|
What are the headline features
of Lightroom 3?
From the outset Lightroom 3 was never going to be
packed with a long list of headline grabbing features. Sure there would
be some, but these would in the main be spin offs from Camera Raw 6.
For Lightroom as a whole, the key objective was simple - make Lightroom
the "best in class" application for digital photographers.
Lightroom 3 beta 1
saw the first moves down this path when Adobe went back to the drawing
board with the aim of improving interactive performance (i.e. scrolling
and module switching) and image quality. The first beta provided
users with an opportunity to comment on the architectural changes and
some of the new and enhanced features. For example, raw conversion and
colour noise reduction algorithms were substantially overhauled in beta
1, but the absence of luminance noise meant that the benefits were to
some degree masked. Luminance noise reduction was added for
Lightroom 3 beta 2, and was very
favourably received.
With the final version we get
a few more new features. For example, both automatic and manual
lens corrections, some tweaks to the Auto Tone algorithms, and IPTC
extensions. The following table lists the headline features that
you'll find in Lightroom 3:.
denotes new since beta 2
|
Workflow & Library: |
Faster thumbnail scrolling and module switching |
|
|
Completely redesigned import dialog |
|
|
Publish Collections |
|
|
Backup on exit |
|
|
Enhanced sorting (i.e. sort by aspect ratio) |
|
|
Enhanced collection and smart collection functionality |
|
|
Import CMYK files |
|
|
New thumbnail badge to show when photo is in a Collection |
|
|
Import DSLR video files |
|
|
Tethered Capture |
|
|
Animation in Library Histogram |
|
|
Optimise catalog command included in File menu |
|
|
Improved preview quality |
|
|
New Library module keyboard shortcuts for more efficient
module switching |
|
|
IPTC extensions in Metadata panel
 |
|
|
Lens and focal length added to Metadata filter bar and Smart
Collections  |
|
|
|
|
Develop: |
Improved raw conversion |
|
|
Improved sharpening |
|
|
Improved colour noise reduction |
|
|
Improved luminance noise reduction |
|
|
Point Curve in Tone Curve panel |
|
|
Process versions renamed to 2003 and 2010 (Current) |
|
|
Process version switch via pop-up menu in Camera Calibration panel |
|
|
New Grain filter |
|
|
Improved Post-crop vignette |
|
|
Collections panel added |
|
|
Simplified local adjustment brush and graduated filter panel |
|
|
Automatic profile based lens corrections
 |
|
|
Manual lens and perspective corrections
 |
|
|
New develop presets
 |
|
|
|
|
Output: |
Enhanced slideshow export, which includes HD video |
|
|
Export video files as originals |
|
|
Ability to limit file size on export |
|
|
Music selection on Mac simplified and decoupled from iTunes |
|
|
Sync slideshow length to duration of selected music track |
|
|
Custom Print Package allowing free-form layout of multiple photos on
a page |
|
|
Enhanced watermarking |
|
|
New templates for Web and Print modules
 |
|
|
Enhanced Software Development Kit (SDK)
 |
|
|
|
Raw Image Processing
Enhancements
I have already mentioned that the raw conversion,
noise reduction and sharpening algorithms had been significantly reworked for
Lightroom 3.
In fact, the extent of the changes mean that for the first
time since the Camera Raw Plug-in was released in 2003, it was necessary
for Adobe to introduce the concept of
Process Versions (i.e.
Process Version 2003 and Process Version 2010 (Current)). The
names represent the year in which the processing technology was
introduced, which should give you an idea of how often Adobe plan on
updating the process version.
By default, photos that contain develop
adjustments from previous versions of Lightroom (i.e. 1 and 2) or
versions of Camera Raw right up to version 5.7 will use process version
2003. However, freshly imported photos will use PV 2010. It's
when a catalog contains images with both process versions that users will notice
the difference between the two, both in terms of image quality and
increased preview rendering times. In my opinion, the improvements in
image quality, particularly high ISO colour and luminance noise, are so
great that the small increase time required to render the previews is worth
it.
Tip - the
new noise reduction and sharpening algorithms only apply to PV 2010
photos, PV 2003 photos will be rendered using the same noise reduction
and sharpening algorithms as previous versions of Lightroom (i.e.
Lightroom 1
and 2) and all versions of Camera Raw up to 5.7.
Performance in general has improved as the beta cycle
progressed, and users should find that
thumbnail scrolling and module switching are much smoother than
in earlier versions. However,
the very substantial improvements in image quality mentioned above have come at the
cost of reduced non-interactive performance. In particular,
preview rendering will likely be slightly slower than it was in Lightroom 2,
especially when working with PV 2010 photos. To ensure the best balance
between quality and performance Adobe have put a fair amount of
engineering time and effort into developing an adaptive system when
applying noise reduction and sharpening to previews for PV 2010 photos. For it to work well the engineers had to profile the noise
characteristics of each supported camera over a wide range of ISO
values. The operation of this
adaptive system are quite complex and therefore beyond the scope of
this review. Nevertheless, when it comes to noise
reduction and sharpening of previews, you can be fairly confident that Lightroom 3 will
do the right thing in most circumstances.
Tip - Working with
Lightroom 3 and Adobe Photoshop Camera Raw 6
Lightroom and Photoshop Camera Raw share the same
image processing technology to ensure consistent and compatible
results across applications that support raw processing. These
applications include Photoshop CS5, Photoshop Elements 8 and Premiere
Elements 8. These applications must be updated with the Camera Raw
6.1 plug-in in order to ensure full compatibility with Lightroom 3
develop module settings. Refer to Lightroom 3 read-me document for
more details on inter-application compatibility.
Library Module and Workflow
Enhancements
There haven't been any UI changes in the Library
module since beta 2, which means that the
overall appearance should be familiar to anyone
who already uses Lightroom 2 or has tried either of the two public betas. The Library
continues to be at 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.
These 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 the your workflow, but you may find
one view more useful than others. For example, Grid view allows
you see large numbers of photos as thumbnails whilst at the same time
providing a workspace for applying metadata, labels, ratings, keywords,
flags, and even quick development adjustments to photos in bulk. On the
other hand, Loupe view allows you to view a single photo as well as
zooming up to 11x of the original. This view is particularly use for
checking sharpness and focus. The "gotcha" with Loupe view is that restricts rating, labelling, keywording, etc
to a single photo. Compare and Survey are specialist views designed to
make the tasks of comparing, rating and flagging multiple photos
easier.

Figure 1 - Library module
Grid view
Other minor, but nonetheless important enhancements within the Library module
include:
-
Match Total Exposures commands added to
Develop Settings menu
-
Collections can be created directly within a collection
set by right-clicking on the collection set photos can be sorted by
aspect ratio
-
The name of a collection is displayed when an photo is
added to a target collection
-
Stack badges can now be toggled on or off independently
in the filmstrip via an interface preference
-
Stack behaviour on double-clicking on stack count badge
now expands the stack with all photos selected
-
Erasing with the spray paint tool now requires the use
of the Alt key
-
When the �spray can� is used to add an photo to a
collection, the collection name is now displayed upon application
-
Select a folder in the Library module and choose a new
option Import to here to launch the import dialog with that
folder preselected as the destination
-
Loupe view in import dialog supports large preview for photos on flash memory card
-
Import dialog defaults to New Photos when
accessed via the Synchronize Folder command
-
The option to include items from subfolders has been
included in the primary Folder panel drop down menu
-
Choose Library -> Show Missing Photos to locate
offline or missing photos
-
Choose Library -> Find Previous Process Photos
to locate photos first processed in earlier versions of Lightroom
-
Attributes filter bar includes icon for
filtering video files
-
Ability to define the limit file size in Export dialog
-
An icon has been added to grid thumbnails to indicate
that an photo is part of a collection. Click on that icon to view
and/or visit the collection
-
Favourite sources can be added to the filmstrip source
pop-up menu for quick access to specific collections or folders
-
Flash State, Lens and Focal Length are now included as part of the
metadata filter bar and smart
collection filter criteria
Tethered Capture
As mentioned above, there are relatively few major
enhancements to the Library module since Lightroom 2. Nevertheless, those
that have been included should please a lot of users. For
example, Lightroom 3 includes support for Tethered Capture,
albeit limited to a selection of DSLR cameras from Canon and Nikon.
Support for other camera makes may come at a future date, but this is very
much dependent on the vendor making their SDK available.
Using Tethered Capture is relatively easy. First, you
choose Library -> Tethered Capture. This opens the Tethered
Capture Settings panel (shown in figure 2 below). The panel is used to
configure the location for storing the captured photos, any metadata
that wish to apply, etc.

Figure 2 - Tethered
Capture Settings
When the settings panel is configured to your
requirements, click the OK button. At this point the tethered capture
control panel will open (shown in figure 3 below). Pressing the large
silver button will trigger the camera shutter, as will pressing the
Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+T keyboard combination. The Develop Settings pop-up
menu is used to choose from any of the Camera Raw profiles
already installed on your computer.

Figure 3 - Tethered Capture control panel
The control panel can be hidden by clicking on the
circle button located below the Close (X) button on the right
side of the panel. Alternatively, the panel can be hidden by pressing
on
the Cmd/Ctrl+T keys. Unfortunately, the control panel
doesn't support remote adjustment of camera controls such as shutter
speed, aperture or ISO; nor does it support the "Live View"
feature found in
many recent DSLRs.
Video File Support
Another commonly requested feature is support for
DSLR
Video Files. However, as with Tethered Capture the support for
video files is rather limited. In short, you can import the video files, view the index frame as a thumbnail in Grid view or full-size in Loupe
view (shown in figure 4 below), and export the files in their original
format, but you cannot edit them or even review them in Lightroom,
Instead,. to view a video file, you press the camera badge either on
the thumbnail or loupe window to launch an external viewer such
as QuickTime (Mac) or Windows Media Player (Windows).

Figure 4 - Video file support
Import
The concept
underlying the new import dialog was to make it look and feel like it
was part of Lightroom. In many ways the development team achieved their
objective, but during the beta cycle some users have expressed the view
that they would have liked them to go further. For example, a common
request was that the dialog could be resized and have adjustable side
panels, etc. Alas, most of this type of request goes well beyond the
scope of changes that the development team had scope to undertake.
So, lets focus on what we did get. By default, the import dialog will open into the expanded mode
(shown in figure 5 below). This
view makes it much easier to visualise the whole process of importing
your images. The Source devices and volumes are listed on the
left side and Destination on the right side panel tracks. It's
also important to note that, unlike Lightroom 1 and 2, which only gave
access to folders that contained photos, Lightroom 3 displays all disk
drives and folders, irrespective of whether they contain photos or not.
This applies to both the source and destinations panels. Some users
have found this behaviour quite irritating, whereas others have
recognised the benefits of being able to look across the
entire disk drive and folder structure on their computer or network. In
effect, the import dialog has become a File Browser, albeit
limited in what it can do with the files and folders.

Figure 5 - Expanded view
of Lightroom 3 Import dialog
The thumbnail (Grid) view of the photos is located in between
the two panel tracks. From here, individual photos can be
included or excluded by clicking on the checkmark. However, it's also
possible to use keyboard shortcuts whilst scrolling through the
thumbnails (e.g. P = Pick, U = Unpick, X = Unpick).
Holding down the Shift key whilst applying a shortcut will auto advance
to next photo. Applying develop presets, keywords, metadata, etc is all
done on dedicated panels within the Destination panel track. Likewise
renaming photos on import and defining the initial preview size. It's
even possible to switch between Grid view (G) and Loupe view (E),
and there is even a zoom tool (Spacebar) that allows scaling
from 1:4 through 11:1. This is also possible when browsing
a Compact Flash or SD memory card.

Figure 6 - Import dialog
in File Browser Loupe mode
In addition to the expanded mode the Import dialog also
includes a compact mode (shown in figure 7 below). This mode removes
most of the complexity associated with the Source and Destination
panels. The idea with this arrangement is that the source and
destination can be quickly identified via Import Presets that
will already
have been configured by the user.

Figure 7 - Import dialog Compact mode
Readers already familiar with the new import dialog
will probably be thinking that the shipping version isn't any different
to the betas. Well, as
mentioned above a lot has changed since beta 1, less so since beta 2.
The changes are subtle and a lot of them not immediately obvious to
the user. For example, the performance enhancements only become
apparent when you browse folders with large numbers of photos (i.e.
thumbnails and photo enumeration has been speeded up significantly). A
more obvious enhancement can be seen in Grid view. Actually,
there are three alternative Grid views i.e., All Photos,
New Photos and Destination Folders. The first (All
Photos) lets you see all of the photos within a given folder or
subfolder. By default, if a photo is already in the catalog it will be
greyed out and unchecked. The second view (New Photos) only shows
photos that are not already in the catalog. This is the default view
when the import dialog is accessed from the Synchronize Folder
command. The last thumbnail view (Destination Folders) separates the
photos into the folder structure that you've chosen in the Destination
panel. Compact mode also provides support for adding keywords and
metadata preset.
|
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
 |
All Photos
|
New Photos
|
Destination Foldr
|
Figures 8a - 8c - Import dialog Grid views
(click images for larger view)
Lightroom 3 will import the following file
formats:
In addition to RGB, Lightroom 3 will also allow
the import of CMYK*, LAB and Greyscale files.
* Any output, with the exception of export original,
or develop adjustments to these files will take place in an RGB color
space.
Publish Services
Publish Services is intended to help users
publish photos to their favourite file sharing site directly from
within the Lightroom Library module. At present there is only a plug-in
for Flikr, but the SDK has all the "hooks" necessary for similar
plug-ins to be developed for SmugMug, etc. The current plug-in
gives you direct access to the Flickr photo sharing site. Obviously,
you will need a Flickr account before the feature can be used, but set up the connection
within Lightroom 3 is fairly straightforward. Simply click on the Flickr Set Up button within the
Publish Collections panel. This button opens the Lightroom
Publishing Manager window as shown in figure 9 below.

Figure 9 - Lightroom
Publishing Manager
The name you use within the Publishing Manager must be
the same name as you use when connecting to Flickr via a web browser.
The account must also be activated from within Lightroom before your
Flickr Photostream will become available within the Publish
Collection panel. Once the account has been activated publishing your
photos to Flickr is a simple matter of dragging your photos on to the
Photostream collection then pressing the Publish button.
Lightroom 3 will automatically begin the process of uploading the
photos to Flickr. Figure 10 below shows how Lightroom 3 displays the
progress of the upload.

Figure 10 - Display of
Photo Publishing in progress
Viewing the photos after they have been published to Flickr is relatively straightforward - right click on the Photostream
to open the context menu then choose Go to Published Collection.
Assuming you have an active internet connection Lightroom will launch your
default web browser at the Flickr page containing your photos.

Figure 11 - View Published images at Flickr
Clicking on the Publish button any time after the
photos have been published to Flickr will import any comments, ratings,
etc that viewer may have posted to your Photostream. These will be
displayed in the dedicated Comments panel located on the right
side panel track, just below the Metadata panel (see figure 12 below).
Flickr Pro Account holders can subsequently modify their photos and
republish them to Flickr using the same procedure as described above.

Figure 12 - Photostream Comments
Prior to Adobe including
this feature in Lightroom I had never used my Flickr Pro account, but
having the ability to manage photos from within the application was too
good an opportunity to miss. You can view some of my photo galleries at
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ian_lyons/
All of these galleries were uploaded and managed from within the
Lightroom 3 beta.
Library Filter Bar
The Library Filter Bar was first added in
Lightroom 2. At the time many were critical of the amount of screen
area that it took up, but were even more vociferous in their criticism
of the developers decision to make the metadata filter operate at local
level. Screams of "where have my photos gone" were common on the
Lightroom User to User forum. Even worse was the decision to make the filter sticky.
Thankfully, the latter two criticisms have been addressed in Lightroom
3, although we now have another group of users screaming that the
change messes up their workflow. Seems like Adobe can't win with this
particular tool. Anyway, back to what we have now. By toggling the padlock button on the top right corner
open/close you can dictate whether Lightroom will apply the selected
filter to an individual folders/collections (local) or to all
folders/collections (global).

Figure 13 - Library Filter Bar (Metadata view)
A Video File filter badge is included adjacent to the Virtual Copies filter
badge the Attributes section of the Library Filter Bar.
It's shown in figure 14 below as the icon with the red boundary.
Clicking on this icon when viewing particular folder/collection will
display all video files in that folder/collection. Clicking on it when
viewing All Photographs will return all video files contained
within your catalog.

Figure 14 - Library Filter Bar (Attribute view)
The Filter Bar is undoubtedly quite powerful, but it is
also somewhat obtuse in terms of how it works. For example, many users
struggle to get their heads around the actual filtering logic used within the
Text section. It's really not that complex, but for the benefit of new
users, it's worth repeating some of the description I provided in my
review of Lightroom 2.
There are four sections to the Filter Bar:
Text,
Attributes, Metadata and None. The first three are
used for a filtered search of the contents of your catalog and the last
(i.e. None) is used to switch the Filter Bar off. The Filter Bar is
activated from the
Library>View menu or by pressing on the '\' key. You can
use the Cmd/Ctrl+L keyboard combination to toggle on/off the
last filter you used.
By default, the Metadata filter contains four columns, but is easily configured to display between 1
and 8 columns (i.e. via menu on the top right corner of each column).
The actual column layout can be saved as a custom preset by clicking on
the Custom Filter pop-up located on the top right corner of the
Filter Bar. Figure 13 above shows an example of the Metadata filter in use.
One of the most useful aspects of the Filter Bar
is filtering by keyword. The Filter Bar uses 'AND' between the
columns and filtering within a column is an 'OR' function (i.e.
hold down Ctrl/Cmd key then make appropriate selections within
column). Using multiple keyword columns it is therefore possible for
both 'AND' and 'OR' keyword filtering.
As mentioned above, the Filter Bar is also the location
in which text based searches and attribute based filtering is carried
out. The rule set for text based searches has changed little since
Lightroom 1.x and they remain relatively self explanatory. However,
it's worth mentioning a few of the less obvious filtering rules that
come in handy for fine-tuned searches within the text entry field. For
example, placing a '+' at the beginning of a word is the same as
Starts With, placing a '+' at the the end of a word is the
same as Ends With, and placing a '!' at the beginning of
a word is the same as Doesn't Contain. Also, worth noting that
the Attribute bar now contains White and Gray label chips for Custom
Label and No Label respectively. Finally, multiple filters
are activated by shift clicking the respective filter name (e.g. click
Text then Shift+click Attribute followed by Shift+click
Metadata).
IPTC Extensions
Many Lightroom users will already be familiar with the
IPTC Core schema for metadata. Users add their data into
predefined fields in the Metadata panel, which can then be saved to the
image file or used directly within Lightroom for searching, etc. For
Lightroom 3 Adobe have added the recently introduced IPTC Extension
schema for XMP. This is a supplemental schema to the IPTC Core, and
provides:
-
fields for additional information about the content
of the image, e.g. name or location shown in the image, an
organisation or event featured by the image, etc
-
fields to improve administration, e.g. for a globally
unique identifier
-
fields for cultural heritage photos, including a
title, a creator, a creation date and information about the source
fields to precisely define the licensing and the copyrights of a
photograph.
-
Currently, there appears to be little, if any other
support for IPTC Extensions with Lightroom 3. For example, none of the
fields are explicitly mentioned in smart collections or metadata filter
bar.

Figure 15 - IPTC Extensions in Metadata Panel
Develop Module
On 27th April 2010 Tom Hogarty, the Lightroom Product
Manager, blogged about a previously unseen feature to be included in
the final release version of Lightroom 3. This new feature is Lens Corrections, and
will be discussed over the next few paragraphs.
Automatic Corrections
The new lens corrections in
Lightroom 3 can be sub-divided into two categories - automatic lens
corrections that are based on lens profiles, and manual corrections.
The automatic corrections use lens profiles created by Adobe or custom
profiles created by you or a third party using the new Adobe Lens
Profile Creator application. Adobe has included an extensive range
of lens profiles for Canon Nikon cameras, although not every lens in
the respective manufacturers catalogue is covered. They have also
included an array of profiles created by Sigma. These profiles are
compatible with cameras from Canon, Nikon, Olympus, Pentax and Sony.
Whether other lens manufacturers come on board is yet to be seen.
|
 |
 |
Automatic Corrections
|
Manual Corrections
|
Figure 16 - Lens Corrections
When applied, the lens profiles are
designed to automatically apply three types of correction. That is,
geometric distortion such as Pin Cushion or Barrel
distortion,
Lateral
Chromatic Aberration, and Vignetting. When profile-based
correction is activated (figure 16 - Automatic Corrections) Lightroom will use embedded Exif metadata for
the lens and camera within the image to look for a matching lens
profile. In the example shown in figure 17 below, the lens used was the
Canon EF 16-35mm f2.8 USM. The three sliders located under the Amount heading are
actually intended for fine-tuning the automatically profile correction.
In the
example shown in figure 17 you'll see that I have already reduced the
amount of vignette correction to 75%. This is because the profile for
this particular lens tends to over compensate for the lenses natural
vignetting. Again, in this example I have already saved this correction
as the new default for the lens, which means that my correction will be
automatically applied each time the profile is activated. Occasionally, it may be necessary to increase one or more of the Amount
sliders, although I have only found this to be necessary for chromatic
aberration with one lens (i.e. Sigma 14mm f2.8). The Amount sliders can
also be used to completely remove the respective correction. For
example, you may want a lenses natural vignetting to be applied in full
rather than corrected. Also, note that these sliders only become active
when a lens profile is enabled.

Figure 17 -
Automatic Lens Corrections
Tip
- you can only apply automatic lens corrections when the appropriate lens profile
is physically installed on your computer. This is because the profiles
are not stored in the actual raw file or XMP sidecar. Therefore, if you
move your raw files between computers or share them with others it is
important that you also install a copy the lens profile on these
computers.
Creating your own lens profiles is a
fairly straightforward, albeit time consuming process. Adobe have
provided all of the necessary software and guidance documentation, so
all you need is the time and the space to set up the calibration charts
and camera.
Manual Corrections
Switching to the manual corrections tab you'll see a
mix of old and new adjustment sliders. The group of adjustment sliders listed under the
Transform heading are
new to Lightroom and operate independently of the automatic
profile-based corrections. They're actually a mix of lens corrections,
perspective corrections, and scaling. The geometric adjustment slider
allows you to manually correct pin cushion or barrel distortion. The
Vertical slider is used to apply a keystone correction to converging
verticals (see figure 18 below for example). The Horizontal slider
correct horizontal shifts, and is typically used to alter the
horizontal viewpoint. Rotate is intended to be used to adjust the rotation of the
transform, not the actual image. The final slider, is goes by the name
Scale.
This slider is used to adjust the scale of an image (i.e. zoom in or
out). Typically, you will want to use it to remove the grey border
after applying one of the other transforms. Enabling the Constrain
Crop checkbox will automatically crop the image to remove any of
the grey padding that appears after a transform gas been applied.

Figure 18 - Perspective Correction (mouse
over for effect)
The remaining adjustment sliders operate much as they
did in earlier versions of Lightroom. They've been retained for
backward compatibility, but their presence may well lead to confusion,
especially if the user subsequently applies automatic lens corrections
from within the profile tab. Therefore, best policy is to avoid using
them when a lens profile is available.
Applying the manual corrections to multiple images has
also been taken care of with additional checkboxes being added to the
Synchronise Settings dialog. As you can see from figure 19 below it's
possible to apply all of the lens corrections or any combination of the
four.

Figure 19 - Synchronise Settings
Noise Reduction and Capture
Sharpening
As discussed earlier, the biggest changes within the Develop
module are associated with the new raw image processing, noise
reduction and sharpening algorithms. On their own, colour noise
and luminance noise are a substantial improvement over their
predecessors, but together with the new capture sharpening
algorithm they take image quality to a new level. Typically, details
and textures are much cleaner, crisper and more natural. To see these
new algorithms at there best I recommend that you make some prints.
Tip - it must be
noted that these new demosaicing, noise and sharpening algorithms only apply when editing a process
version 2010 photo

Figure 20 - Detail Panel
While the actual UI for the sharpening tool is the same
as Lightroom 2 the actual sharpening algorithms have undergone
significant change and improvement. The improvements begin with the new
demosaicing algorithms, which are more noise resistant than in previous
version. That is to say, the new algorithm does a much better job of
removing color and pattern noise, but leaves much of the non-pattern
noise behind. This residual random or grain-like noise is actually what
gives the sense of detail and texture that many find appealing. The
sharpening is achieved by adding halos to the edges in an image.
Typically, one side of an edge will contain a dark halo and the other a
light halo. In Lightroom 3 these halos have been made more subtle. For
sharpen radius values between 0.5 and 1.0 the halos are much narrower
than before, which means that it's now possible to sharpen fine-detail
in landscapes more effectively. In a recent post to the Lightroom 3
User to User forum Jeff Schewe wrote:
"There have been some subtle
but important improvements in the sharpening tools in Lightroom 3. The
radius has been tuned so lower than 1 radii are more precise...the
masking has been improved to have more cut-off in the masked areas
while also allowing for local-sharpening adjustment brush additions to
the mask, which means you can punch the sharpening a bit more and then
paint away the sharpening in areas that get too crunchy. There have
also been some technical improvements in the way the sharpened data is
blended back into the unsharpened image data...
But the biggest impact on the sharpening has been the removal
of noise reduction in the actual demosaicing and placing the enhanced
noise reduction with additional controls later in the processing.
Which this means is the sharpening by default now no longer needs to
compensate for the built in noise reduction of the demosaicing, which
could not be turned off.
The end result is while the sharpening has been improved the
biggest thing you are seeing is the increased "bite" the new
demosaicing allows."
For a comprehensive explanation on Lightroom 3
sharpening (and noise reduction) I recommend that you obtain a copy of
Jeff Schewe's & Bruce Fraser's latest Camera Raw book -
Real World Camera Raw with Photoshop CS5. While Lightroom 3 is not
specifically discussed the details associated with sharpening and noise
reduction are applicable equally to Camera Raw 6 and Lightroom 3.
Next we have noise reduction. With five sliders available you could be forgiven for
being confused, not to worry Eric Chan provided the following
description for each noise reduction sliders:
Controls amount (or "volume") of
luminance noise reduction applied. Lightroom 3 has been tuned so that a
setting of 25 is a reasonable balance of noise reduction applied, and
detail preserved. This also means that the extra range between 25 and
100 can be used to control how much additional noise reduction to
apply. A value of 0 means "do not apply any luminance noise
reduction." When set to 0, the Luminance Detail and Luminance
Contrast sliders should become disabled (greyed out). This slider is
always enabled (for both process version 2003 and 2010). The default
value is 0 (i.e., off).
Luminance Detail -
Sets the noise threshold.
Dragging the slider to right will preserve more details; however,
doing so may cause noisy areas of the photo to be incorrectly
detected as details (and hence will not be smoothed). Drag to left to
increase smoothing; however, doing so may cause real details to be
incorrectly detected as noise (and hence will be smoothed out). Other
notes: effect mainly observable only on very noisy images. This
slider is new to Lightroom 3. This slider will be disabled when photo is
process version 2003, or when the Luminance slider (see above) is set
to 0. The default value is 50.
Luminance Contrast
- Dragging this slider to the
right will help preserve contrast and texture; however, it may also
increase perceived "noise blobs" or mottling in high ISO images.
Dragging it to left when you want to achieve very smooth,
fine-grained results; however, it may lose local contrast and
textures may get smoothed out. As with Luminance Detail, results more
noticeable on very noisy images (e.g., above ISO 6400 on a DSLR).
This slider is new to Lightroom 3. This slider will be disabled when photo
is process version 2003, or when the Luminance slider (see above) is
set to 0. The default value is 0.
Color - It is designed so that its default value
of 25 does a "pretty good" amount of colour noise reduction,
balancing the competing requirements of suppressing ugly colour noise
blobs whilst maintaining colour edge detail. Setting the slider to 0
means that no colour noise reduction will be applied at all. Setting
the slider to higher values than 25 means that much more aggressive
colour NR will be applied. However, doing so will likely cause
"colour bleeding" at edges. The default value is 25 for raw files and
0 for non-raw files.
Color Detail - This control is mostly
useful only for extremely noisy photos. It allows users to refine
colour NR for thin, detailed colour edges. At high settings (e.g., 75
to 100), it will try to retain colour detail in edges, but this may
cause pixel-level "colour speckles" to remain in the photo. At low
settings (e.g., 0 to 25), it will suppress these small isolated
colour speckles, but thin features in the photo may become
desaturated (i.e., some colour bleeding at fine edges). For testing
purposes, Adobe suggests you try zooming to 400% pixel view to get a
clearer understanding of the effect. This slider is new to Lightroom 3.
This slider will be disabled for process version 2003 photos, or when
the Color slider is set to 0. The default value is 50.
Figure 21 below shows a comparison between the old and
new colour noise algorithms. The photos was shot on a Canon EOS5 Mk11
at 3200 ISO in quite poor lighting conditions. The color noise and
sharpening are at default settings. Even allowing for JPG compression
associated with the screen shots it should be pretty obvious that the new
colour noise algorithms are vastly superior to the old. Figure 22
compares the same photo, but this time with a luminance noise
adjustment of 25 applied. The left version uses default sharpening and
the right has sharpening slider set to 50 and radius at 0.8

Figure 21 - Compares
Colour Noise in Lr 2.6 (PV 2003) with Lr3 Beta 2 (default noise/sharpening
settings)

Figure 22 - Compares
Luminance Noise/Sharpening at 25/25 with Luminance
Noise/Sharpening at 25/50
For
a comprehensive explanation on Lightroom 3 sharpening (and noise
reduction) I recommend that you obtain a copy of Jeff Schewe's & Bruce
Fraser's latest Camera Raw book -
Real World Camera Raw with Photoshop CS5. While Lightroom 3 is not
specifically discussed the details associated with sharpening and noise
reduction are applicable equally to Camera Raw 6 and Lightroom 3.
Process Versions
Adobe received quite a bit of feedback from
photographers confused by the process version options in the first
Lightroom 3 beta. So, in addition to new names, they made several
improvements with the aim of ensuring that photographers can access the
best raw processing quickly and easily. The improvements are summarised
below:
-
The graphic to let you know that the current image
selected in the Develop module is a previous process version has been
enhanced and relocated to a more prominent position over the lower
right corner of the image (shown on figure 18 above).
-
Clicking on the process version graphic provides additional
details (shown on figure 23 below) about what will happen if you
should chose to update to the current process version, the ability to
see a before/after view of the old and new process versions and the
ability to update all the selected images or all of the images in the
filmstrip at the same.

Figure 23 - Update Process Version
Point Curve
For nearly as long as Lightroom has
been around, now we finally we have it - an adjustable Point Curve. The
parametric curve (i.e. original) operates as it always has, via
sliders, by clicking on the curve and dragging up/down or using the
Target Adjustment Tool (TAT). The advantage of this approach is that
the adjustment of the curve is constrained to predefined limits, which
have been optimised to prevent detrimental adjustments to the shadow,
mid-tone and highlight regions. However, the in-built constraints
occasionally prevent the user from making fine adjustments to specific
parts of the tone curve. With the point curve very fine adjustments to
specific parts of the curve are possible because you can set your own
limits (lock points) and adjust the curve within them. Even greater
control can obtained when you hold down the Alt/Option key while
adjusting the curve. This flexibility,
unlike the parametric curve, means that is possible to over adjust,
thus causing some fairly extreme results. Some users may actually like
what happens and use the point curve for creative effects.
|
 |
 |
|
Parametric Curve |
Point Curve |
Figure 24 - Enhanced Tone Curve
Local Adjustments
Lightroom 3 beta 1 saw the removal of the button sets and Amount slider
from the Local Adjustment panels . Since there was
little, if any adverse feedback no further changes have been made to
either the Graduate Filter or Adjustment Brush panels. Other enhancements to local
adjustments include:
-
The Color palette is filled with a cross (X) to
indicate that not colour has been selected for the brush or graduate.
-
The adjustment brush and
graduate filter sliders can be reset by holding down Option/Alt and
clicking on Effect (Reset)
-
Double click on adjustment name (e.g. Exposure) to
reset individual sliders
-
Sharpness values between 0 and -50 will remove any
capture sharpening applied via global sharpening. Values between -50
and -100 will blur the area you brush (similar effect to lens blur)
-
Additional brush strokes or gradients (stacking
multiple pins) to
strengthen the effect of the first
|
 |
 |
Adjustment Brush
|
Graduate Filter
|
Figure 25 - Local Adjustment Tools
The Graduate Filter and Adjustment Brush
have their own set of keyboard shortcuts, with the following being the most important:
|
|
- K |
|
- A |
|
|
- M |
|
- O |
|
|
- H |
|
Shift+O |
|
|
- ] / [ |
|
Shift+drag |
|
|
- Shift+] or Shift+ [ |
|
- ' |
|
|
Enter |
|
Alt / Option drag |
|
|
Delete |
|
|
Keyboard shortcuts for Local Adjustment tools
Post Crop Vignette
Post-crop vignette was introduced in Lightroom
2, but many users complained that the manner in which it was
implemented did not properly reflect the desired effect. In particular,
photographers wanted a tool that increased/decreased
exposure/brightness rather than simply paining black or white into the
image corners. Adobe thought they had addressed the earlier
shortcomings in beta 1, but user feedback quickly dispelled this idea.
Thankfully, they reinstated the original post-crop
vignette style in beta 2. So, we now have three vignette styles, i.e. Highlight
Priority (default), Colour Priority and
Paint Overlay (original). Highlight
priority is intended to produce vignettes similar to what you would get
with lens vignetting. Colour Priority produces a similar effect, but is
designed avoid hue shifts. Figures 26and 27 compare the first two styles with the same settings applied.

Figure 25 - Highlight Priority Post-crop Vignette

Figure 26 - Color Priority Post-crop Vignette
Other Develop module enhancements include:
-
Crop presets choices have been edited for clarity
-
A checkbox has been added to the toolbar to turn on/off
overlay visibility
-
The targeted adjustment tool is deactivated when
switching to a new Develop panel
-
Keyboard shortcut (X) to flip Crop Orientation
-
In the 2010 Process Version, the algorithms for Fill
Light and Highlight Recovery have been changed to reduce the
possibility of tone inversions (halos). You will likely need to fine tune the
settings on these sliders after you upgrade the process version
-
New develop presets
Watermark Editor
The
Watermark Editor (figure 27) first seen in beta 1 and underwent a fair amount
of remodelling as the beta cycle progressed.
With this new enhanced watermark editor you can apply a text or graphical watermark
directly to a photograph. In addition to providing support for adjusting the size,
orientation, location and opacity the watermark editor can also used to
add creative effects such as a shadow. The watermark can be anchored in
up to nine positions around the image or specific insets. The size of the
watermark can be set proportionally or to fit or fill the photo
dimensions. Saved watermarks
can be applied from within the Slideshow, Print, Web and
Export modules. In figure 28 I show a sample watermark applied
to a photo in the Print module.

Figure 27 - Watermark
Editor

Figure 28 - Watermarking a
photo in Print module
Slideshow Module
In addition to JPEG and PDF Lightroom 3 can export
slideshows as HD video. Another change is the link to
the iTunes music library has been removed. This means that
incorporating your music tracks doesn't require iTunes, but you can
only use single tracks. Double clicking on the music track
duration will automatically adjust the slide change time so that the
slideshow duration matches the music. The Playback panel has
also been enhanced to include new buttons for selecting the music and
automatically adjusting the slide change time. A palette tile and
checkbox has also been included to enable the user to add colour fades.

Figure 29 - Enhanced slideshow Playback panel
Other Slideshow module enhancements include:
-
Watermark editing included in Slideshow module
-
An option to prepare previews in advance will ensure
that a slideshow is never interrupted waiting for image information to
render to the display
-
Developers can now use ActionScript 3
galleries in the Web Module

Figure 30 - Export
slideshow as HD video
Print Module
The next new feature I want to discuss is Custom
Print Package. Like the Watermark Editor mentioned earlier the
custom print package has been high up the request list from very early
days. Laying out a page is relatively easy in so far as you can add
Cells of various sizes using the button set located within the Cells
panel. Once the cells are in place you can drag the images into them.
Alternatively, you can create a free-form layout by dragging the images
directly to a blank page then resizing them to taste. Figure 29 below
shows fairly simple free-form layout containing 3 images of slightly
differing size.

Figure 31 - Custom Print
Package
Other minor, but
nonetheless important enhancements to the Print module include:
-
Black or a custom color can be selected for a print
layout background
-
The Identity Plate can be moved in small increments by
selecting it and using the arrow keys
-
Match photo aspect ratio is now a persistent option in
the Cell panel
-
Maximum print resolution increased to 720ppi

-
Rotate to Fit option and a Rotate Cell
command were added to the custom print package layout tools

Web Module
Unlike the other four modules the Web module hasn't
received much attention this cycle. That's not to say that there
hasn't been any improvements, there have, but they are fairly minor
and under the hood. The only really obvious enhancement to this
module is the inclusion of the Watermark Editor. There are also some
new Flash and HTML web templates.

Figure 32 - Web Module

|