I have an opportunity to purchase CS3 Extended version and Lightroom for a discount student price. I was wondering what peoples suggestions are if I should get one or the other or both.
Buy 'em both. They each offer their own special abilities and together, offer capable tools for most, if not all your imaging software needs. They will serve you well, especially at student level pricing.
Both...they work as a team......Adobe has been around a long time and are not going anywhere. Photodhop has been growing better and better and so will Lightroom
I agree, buy them both. Especially since you can get them at a student discount. Lightroom does the workflow Raw conversion and basic post processing, CS3 will do all the additional post processing you will ever need. They will really compliment each other.
I'm demoing lightroom right now. and I am definately going to buy it (at student pricing). but it also doesn't have quite the functionality that photoshop does. if you can get both. if only one CS3
Lightroom is for developing, cataloging and output of photos.
CS3 is for altering, compositing, adding text etc.
CS3 can do everything lightroom can do, but lightroom cannot do all PS can do.
CS3 is no where near as efficent as LR.
What is most important to you? If you take lots of pictures but don't alter them, then LR is your program. If you want to put an elephant in a tree, then you need PS.
They aren't meant to compete with each other, rather they complement each other. LR you import, make over all adjustments, crop, straighter, apply adjustments to groups, organize the groups, tag images, etc, can print from if you desire, throw together quick web galleries (proofs for clients in a snap). For what I do, I'd say 2/3rds, if not more, of my post work is now taken care of in LR.
For me, I can say that the analogy of getting it right as much as possible in camera so you have the best file to work with in and don't have as much to do in the next step, can be also applied to LR. A killer shot in camera makes it easier to do minor tweaks and corrections, and doing these adjustments makes it much easier to work with in PS. If you have your tweaks taken care of before hand, all I have left is to do retouching and finishing steps. I can also say I can get tired of staring at PS, so looking at a different program is nice, especially when the layout is amazing (go full screen, it's perfect).
Breaking the workflow into smaller, easier steps, makes it much more enjoyable.
For me, it's like this:
Capture -> Backup ->LR -> Tag/Delete ->Adjustments in LR ->Upload Site -> Work on selects in PS -> Backup Finished Files -> Eat a cookie and listen to some music.
Very crucial last step
Buy both while you can, I wish I had when I was still eligible.
If you are a student, you probably can't afford both. It really depends on what you need.
If you do any graphic design, major artistic manipulation of your photos, or ever want to move beyond still photography, you need CS3.
If you shoot events and have to process a large number of still images and get them ready for a customer in a hurry just doing basic changes (WB, curves, exposure, saturation, etc), I don't think you can beat Lightroom.
Get both, but in a pinch, I would choose Lightroom and then down the road see if your work necessitates Photoshop. I actually find Lightroom superior for conducting the basic processing mods like shadows/highlights, curves, WB/tone, etc. It's funny -- if ever I have a problem image that needs a lot of editing and I am not successful in Photoshop, I port it into Lightroom to see what can be done from there. Lightroom tends to process the same commands differently from Photoshop for some reason.
They aren't meant to compete with each other, rather they complement each other. LR you import, make over all adjustments, crop, straighter, apply adjustments to groups, organize the groups, tag images, etc, can print from if you desire, throw together quick web galleries (proofs for clients in a snap). For what I do, I'd say 2/3rds, if not more, of my post work is now taken care of in LR.
I see similar statements all the time. And obviously I'm missing something. I do like certain things about LR, but the problem I have is that all that work is "virtual" and hasn't affected my file at all until I take it into PS and save it there. Then what happens if I am doing a job with 300 or more selected photos? Do I have to do them 1 by 1 in LR, then 1x1 send them into PS? When I can batch process them in Bridge, ammend metadata (not virtually!, and it is attached, saved, one fell swoop!
Is there a way for LR to batch save it all as a permanent file to send the lab without sending it singly to PS?
mkweaver wrote:
Is there a way for LR to batch save it all as a permanent file to send the lab without sending it singly to PS?
Yes, look at the "Export" command in LR. You can write a file in PSD, JPG, or TIFF format that will apply all your LR changes. You can also set the color space (SRGB, Adobe RGB, etc.), and change the size if you wish. It will convert whatever images you have selected, so you can output a single image file, or batch process you whole day's shoot.
