Wishlist and speculating on Lightroom 5

[hamish niven]

Any news, ideas thoughts of the next iteration of Lightroom?

Message title was edited by: Brett N

[raffi2]

i agree with Hamish We need :

• the speed issues : very important
• the clone / heal issues
• the speed issues : very important
• the streamlining issues
• the speed issues
• relative presets : good
• More Photoshop like clone/healing/content aware brushes in Lightroom! : i agreee but is this possible with concept of Lightroom ?
• Multi-User / Multi Computer (Shared catalog on a network) : yes good : the actual process is to slow for working alone on a catalog !!
• Photoshop/Lightroom: Provide preference and preset syncing via the cloud! (Brushes, Actions, Tools, Workspaces, etc) : good
• Better keyword management:  yes to apply several at the same time via a flotting panel on an other screen ( inside the workspace is not productive )
• We have now, with the years undreds of keywords and presets to manage and even on a 30“ this is a nightmare to manage and apply we need a better modern "metaphore" of this
• The Lightroom interface was good 5/6 years agoo but we need something more productive than this tools on the 2 sides !!!

          The tools are too much focused on the side of the window

• Display camera focus information ( is it possible ?)
• Lightroom: Allow for keyboard shortcut customization : this is the minimum we can get since 4 version !!!

• Better Preset Organization (sub-folders, tag, search) : a must have : the foler style we have is a night mare
• Lightroom: Colour coding folders and collections to simplify navigation & cataloging

• Lightroom: Ability to create custom book templates/sizes from scratch
• Lightroom: Better Library Module performance : a minimum expected from a pro software !!!!
• Lightroom: Ability to lock photos. Please protect me from myself! : good
• Lightroom: Gradient Eraser Request : good idea

i will ad stack of different version with different presets : ability to activate a set of presets for a group of files inside eg a folder or dynamic folder,  and get an other version with other presets with a single clic not by making virtual copies and having undreds of copies with have to magage every where !!

[hamish niven]

Thanks Raffi2.

This comment is more in what I was wanting from this thread. We all know that LR4 is flawed so I don't really want this thread giving yet more specs lists and the like, there are plenty of threads for that.

I was more thinking of what users expectations and realistic wishes are for the next iteration of the program

It seems that speed and reliability are the over riding wishes.

Your list covers more than what I want, but my needs are mine and I can cope with the stacking not sorting as I'd like but click D wait 5 seconds for the develop mode to become accessible is not good enough...

Edwin's LR4 working properly version is one that many man people want and would begrudgingly pay for as we should have been sold software that works properly.

Maybe that is why it was cheaper - cos they knew it provided a poor user experience with unacceptable performance.

[Lee_Jay]

hamish niven wrote:

Maybe that is why it was cheaper - cos they knew it provided a poor user experience with unacceptable performance.

If any of these minute-long delays that have been reported by some were happening on any of Adobe's internal test machines, they would have fixed them before release (reproduction is the key to bug fixing).  They don't happen on any of my Windows machines, they don't happen on my friend's mac.  They don't happen on the majority of machines out there.  They happen on a few, and there isn't enough information to figure out which ones or why.

[raffi2]

i don't think any one at Adobe work really in real production with there prodcut !!

That's why they should find better beta tester !!!

i am on the list they neve contact me !!!

Will move to competitors never mind

if this continue Lightroom will be used only for cataloging already developped files from an other raw capable software !

[Lee_Jay]

raffi2 wrote:

i don't think any one at Adobe work really in real production with there prodcut !!

You're basing that on nothing but making it up.  You have no real information at all, of course.

[raffi2]

Maybe i have no informations, maybe i have !

But if you think 5 minutes how the workflow and performance is i am not sure they are !

[hamish niven]

Jay Lee you are a lucky man, we all know you have 3 amazing machines that work Lightroom fine for you and your expectations and needs. You were one of the few who is happy with the capabilities, speeds and other issues that so many of us are not happy with.

Yes, it would still be very helpful for adobe to figure out why it's not working because most users have paid for at least 2 iterations of a sluggish but amazingly powerful piece of software.

Adobe have thousands of testers for every point beta and then as many again for every Candidate Release and they still can't fix it for their paying clients.

They have forums of questions made by users asking and other users answering the questions, forums of people suggesting ideas, improvements, polling what is good and what is bad about Lightroom, but still it's not working properly.

I use LR 4.2 for about 30 hours a week when I am not shooting on location. It is not a joyous experience as Edwin intimated.

Jay Lee,I'd like to help Adobe with their roguish software, however I don't have time to bug test paid for software, I have to pay bills and like.

Many even most users of Lightroom use photography for their primary income and unfortunately we have to use time that could be used to help Adobe with their troublesome baby, but we have to put more time waiting for things to happen in Lightroom to get finished work to those who pay us.

All most people want from LR is a paid for product that works, properly quickly and reliably to their recommended specifications hardware, and if they have an over specd machine, it should simply work better.

Sent from my iPhone

[areohbee]

When discussing performance, consider posting some example performance stats.

I mean, one person's "too slow" may be another person's "fast enough", or one person's "slow" may be a little or a lot slower than another person's "slow"...

Lr4 works OK for me, but I dunno whether yours is slower, or you are just unhappy with like performance.

What percentage of users have decent performance vs. percentage with poor performance? - depends on how you define "decent" and "poor"...

Don't get me wrong: I understand if you don't want to elaborate further now, but just express your displeasure and let Adobe sort it. Still, every time somebody mentions it, I can't help but wonder...

e.g. One person chiming in about poor performance - turned out their chief complaint was dev module loading time upon first use; others: Lr spins the beach-ball/blue-donut for several seconds every time any dev slider is touched - big difference, IMO.

Rob

[edwin_ludicrous]

Hi Rob,

As a fully paid-up whiner, I must say, a strange, reluctant torpor descends on me when it comes to 'defining' the performance of my LR4/Hardware.  The behaviour is so gross, not micro, not even macro, but so gross that finely honed, operational, quantified definitions simply aren't where it's at for me. 

Boot up LR4 with a freshly maintained catalog into an 8GB 64-bit environment with shiny, fast, freshly defragged HD with 50% free space, having killed off all other reachable processes on my computer and it starts off merely 'turgid'. Warming to its task and ten minutes later it is slowing to hour-glass pace, ten minutes after that it is claiming to be unresponsive (yes, I know!) and ten minutes after that, it's time to shut down, re-boot, start again.  I sometimes leave stuff in my cameras for a whole week because I can't face the prospect of 'working' with such a deeply aversive, unpleasant system.

I'd like to come at it a different way. It appears that 'some people' maybe a few, maybe the majority, have happy smiling faces that last the whole day long when working with LR4.  I would like these sunlit uplands for myself. I'm wondering if there is a list of LR4/Hardware combinations that don't cause LR4 to cripple/be crippled by the hardware.  I'm hoping that if there's an answer it isn't 'buy a Cray'.

1. So, is PC or Mac the better environment or do both platforms suffer equally?

2. Is there a particular hardware spec that always works, or is it more random and capricious than that, i.e. people with exactly the same rig have widely differing experiences?

3. Are there known brands to avoid at all costs because they always fail? e.g. because maybe they slipped into their machines some small, innocuous piece of normally harmless proprietary hardware which wreaks havoc with highly strung LR4 and isn't fixable by Adobe.

Which leads me to my revised wish list for LR5.

I'd still like it to be LR4 PWV. Don't bother to fix it Adobe, if it were fixable, you would have done it by now, so let it go son. Instead, provide a certified list of hardware combinations that are absolutely guaranteed to work.  Then 'some people', maybe the few, maybe the many, can abandon hope, bury their crushed dreams, and get on with the business of whingeing, mewling, puking and grieving over their loss, before getting over it and buying a certified machine.

Just saying 🙂

[areohbee]

Hi edwin,

Abnormal behavior is usually caused by some combination of Lr "bugs" (or insufficient robustness) and system "configuration" compatibility/health type stuff (as opposed to hardware compatibility) - there is no machine guaranteed to run it based on specs.

Having it slow down after using for only a short while is definitely "abnormal" behavior. I can usually run mine for days with no slowdown (although occasionally I have to restart if it cops a mood... - and sometimes it restarts for me ;-}).

I always recommend stripping  machine down to bare essentials, (hardware and software/background services), updating drivers, checking ram and disks, deleting (or renaming temporarily) all Lr data files, re-installing OS and Lr... - to see if it'll work when the machine is lean, up-to-date, as healthy as possible, and everything fresh. If it still doesn't work well, then I dunno... - check for some clue in the system logs I guess... I would also start Lr with the -traceback switch and run it via a compatible debugger, since that will show you if Lr is enduring unusual errors...

http://forums.adobe.com/thread/925598

Rob

[hamish niven]

I think Adobe have enough empirical and anecdotal evidence to fix the software properly.

Rob it would be nice to strip a machine down just for Lightroom, have one computer dedicated to getting the max out of an unwilling piece of software that often requires hardware that is unnecessarily powerful.

Most people can't afford that luxury to have a dedicated computer for Lightroom and with no guarantee that it would be any better. It also makes the cost of Lightroom rise from around the $100 mark to close to the $1000 mark which is a crazy price to run a piece of software.

The chances are very high that the stripped down computer would have to run several adobe products as they tie in with Lightroom for destructive editing - photoshop being one. An FTP program is almost essential for a anyone uploading galleries etc. browser and email, music to work with....

Running trace routes, debuggering etc that is not a paid up user requirement. Yes I want my system to work but I'm no a programmer.

The simple fact is that a multi core hyper threaded CPU with excessive RAM, space on hard drives whether USB 3 / thunderbolt or even SSD should work.

It's got number crunching raw power, ram enough to keep away from disk access and then plenty of disk access.

So why does it not?

Is it a MySQL issue? Is the backbone of LR fundamentally flawed? Is LUA a loa kak?

Is the architecture of the plugins causing massive bottleneck?

Empirically there are many hardware configurations , less so in the Mac environment, so what is the common denominator?

The software. Maybe the software architecture simply cannot cope with larger files, and sitting on a database is proving complicated. Maybe it's poor programming but I'd like to assume the programmers are extremely competent people.

With all the possibilities, combinations and permutations, it appears the protagonists are within the software - the one thing common to all the computers and the users experience.

[areohbee]

hamish,

-------------------------------------------------

I was not suggesting that people strip their systems down to bare bones and then use them that way. The point of the exercise is to rule out a bunch of things that the problem is not, or is caused by. Armed with such information, one can then take the next step(s).

Note: Suggesting there are things one can do to get it running better is NOT the same as implying fault of user or machine, nor does it imply Adobe need not participate in ultimate remedies. Please do not misunderatand. - you *MUST* consider the context/purpose (software as a given entity - not changeable by users: what can ya do to get it running as well for you as it is for some), in order to properly interpret the term "cause" in the preceding paragraph.

- If ya don't have the time/skill/inclination... - then you are at Adobe's mercy to solve for you, (or you have to use a different product) - I get that.

Short story: I used SageTV for a while because it worked on my machine - BeyondTV didn't (I probably could have gotten BeyondTV working, but I didn't try very hard, since I had a working alternative). Then when I rebuilt my machine, SageTV no longer worked, but BeyondTV did, so I switched. This sort of thing is really not unique to Lightroom. I probably could have gotten SageTV working on the rebuilt machine, if I persisted - in this case: switching was path of least resistance... - I realize there is more resistance when switching raw converters - still, my point: one can often get stubborn software running better if one tries hard enough. Perhaps a new phrase: Software whisperer, or to bring it closer to home: Lightroom whisperer - yeah: I like that... .

---------------------------------------------------

That said, I do not know Lightroom's future. Current implementation / design: Lightroom as lua-wrapped version of ACR, (plus value-added..), which Photoshop more than Lightroom dictates features of (the ACR part I mean, not the "lr-value-added" parts).

It will probably always be that, since any new multi-user, redesigned thingy is likely to be released as a completely new product, I'm guessing.

I predict Lr5 will be, to Lr4, as Lr3 was to Lr2... - they'll try to leverage the existing infrastructure as much as possible, change only strategically, optimize and get it running as well as they can, and voila: Lr5. - it won't be Lr4 PWV. I could be wrong, but that's my prediction.

I tend to agree with those who interpret the drastic price reduction as evidence that Adobe is not planning to pump tons more resources into it, au contrare: to eek what they can, and concentrate on other things... - also consider that Lr4 emerged in a very difficult economy: partial explanation, not excuse...

Summary: Keep expectations for Lr5 low, and don't assume Adobe will redesign Lr5 to eliminate any fundamental flaws - lest you be disappointed. It'll probably work just great for some folk, and for others: not so much - around n' around we go: the wheel keeps on turning...

PS - This is all speculation without inside info.

My desires for Lr5? - same as my desires were for Lr4: see Adobe feedback site...

Rob

[Nagchampa1]

Not to come off as sounding harsh - but this is how it's going to sound.

My apologies..

But, Kiwi Geoff is the nicest guy on the planet... spends HOURS AND HOURS AND COUNTLESS HOURS helping those of us LR deficient..

He simply doesnt have the TIME to have a life and answering questions to what he doesn't have answers to. Like you said, you are well aware of N.D.A's... Geoff won't risk his community expert status by offering anything to the contrary.

He reads  thousands of posts here and on I believe at LEAST 2 other forums that he is part of - whether it be via the forums OR those who happen to ask question directly... He helps all that he can who have literal needs for help and understanding. 

I hope Hamish, you were trying to be funny with your tumbleweed comment...

Without Geoff I would have been in big trouble many times. (Victoria and Rob Cole too)  and the countless others who VOLUNTEER in other boards and forums, they do it simply because of their passion for photography and desire to help others. Not to metion these 3 help without being contrary, rude, obnoxious, sarcastic and just plain rude as alot of people are...

Geoff has personally spent HOURS with me on cataloging and keywording alone.

So, since your issue is just that of wishes and frustration - he won't and  can't 'fake' any more information than he's already shared with you.

On top of  ' I CANT TELL YOU ANYTHING'..

Your wishes are noted and TONS have people (several of those are my wishes as well...) we have made those requests just as you have and Adobe is WELL aware of our requests. I'd say a few of them will be addressed about 1/3 and then by LR7 we'll be using something else.

And, at that time, LR will be 700$

Kim Siebert

[hamish niven]

Thanks Kim

Victoria's comment was on another thread about something completely different, so please disgregard that - its not pertinent to what is being discussed here

I'm not interested in people breaking NDA's etc, that is not this post is about. Rules, procedures guidelines etc are just that and put in for a reason.

On the assumption Geoff is under a TLA, and in the know then great, I hope that the having the info upfront will be useful to everyone when the blankets are lifted.

I'm sure nobody wants incorrect info about LR5, but I'm sure people want carrots.

I'd happily pay $700 in 4 years time for a full fast future spec LR7 to be working properly, I'd rather pay $200 for LR4 to be working properly now.

Its not a harsh answer, so no apologies needed.

Enjoy Monday wherever you are.

hamishNIVENPhotography

[Keith Reeder]

hamish niven wrote:

There were some noises the other week about a new RAW processing program which seemed to be lightning fast and started the images with a pleasing default.

Photo Ninja, perhaps?

If so: yeah, it's OK (no, that's unfair - it's good), but it's not definitively "better" in IQ terms than Lr; and it's limited in functionality terms (which I don't mind, actually).

I actually bought a copy despite the reservations I expressed in the thread on here about it (it can still give pink recovered highlights, no matter how well it's driven - Lr is better there) because I actually prefer converters that are just converters, and PN has some really clever stuff going on in the background in the way it handles exposure adjustments. It does indeed make for a very good starting point on most images; but it's still not better than Lr, it's just different - I prefer some results from it, some from Lr.

At least it's given me the motivation to give Capture One (and the company behind it) the boot once and for all...

Back on topic: I would love an "Lr 5 Lite" without DAM capability - just a converter. Yes I know it can be said that Lr 5 Lite = ACR, but it'd be a damn' sight cheaper to go from Lr 5 to Lr 6 (when we get there) than from Photoshop 6 to Photoshop 7 (or whatever increments apply by then) in order to stay current.

[Geoff the kiwi]

Actually Hamish, I have been taking photos - that is what I do.

In Uganda and China!! Internet has been very random.

Hope lr4.3 is working well for you and that you are having a great holiday season!!

[hamish niven]

Having a steaming hot holiday season thanks Geoff, just all that is perfect about South Africa.

LR4.3 is no improvement Geoff - there are some nice new icons, but even with fabulous thundebolt drives its treacle in winter.

New catalogs with 10 images - no faster on computers internal drives or on the thunderbolt.

All I can try is a new catalog with no plugins no extensions and see if that helps.

Bitterly dissappointed, but resigned to mediorcity that is the hall mark of what Lightroom is becoming in terms of speed, its a real shame as machines get faster, operating systems get more intelligent ( and bloated), but lightroom is not offering a great speed improvement

I even import all my images with as many presets as possible and leave the machine to render standard previews and still moving from image to image in develop mode is somethimes fast, other times 3 - 7 seconds.

All in all is a tedious experience and one that is costing me.

But Geoff, I hope you liked Uganda. I was there in 93 and it was amazing - internet pa! we had cesna planes and the occasional landline for communication, something special about being miles from everywhere, take a left and keep going. - Magical!

[Geoff the kiwi]

Hamish. I'm happy to help troubleshoot your problem but start a new thread. I use a MBP i7 (10.7.5) and have a 12tb Thunderbolt Promise Pegasus and have no isuues at all. So I beleive there is something that you have that is causing your troubles.

Steamimg hot here for Christmas 30º + but today we have much needed rain!!

[Jay Mitchosky]

Personally, I'd pay full upgrade price for complete emphasis on new architecture that burns with speed and efficiency.  Better use of multiple cores and GPU acceleration and whatever magic mojo software engineers do.  Zero extra features, pure performance enhancement and I'd happily shell out the cash.

[Pbeck1]

Levels tool, would be nice. I think 50% of the time a simple and fast slide on a dedicated levels tool would be all that an image needs, rather than having to muck about with all the sliders of the basic's panel (which quite frankly can take ages to get right sometimes). I would argue that the basics panel should instead be called the 'advanced panel' and used for treating the other 50% of the images that are in need of something more than just a levels tool.

[Lee_Jay]

You can use tone curve like levels if you really want to.

[Pbeck1]

Hi Lee, Thanks for the reply.

Yes, i find myself using the tone curve as a levels tool substitute half the time, but it does lack dedicated black and white point sliders and easy to read numbers. I'm talking about a levels tool similar to Photoshops.

p.s i'm just an amature photographer taking pictures of my family, & although i shoot in both jpeg and raw, i mostly throw the raws away and keep the jpegs (unless there's some major exposure problem that needs fixing). You might ask why am i using Lightroom then? It's because i love the non-destructive aspect to it, being able to go back in the future and change anything (inc crop etc).

[areohbee]

Pbeck1 wrote:

Yes, i find myself using the tone curve as a levels tool substitute half the time...

If tone curve supplied input to basics instead of the other way around, tone curve might be an OK solution, but alas: tone curve is after basics (in the processing pipeline), so if you use it instead of basics for levels then you really screw yourself when it comes to making adjustments via the basics.

For example, basics sliders are tied to exposure, independent of the tone curve, but if you've already increased exposure by left-shifting the white-point of the tone-curve, then basics sliders will not behave "properly".

I recommend against this approach, unless it is your policy not to adjust the basics afterward, or if you remember to reset the tone curve before embarking on the basics.

Rob

[Pbeck1]

Very interesting. I didn't know that. Thanks for the info Rob.

Perhaps my request should be amended to asking for black and white point sliders for the basics panel then (that behave just the same as a proper levels tool)? Not sure what they would call them though, as there are already sliders called blacks and whites!

Perhaps they could even put the sliders on the actual histogram (underneath), so it's 1st in line?

[areohbee]

Yeah, part of the problem with a levels tool in Lightroom, is that there is no simple mapping of levels to basic controls: whites affects white point, but so does highlights (usually, but not always more than the whites slider itself, somewhat counter-intuitively if I may say so) - which is one reason highlights is above whites in the top-down recommended order). Exposure also affects the white point... So setting the white point properly nearly always amounts to a balance of exposure, highlights, and whites sliders, primarily. - hard to do that automatically, although it's something auto-tone aspires to.

If you are editing just one photo at at time, you can shift-double-click the blacks & whites sliders (the word labels, not the sliders themselves), to initialize them to the auto-toned values, then adjust exposure and on down, but no way to do that en-bulk, that I know of (does anybody know if that is possible? - it seems like I tried auto-blacks/whites presets in PV2012 but it did not work - whereas it used to work in PV2010.

You may sometimes prefer the editing order:

1. Exposure

2. Blacks

3. the rest.

My experience is that PV2012 generally leans a little timid when it comes to blacks, and I sometimes find it hard to adjust contrast and/or shadows (and even to finalize exposure/whites...) until blacks are in the ball park.

Don't get me wrong: I'm an advocate of a levels tool which sits before the basic controls in the pipeline, but my suspicion is that it's not as straight forward as it sounds - hopefully I'm wrong .

Summary: If one could just get the levels close before hitting the basics, then editing the basics would be quicker and require smaller adjustments and fewer iterations - and I hope for but do not expect to see that feature in Lr5.

R