P: Large numbers of brush strokes leads to slowdowns and can cause an image's edits to reset.

[C.Cella]

In Lightroom it is impossible to edit a photo as much as we want or need, using Masking regardless of the hardware you have.

EXPLANATION 

Let's say you want to edit a photo with Masking to your heart's content OR because you need to change many aspect of the photo.

Logic tells you "we have Masking so obviously it's possible to do masking safely and as much as I want"

Reality is that in Lightroom Classic there is an "upper limit" of local edits that we can have on a photo: once we reach that "upper limit" the photo will be be reset.

So in Lr it's not possible to sue Masking as much as we want/need.

Usually if you have lots, lots of edits on an image other editing software struggle and get progressively slower and slower (if one has powerful hardware generally slowdowns don't happen or appear later) but in LR a photo can reach a point where it's no longer editable and it will be reset NO MATTER THE HARDWARE YOU HAVE.

All Masking tools (gradients, spot removal, brush, Ai, et...) contribute to reaching this "upper limit" of local edits BUT Brush is the tool that contributes the most because each strokes is made of countless of dab points that are heavy to process.

Here I have attached a preset for everyone to use.
Apply it on one of your photos that already has Masks and your photo will be reset. (Please be sure to undo, or use another another history step or Snapshot to revert back to your safely edited photo)

This "Reset Bug" is a huge problem/limitation AND as long as it exists we users will never, ever be able to use Masking as much as needed/wanted in Lr.

For the record this issue is not present in Adobe Camera Raw or other non Adobe softwares: it is totally unique to Lr.

As far as I have tested we can have "infinite" number of local edits in ACR...logically with many, many mask ACR becomes progressively slower but there is no photo reset.

Best Practice When Working in ACR and LrC using Masking

If you are doing Masking in ACR and import the photo in LrC (or import settings form disk if the photo is in the LrC catalog) then the photo will either be slower to edit OR be reset in LrC.

If a photo is resetting in LrC then you must go one step back beore the reset after that you can finish editing it in ACR but unfortunately you can't safely open/import that photo in LrC again as the edits will be unusable by LrC

Keep a Virtual Copy in LrC before you edit in ACR or import form ACR.

That Virtual Copy will be always usable in LrC.

Best Practice with Brush Tool

1. Create a new Brush Mask for every single stroke you do. This way you can delete the stroke(s) that you don't like, redo them better and go back to an editable photo when the reset happens.
2. I recommend to ONLY use Subtract as and never user Erase Brush that adds dab point but are not visible in the overlay. Subtractions are always visible in the overlay and can be deleted.
3. If you are working with Brush Density I recommend to ALWAYS keep the same Brush Density in the same Correction and ideally write it in the Correction's name. On the same correction a new brush with different Density will overwrite the previous stokes adding more dab points above the ones created but in the overlay it looks like you did fewer. It you find a that a brush at the current density is not giving you what you want then: create a new correction > use the same settings AND use Brush with a different Density in that correction.

I personally work with very low flow and keep always Density at 100 for all my corrections. When is see that a brush is not enough or too much and is not giving me the result I want I: delete it > create a different Correction with  higher/lower different settings and brush there but the Density is always at 100.

P.S.
I was the first to discover and report this back in 2017 in this thread. (The username is different but it's me)
I bring it back as a full fledged Bug Report upon request of the Adobe team so please moderators do not merge this with existing Bug reports as this needs to be traceable as a standalone.

[GoldingD]

1. Wow what a photo

2. Experimented with your sample, created a virtual copy, determined what masks were just the tree. Removed those, then tried to mask the tree. Selected an Object mask, at first using mode brush select, brushed over all the tree and it's bits, not trying to be at all neat with that. Resulting mask missed a lot of the small branches, within that mask selected Add, selected object, repeated the brush. Closer, repeated again but selecting a mode rectangular selection, just up in the upper branches. About 5 adds and a subtract, not to far off, might work.

My LrC did not crash, etc, but was a bit slow during image selection

[GoldingD]

Inquiry, that DNG file, I assume it is converted from RAW, did you include the RAW file embedded into the DNG, making the file larger, perhaps slower?

[defaulte1bptwq3szfa]

No, the RAW file wasn't embedded in the DNG file.

[defaulte1bptwq3szfa]

The failure was in LrClassic, not in Lightroom, sorry. I've tried to brush for a bit in Camera Raw and it it seems to work in there without failure, albeit it's a bit slow.

[defaulte1bptwq3szfa]

1. Thanks! That's why I want to make a detailed edit. I believe it's worth it to do it for this photo 🙂

2. That sounds like a complicated work around and not too ideal. Thanks for thinking along though, I appreciate the effort.

[GoldingD]

hmm, I do not have that camera, so I am not aware of what to expect for RAW file size in LrC.

However, trying to understand a way to see if the DNG included an embedded RAW, I used the DNG converter to convert it with the embedded options off. I received a smaller file as result that runs quicker in LrC. (roughly 47K vs 62K). But then I rarely use the DNG converter, may  have done something odd. (just double checked, no compression was selected)

[defaulte1bptwq3szfa]

I understand. The RAW file is 94.2 MB, so rather big. I'm not really a fan of compressing files, because I intend to print big, so quality matters a lot to me. Even something you cannot physically see, it's just about me knowing the end result could technically be better. That's also why I want to mask each individual branch instead of doing it globally and 90% accurate. You probably won't notice a difference, but it's all in the mind. Anyways, these were the setting I used for export:

[GoldingD]

Looking at your screenshot (and I will include it below, as some members absolutely hate attachments, and will not look at)

You are indeed including a smaller RAW in the DNG (embedded for fast load data), but not the full RAW in the DNG, So probably should not be taking a performance hit on that.

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop-elements/using/processing-camera-raw-image-files.html#save_changes...

[drtonyb]

@defaulte1bptwq3szfa 

This issue is a known limitation of Lightroom Classic. Camera Raw doesn't have this limitation, so is unaffected.

LrC has a limit on the number of "dab points" that can be applied using the Masking Brush. I don't know what the limit is, only that it's large. However, fine brushing adds huge numbers of "bad points", so the number can build up very quickly.

It seems that you have reached this limit in trying to paint a far too precise mask on the tree. This is beyond LrC's current capability. However, its ungracious handling when reaching this limit by deleting all the masks is a serious bug that the LrC team are aware of and have been for some years.

Mask 1 does nothing to the image. The Brush 1 doesn't intersect with Object 1, so it can be deleted.

Mask 6 is the problem. Extracting the XMP from your DNG file, I find that it is 10MB. After deleting Mask 1 and Mask 6, the XMP size falls to 9.87KB. When Mask 6 is deleted, the file is handled quite comfortably by LrC 12.

I don't know your intention with masking the tree, but I assume that you want to highlight it in some way. Try using multiple Object Masks in the marquee mode. Doing this myself, I have achieved what I see as a reasonable mask for the tree. You can then Subtract unwanted parts of the mask using a small amount of Brushing.

[GoldingD]

"Mask 6 is the problem. Extracting the XMP from your DNG file, I find that it is 10MB. After deleting Mask 1 and Mask 6, the XMP size falls to 9.87KB. When Mask 6 is deleted, the file is handled quite comfortably by LrC 12."

Ah, that explains my confusion on DNG  file size when looking at the authors DNG file. Thank you.

also

"Try using multiple Object Masks in the marquee mode"

Yes, that explains what I was stating, but much better, clearer than my words.

[C.Cella]

@Rikk Flohr: Photography 

This is the Reset Bug I reported long ago here : Reset Bug 

In case please merge the two threads.

[C.Cella]

@defaulte1bptwq3szfa 

@GoldingD 

Please go vote for the bug Here 

It's the only chance to get it considered and fixed.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Yes, in this most recent example, posted by @defaulte1bptwq3szfa the Mask 6 contains over 250,000 individual brush strokes.  The team is evaluating next steps based upon the sample file submitted. Thanks. 

[C.Cella]

@Rikk Flohr: Photography 

One of my photo had the reset BUT with 2,3 Million dap points (that's what your engineers told me I had on my photo)...which is about 200-250Mb of data.

250k dab points is tolerable by Lr Classic in my experience.

( I don't think it's possible to have 250k individual brush stokes, each made of thousands of dab points!

That would mean having a history of 250k steps, a Catlog potentially in Terabytes in size...no sane human being would do that, not even I can do that and I am insane 🤣🤣🤣)

[C.Cella]

Hi all, this is a long standing issue issue in Lightroom Classic.

Basically the more local edits we do, the more Masks we have on our photo(s) the slower LrC gets and in a dramatic way.

The reality is that we can't use Masking as much as we need or want in LrC because at one point the slowdowns will make unbearable to work or, even worse, we get a photo reset.

What is really unacceptable is that Adobe Camera Raw on the other hand can perfectly handle the very same photo(s) without any issues or slowdowns.

I here attached Preset that you guys can use. 

The preset has no settings applied so your image will appear unchanged BUT it contains all the masks of one of my edited images and it should be a good starting point to prove how slow LrC can get.

Bear in mind this preset is only a good starting point to see the slowdowns and you might experience them immediately even just by hovering over the preset.

If you apply the preset on a photo that already has Mask it will either: make slower to edit said photo OR even lead to a photo reset.

What I suggest to test the speed LrC of after applying this preset is:

1. Use the Crop Tool and see how responsive/unresponsive cropping is for you.

2. Change any other setting/slider AND look at how long it takes for the history step(s) to appear.

3. Undo and redo steps to see how fast these operations are performed.

4. Do more local edits using Masking.

Now after using LrC load the very same image in ACR and do more editing or simply try to crop the photo.

You will see ACR is not having issues.

Also consider that in LrC reading, writing and saving metadata for the photo will become exponentially slower as well since the edits are literally slowing down even pure metadata processes.

[Fnc21]

Hello,
While creating a pretty long and precise mask through the brush tool, all of a sudden, Lightroom loses all the editing (although the brush mask was the only mask - he not only loses it but loses any other kings of editing such as the sliders and so on...).

I also tried to create a new brush mask and keep the editing going on this newly create brush mask, but the problem persist.

I also tried to allocate 50GB of raw cache memory, and restart both software and computer (iMac Pro on OSX BigSur) several times, but the problem still persist.

What is the source of the problem and what can I do to solve it?
Thank you!!!

[C.Cella]

@Rikk Flohr: Photography 

Why was my bug report for the poor performance in LrC vs ACR merged with his one.

One can get poor performance way before a reset even take place.

It's not the same issue.

Countless of users over the years have experienced poor performance using LrC never got a reset, but the poor prefrormancd has never been addressed.

[C.Cella]

@Fnc21 

There is no solution in LrC for this.

What I suggest for your workflow is the following.

1. Use Brush only when indispensable.

The other tools do contribute to reaching the "upper limit" but much less than Brush.

2. Always create a new Brush component when you start drawing.

So you draw, stop drawing > Shift + N to create another new brush component in the same mask.

This means that when you reach the reset point you can undo and go back to the edited photo and delete components that could be done better, this means you keep 99% of your work.

Having a single brush component is bad.

Never do that, ever!

Yes your Mask might have lots of different Brush components BUT it's the right way to work.

Always keep track of every edit you make using separate components...masking is great for this reason as well as it process total trackability of all stpes and edits, its better than Layers in Photoshop.

3. Never use Brush in Erase mode!

Always remove part of a Brush you don't like using another Brush in Subtract mode.

Erase mode should be removed form Lightroom altogether as it's just a legacy of the past and tis terrible because it does not allow to keep track of your edits separately.

Edited to clarify.

.

[defaulte1bptwq3szfa]

Apparently LRC can't handle the brush strokes. You can achieve it in Camera RAW (Photoshop), but you will suffer from performance issues. Best hint I can give is to duplicate your photo and split the brushing, for example top left, top right, bottom left and bottom right. Then merge the photo's together in Photoshop.

[C.Cella]

@defaulte1bptwq3szfa 

LrC can handle Brush but only up to a certain point.

After that first you get slowdowns then then the reset.

ACR form my experience doesn't have performance problems.

I was able to work in ACR without performance issues my heavily edited photos, the very same ones that are not editable in LrC...but as soon as the photos are loaded back to LrC they will reset.

Doing the local editing in another app, in Photoshop is a workaround...I could also suggest to use the competition like Capture One.

Let's not forget that there is a standalone license for Lightroom and so many users might not have Photoshop.

Perhaps Adobe should give a free Photoshop license to all Lightroom users so that we all can edit our photos in full since LrC prevents us to.

I discovered and reported this bug internally back in 2017 and yet nothing has been done because back then nobody was expected to use LrC to do local edits.

I was laughed at when I was telling people "I don't use Photoshop for local edits".

With Maksing one should use and do local edits in Photoshop ONLY because of this bug.

Masking is a marvellous tool but as long as this limit exists Maksing is doomed.

If we want to get this bug fixed in Lightroom then the solution is to upvote the bug, so please, I beg of you: vote!

Using another app is not a solution...it's an escape.

P.s.

I am a total Lr fanboy, it pains me much to speak about this...I wish this bug didn't exist.

.

[richardplondon]

There's using another app, and there is using the same app in another way that doesn't cause you the same problem.

For example I've found it possible to make and tweak quite specific and complex masks in LrC with the aid of AutoMask. I don't mean the rather crude outcome from dragging the brush around with autoMask active; I mean repeatedly single-clicking a larger radius brush with AutoMask active, working off the crosshair for each click, both adding and subtracting as necessary. This pulls the needed detail from the image itself.

I honestly am not surprised if tens of thousands of simultaneous parametric 'dabs' might cause an issue. Not least, of patience! This sounds like a lot of avoidable work to me.... An equally complicated mask could be made parametrically in PS - say, using tens of thousands of overlapping vector shapes - and also cause an issue there. A pixel mask within PS would be the massively more straightforward way. So there are also tactics in LrC along the same lines.

For example: intersecting with a tonal or hue restictive mask, or using adjustments that are natively restricted in their tonal application, may mean a less tightly and laboriously drawn brush mask is nonetheless equally acceptable towards the end result you want..The painted extent of a mask does not always need to do all of its selective work, IOW.  In LrC, or in PS.

[defaulte1bptwq3szfa]

I understand that it's an escape, but I have a client that doesn't want to wait for years or decades to get his photo, so if there's a workaround, I will use it. It's still up to Adobe to fix the problem, because if some company decides to release software that does manage this, and is able to provide the same quality as LR then I will happily jump ship. It's not just in our interest to get it fixed, but also in their interest. If they decide not to fix it, that's their call. I will make my own call with my wallet 🙂

[C.Cella]

@richardplondon 

The "upper limit of edits" is totally arbitrary.

It's not (anymore) a physical/hardware limitation.

It's a "speed limit" set a decade ago in the code (to make a rough analogy)

To put this in context my most edited photo(s) has around 200-300mb of local edits data in total.

We have machines that can process 100 times more data than that nowadays.

I have 64 GB of unified memory and 400gb/s bandwidth but apparently 300mb is too much for LrC.

 It boggles the mind!

.Edit

ACR can handle the data.

Same hardware, same photo, different code.

There is no real reason for LrC to be unable to handle our edits.

.

[Alexandru28604841zz1v]

I'm having the same issue. Spent two days working on a photo trying to adjust the object auto select with the brush substract and there you go... image ressets all the mask. I can ho back one step in history and see the last brush and all the masks but I can not edit any further. This is horrible, makes  the brush function useless 

[C.Cella]

@Alexandru28604841zz1v 

I have added in my OP a series of recommendations and steps to follow to work with Brush. This will help deal with the Reset Bug and in general allows to see every edits we did and control them.