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mtngal
Participating Frequently
December 3, 2023
Question

LR Classic Develop Module Dims Monitor

  • December 3, 2023
  • 3 replies
  • 901 views

My computer is an M2 Max MacBook Pro about a year old, no second monitor, and now running Sonoma 14.1.2.  I'm using Lightroom Classic 13.0.2.  I recently updated both the operating system and Lightroom.  Now, whenever I switch to the Develop Mode in Lightroom Classic, or try to open a raw file in Camera RAW, the monitor goes dark.  I can see the frames go darker.  If I have a Safari window open next to LR and switch, I can see where the Safari window changes though it won't necessarily stay dark.  So switching between Library and Develop is doing something to change the brightness of the monitor.

 

I tried deleting LR Classic and then reinstalling it but it still dims the monitor.  When I uninstalled, I did keep the preferences, etc. and the re-installed program opened where it had before, would that make a difference?  I'm not sure that the behavior started before or after I upgraded to Sonoma, I upgraded both LR and the operating system about the same time.  So I don't know if the problem is with Apple or Adobe, but it's made LR Classic impossible to use for editing photos.

 

What can I do to stop the develop mode from dimming the monitor?

    3 replies

    M
    MJ-Indy
    Participant
    April 8, 2024

    MtnGal is absolutely correct and wins the golden scepter for her comment.  After searching many times with many different combinations of key words, like ''lightroom develop module monitor profile darker" or "lightroom classic monitor profile change" or "lightroom classic develop module gets darker" or "lightroom develop module problem darker display" I finally got here.  

    So, to solve this, go to Preferences >Performance > Then to the Camera Raw section, and for Use Graphics Processor, I changed it from Auto to Off.  This then stopped the monitor from dimming only when entering the develop module.  This may be because I'm on a Mac Studio M2 Ultra and Apple and Adobe aren't working very closely on this issue, or some renegade at Adobe switched the settings for the v 13.2 update with Camera Raw 16.2.  Who knows.  It would be nice if they could get their act together.  

    It was not the camera import settings nor the monitor profiles, although many posters across many sites suggested such things.  My workflow is not sophisticated.  I did set my import profiles to match my camera, but haven't imported any new images since then, so not sure what it will do.  I did run Library > Previews > Build Smart Previews, so, maybe that will do something beneficial for my images and previews.  

      C
      chfilm
      Inspiring
      September 3, 2024

      same problem here on m2 ultra mac studio! Not the first really really bad problem Adobe has with this machine! 

      What helps is to set the XDR Display to photo editing reference mode and restarting Lightroom. It's almost as if LR is trying to switch the develope module to reference mode even when not being asked to do so.. 

      M
      mtngalAuthor
      Participating Frequently
      December 4, 2023

      When I was looking around for information, it seemed like some people had issues with GPU acceleration.  I figured that my MacBook Pro M2 Max with 64GB of memory wouldn't have a problem.  The Preference page says that the system automatically supports full acceleration.  If I turn off graphic acceleration off and go into the develop module, the monitor does not dim.  Turn it back to auto and the monitor dims again.  Is that the answer?  Leave graphics acceleration off?

        M
        mtngalAuthor
        Participating Frequently
        December 4, 2023

        I also use Apple's Time Machine and used it to install LR Classic 12.5 from a backup in August.  I opened an older catalog (it wasn't able to open the catalog I had originally been using with Classic 13) and switched from Library to Develop in that version - the monitor doesn't dim.  So it's definitely something connected with LR Classic 13.  Some setting or something that's causing my monitor to dim when I switch to the Develop module.

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