P:(Masking) Add auto update recompute to subject /sky masking after copy/paste

[rhp3]

Love the auto subject detection in the new lightroom classic update.

Idea: add an auto recompute feature to the subject masking when working with multiple images.

Observation: I'm a wedding photographer. When working with multiple images and auto sync is turned on, all of my edits to one image are synced across all selected images. When working with the auto mask subject selection, LRC basically creates a mask "preset" for the visible image but won't apply that "preset" to all other images until you manually select the  "recompute subject" button on the mask pannel. 

Why not have LRC do this automatically across all selected images? Seems like a nice improvement.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Setting status to Planned

[SharonCarter]

Bring it on! I would walk away for 30 minutes to allow it to work rather than manually recalculating.

[JohnNokomis]

It shouldn't be very hard to implement since you can already do this exact task in Photoshop. Actually it's even better than the suggested idea.. PS can batch select subject locally OR process it through the cloud for "finer details". I haven't tested to see just how much finer the details are though. 

[arlo5E39]

I appreciate you thinking of the processing needs of this. Please post a warning(skipable for the future) that warns of this. I have no issue with ANY amount of time it takes to accomplish this task as it can be run while I do something else such as make lunch or sleep(depending on the time necessary). The difference is that I do not need to do the repetiive task of asking for one mask(and the inverse) to be saved for each photo. The new features are so incredibly useful that I use them on almost all my photos, so just give me the option to have that created on import, or applied to a batch. If I have an issue with a large batch running too slowly, I can always select a smaller selection to be computed at this time, but the time is saved on repetive tasks.

I only see 8 seconds or so for one mask to be applied, so 4 photos a minute on a fairly old computer. It does max my cpu, but it saves soooooooo much time vs manually masking, I will happily select 20 photos and go make myself an espresso.

Thank you for the new features, and thank you for listening to the community!

[defaultgh5c5ca9s2ud]

Status set to planned. Can hardly contain self. Wondering if maybe they can bang this out over the weekend so this next 4000 photos isn't sich a slog.

[alexb30229931]

Hello, just adding my +2c that after a little learning curve yes these AI masking options are a game changer and I love them.

Definitely agree with OP though. Could there be multiple levels of this? Option to set autocompute as a default / option to enable in copy/paste / a shortcut key?

Even just a shortcut key would help speed up my workflow immensely!

Thanks 🙂

[Zuhair_Shafai]

I'm doing astrophotography; one photo can consist of 300+ images. It's annoying to compute each photo. 

[angellomiami]

It really doesn´t matter if it takes 30 min or an hour, We can play with that and do dome other stuff in the meantime. But definetelly is something I am hoping you guys implement. 

[angellomiami]

100 %%%%%%

[Russ22792296dahh]

Any amount of time that it will take to recompute the masks is easily half of what it takes to manually go to each photo and do it.  If that is a serious concern, make it an option in preferences or a seperate check mark when copying settings.

[tobiasgelston]

Why not have the ability to "rasterize" or make the mask a non compute mask? So on images where the sky doesn't change (like a long timelapse) you can easily sync the sky mask from the first image to the others - no additional computing is necessary. 

[johnrellis]

"Why not have the ability to "rasterize" or make the mask a non compute mask? So on images where the sky doesn't change (like a long timelapse) you can easily sync the sky mask from the first image to the others - no additional computing is necessary."

While waiting for Adobe to implement this, you could use the Copy Settings plugin to do it.

[Landon21967358r14h]

We just completed a shoot of 900 images for an apparel company to use. I'm blowing out white backgrounds, selecting the subject, and bringing the exposure back down to normal. Being able to select an option to "Auto Update Mask" or "Auto Recompute AI Mask" would be game changing right now. I'd happily let Adobe run this process in the background while I answer emails instead of having to click a button hundreds of times. 

[radimm54041199]

@Rikk Flohr: PhotographyThat very good point! Maybe we should also cancel auto 1:1 preview render since it takes time, right? After all, on some slow systems it might take more than 60 minutes. Better make the users do it manually just like with AI selection now and spend 3 hrs JUST LIKE I AM CURRENTLY WITH 600 PHOTOS OF BOTTLES OF WINE. I'm currently on 200th and going insane already.

[barrygoyette]

This feature is so valuable and it's so surprising that there is no ability to batch apply it accross a group of images. So...ditto to all the other responders saying "yes" ---I'll be happy to wait for this AI feature to sync automatically, or with a dialogue asking me if I want it to.  Also...the select subject masking seems to be quite a bit less accurate than photoshop's version, at least for me...often it is selecting large portions of adjoining subject matter. If anything, Lightroom's masking needs to be more accurate than Photoshop because it lacks the selection tools of its older sister. 

[kevinm97231858]

I would love to see this auto evaluate AI masks when copy and pasting develeope settings.  I will run timelaspe photos and when you process one image using AI masks and then several hundred photos all need individually updated, that is very time consuming.  Even if it took a while to process, I could just set it overnight or go get a cup of coffee and come back while it does its thing across the board to all images.  I do think that setting an abort option would be a good idea so you dont end up stuck doing it if you change your mind.

[edgariscoding]

Glad to see this suggestion status set to Planned. 

I'm really looking forward to this. 

I have a maxed out M1 Max MacBook Pro and i'm sure recaluclating masks in the background woudlnt be a problem. With that said, maybe add some settings or options to allow users to choose if they want the masks recalculated right away, ihn the background, or only when a photo is selected/exported.

[Qamera]

I don't mind committing time and computer resources to a batch process because a) it will still be much faster than any of the semi-manual workarounds, plus b) I can do something else while in batch.  For example DeNoise can batch process 100+ photos with individual AI at about 30~45 second per photo.  It's a good time to have a cup of tea or clean the camera.

[richardplondon]

"blowing out white backgrounds, selecting the subject, and bringing the exposure back down to normal" - just as a suggestion, it may be better to invert your subject selection. Then you can blow out the background with just one targeted adjustment - affecting that background only - and otherwise leave the processing of the subject alone. Rather than applying global adjustments that alter the subject needlessly, and then requiring a precise subject selection to recover the subject tonality back as it had been.

Another perhaps more robust and economical approach might be to apply a tone based local adjustment instead, that just affects white and near-white tones. Ensuring your background is illuminated brighter than more or less the whole subject, which is a lighting issue not a postprocessing issue, anything that overspills into affecting the brightest parts within the subject should be exceptional. That exceptional issue can be very rapidly erased out with a brush, from that same 'background' adjustment mask - requiring no particular precision when doing so.  

Because the described workflow depends on the AI selection being more or less perfect, needing review per image, and to be corrected for wherever not: also, on the right corrective processing to counterbalance the blowing-out adjustment whatever that may be. And it depends on an AI recalculation for each image.  The tone-selection method will be immediately specific to each image you sync that masking onto. You can even have already included a subtracting brush layer, in this Synced masking. All you'll then need to do is press K, activate that subtracting brush layer, and quickly brush anywhere that it's (exceptionally) needed on that image.

[mattd67431277]

Could you please add the ability to batch select subject for an entire gallery/selection? It would save a lot of time in my workload to select the subject and the background in each photo if I didn't have to open each photo, wait for select subject, duplicate that mask, and then invert the subject in the mask copy for each photo individually. If, instead, I could highlight all of the photos I need to select the subject and inverse for, turn on auto sync, and batch select subject (hopefully with the ability to select its inverse in an additional mask as well) before I start to edit, I would be able to go get a coffee while it computes all of them for 5 minutes before I begin instead of waiting 5-10 seconds at the start of editing each photo for select subject to compute and refine. It would also save a keyboard shortcut and about 8 clicks per photo, which adds up in large galleries.

Currently when selecting subject with auto sync turned on and multiple photos selected it will compute the subject for the first photo and then add a mask with a broken Subject 1 selection for every additional photo. It says, "Subject 1 needs to be recomputed" when hovering over the subject in the mask in each additional photo, but there doesn't appear to be a way to tell it to recompute it.

[mattd67431277]

Sorry, I couldn't find this thread and my idea post was merged into this one. I agree with everyone here that it would be invaluable to have this done in a batch effort before beginning by editing process rather than done at the start of each new image -- waiting for one large job at the start would be much better than waiting at the start of each photo as it would allow me to multitask without getting distracted once I start editing. I'd like to recommend the option to add a mask for subject selection and an additional mask for the subject inverse as part of the batch process. I would love it, as others have suggested above, to have this be an option on gallery import just like preview generation and face detection, as it's something that I've been doing to just about every photo since the feature has been added, even if only for a few minor tweaks to each photo.

Really glad this has been changed to Planned!

[shawnh97010311]

@Rikk Flohr: Photography Can I ask, related to this subject, is there any option within the backend SDK for creating our own form of automation for the masking re-compute? I am looking for any possible workaround for turning that computation into an automated experience. Our users are okay with the added time for computation. Thanks for your help and looking forward to hearing your thoughts! 

[Ivan238721802vc9]

Everyone must agree that subject/sky selection is a really life-changing feature for most professionals working with large amounts of images. Given the amazing accuracy of the algorithm I would suggest adding a batch task option (similar to the "build smart previews" feature) that calculates ahead subject/sky masks on a selected group or all images, so you don't have to do it one by one. This woud add two masking layers in every selected photo: one for subject,one for sky and (why not) another for background (which would be the inverted subject). That would speed up the developping process greatly.

Also it would be great to include a new "select background" option, to avoid the step of inverting the subject mask everytime.

[Ivan238721802vc9]

Just added a similar idea. The point of "it would take a lot of time" would also applies to smart previews or 1:1 previews batch build,  these can also be time consuming tasks, but still is up to the user to plan and decide when it's best to run such a task, say go to bed and return to a catalog with all its previews (smart and 1:1) ready to rock. Right? Same principle here. You give as the option, we take the hard call to actually use it when is most convenient.

[JohanElzenga]

You can already do this with 'Synchronise Settings' or 'Auto Sync', so a separate batch option seems superfluous to me. Of course right now that does not work very well yet because each synchronised mask needs to be recalculated, but that request is already marked as "planned" (https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-ideas/p-masking-add-auto-update-recompute-to-subjec...).