Inspiring

Question

Exporting DNG files Lightroom settings

Forum|Forum|2 years ago
November 28, 2023
4 replies
857 views

I am trying to send DNG files to a photo editing service with active settings on the "Details" tab in Lightroom - denoise, masking, & sharpening. However, once the DNG files are arriving at their destination, those Develop settings aren't being used. I'm getting edited photos back with all the original noise intact. I'm trying to understand why this is happening.

I can find two ways of opening DNG files in Photoshop - one is by opening them normally in Camera Raw (the default), or by opening them directly in Photoshop by pressing the "shift" key when opening.

The first method, opening in Camera Raw, gives me the DNG files with the develop settings intact. I can see that the sliders are just where I set them when I exported from Lightroom. Good - works as it should.

The second method, opening with shift key, opens the DNG file directly in Photoshop, bypassing that Camera Raw dialog, but with the develop settings seemingly already applied. If I apply Filter>Camera Raw Filter I can see that there are NO develop settings activated, as if the settings I exported with are "baked in" when opening with the shift key pressed. Not quite sure if I get how this works.

But I can't see how my editor is opening the DNG file and simply not seeing the develop settings at all - unless they're opening in something other than Adobe, which woukld explain it!

Windows

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JohanElzenga

Community Expert

"The first method, opening in Camera Raw, gives me the DNG files with the develop settings intact. I can see that the sliders are just where I set them when I exported from Lightroom. Good - works as it should."
That means that you opened the image as smart object, so that is good.

"The second method, opening with shift key, opens the DNG file directly in Photoshop, bypassing that Camera Raw dialog, but with the develop settings seemingly already applied. If I apply Filter>Camera Raw Filter I can see that there are NO develop settings activated, as if the settings I exported with are "baked in" when opening with the shift key pressed. Not quite sure if I get how this works."
This opens the image as a rendered RGB file, so the edits are baked into the pixels. Not good. Using the Camera Raw-filter is meaningless. You will never see the Lightroom edits in this filter, regardless of how you sent the image from Lightroom to Photoshop. That is because this filter is just like any other Photoshop filter. It has no relationship with the Camera Raw plugin used to convert the image when it is sent from Lightroom to Photoshop. Even if you used this filter on the smart object in your first example, you would not see the Lightroom edits. You will only see the edits if you double click the smart object, so the Camera Raw plugin is called again.

-- Johan W. Elzenga

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richardplondon

Community Expert

It should not be necessary to use Smart Object in order to have ACR read and use Develop settings that have been nondestructively applied in Lightroom Classic, provided these Develop settings have been successfully written to the DNG concerned. If opened directly into PS, ACR will step in and adopt whatever editing metadata it finds.

Another method: export the image(s) concerned to a new folder selecting "Original" as the file type. A duplicate of each relevant imported file is made, each in its own format. with a copy of your latest editing adjustments enclosed/alongside. This packages up the job and saves you the task of going looking for each of the imported originals (and XMP sidecar files if these are non-DNG Raw) after making sure your latest adjustments have been written. These exports are simply duplicated copies, so can be deleted after sending off.

One caveat here is: if this editing metadata refers to a colour profile (perhaps a custom one or a specific camera matching one), lens profile, custom lens profile default, or some such resource - which the recipient of the image does not also have, the same - the desired effect will not be seen in their context. Probably LrC or ACR will fall back to its standard colour profile instead; a missing lens profile will simply fail to apply.

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richardplondon

Community Expert

Excellent info. She IS editing layers in Photoshop, and I will not be revisiting any of her layered editing work. If I feel something isn't right, I'll bust open the original layers myself in Photoshop and do my own editing. So, it sounds like a TIF export is the best bet for her - which is how we've been doing it so far.

If you might ever want to update "the original layers in Photoshop" then it will be a layered format that you will require back. And IIRC that means a save as, not an export. A standard exported TIFF has got no layers. But, I suppose that flattened bitmap could still be later further altered (in PS) even so, with or without making new layers to do so, besides receiving nondestructive adjustments by the Catalog.

Rob_Cullen

Community Expert

"I apply Filter>Camera Raw Filter I can see that there are NO develop settings activated"

To be expected! A camera raw FILTER is working on rendered RGB data in the Photoshop Document. ie. any Lightroom edits have been "baked in" the image document that opens in Photoshop.

Camera Raw and Camera Raw 'Filter', are very different in their function.

If you want to be able to 'edit in Camera raw' within photoshop then you need to Open the raw image as a 'Smart Object' which embeds the raw data in the Ps document- By double-clicking the Smart Object layer in Ps you re-open the image in Camera Raw (the Plugin).

Regards. My System: Windows-11, Lightroom-Classic 15.1.1, Photoshop 27.3.1, ACR 18.1.1, Lightroom 9.0, Lr-iOS 10.4.0, Bridge 16.0.2 .

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Dan McKinneyAuthor

Inspiring

This is extremly helpful!! Learning every day. I was not sure what a Smart Object even was - now I know.

GoldingD

Legend

Is this DNG file your original work? Did the image start out as a DNG file upon import. Or an export?

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Dan McKinneyAuthor

Inspiring

All files started as RW2 files from my Panasonic GH5. The non-flash bracketed exposures are merged to HDR first, then merged images are exported as DNG. The flash images are exported to DNG from the original RW2 file.

Identical Develop settings are used for all in the final DNG export.

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Dan McKinneyAuthor

Inspiring

Using Lightroom 13.0.1 and Camera Raw 16.0 and Photoshop 25.3.0

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