines with raw. Plus the DAM functionality is great too.
Its not a question of either/or. For a complete post processing system you need both LR and Elements. As great as LR is, there are still some things that you need a pixel editor for. Removing that branch, for example, is one.
All I have ever used is elements. But when I started shooting raw I got LR. Now I rarely go to elements. The more you use it the more you find you can do with it.
Many books have been written about the good things in LR, so it's hard to include it all in just a post here. If you keep searching you'll find plenty to read about LR. If there's any way to get a student or teacher discount you can get it for about $100.
OH, very nice shot of the cardinal.

I always say, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it..." Yes, you can do wonderful things with Lightroom 2 but if what you have is giving you what you want, why change? And as the user above notes, LR does not permit you "remove a branch" or crop an image. For that you'd need to send the image back to Elements, or in my case to Photoshop.

No doubt the tools that are available to improve our photos are wonderful but they are also often expensive. There is nothing wrong with making the investment. It does, after all, stimulate the economy. Hopefully, common sense will prevail, however, and we won't throw money away when we don't need to. It's your call, of course.

What you did with the image above is fine.

You can download a free trial version and see for yourself if LR is right for you ... there are also a ton of free video tutorials as well as many good paid sites like Lynda.com or Kelby Training where you can also get a trial membership for more in-depth info.

I would work at improving your expertise in Photoshop (Elements)

Here I altered levels (selectively), added contrast through USM at unusual settings and sharpened more.

I used CS4 - but you can probably do it in Elements just as well.

Try the Lynda.com website for tutorials $25 per month - and possibly upgrade to a more recent version of Elements too. )

CGrindahl, LR does have a crop function, as well as a straighten function. And the spot removal function, when done well, can remove more than just spots, it could remove the branch you're talking about.

I've used Elements 5 for 2 years but I recently switched to LR. For someone familiar with Elements who shoots RAW (like I do) the best explanation would be that LR is the Elements camera RAW module plus the more advanced ACR capabilities of CS4 (like tone curves) plus basic functions of Elements plus a photo organizer in one program.

If most of what you do to your photos is straighten, crop, adjust colors and levels, remove blemishes and sharpen you may rarely need anything more than LR. That has been my experience and having everything in one has speeded up my workflow.

Having said that, I don't think LR is worth $300, but at $100 for the academic discount (which you can use if you have kids in school or are in school yourself) it is.

+1
I started with PS Elements and could not clearly see a role for LR in the first version. Version 2 was a big step forward and now I am using (and learning as fast as possible) LR almost exclusively. Some good resources (videos mentioned and books) are available.
BTW, regarding the crop feature, it is there in LR but I did not find it at first blush.