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Question

Biggest advantage / difference between Lightroom and Photoshop

Forum|Forum|2 years ago
October 25, 2023
2 replies
1326 views

At the moment I'm toying with the idea of installing Lightroom, although I'm not sure how useful it is for me. Currently, I drag the photos from my SD card to the desired directory, open them in Photoshop and make any desired changes via AdobeCameraRAW. Theoretically that's enough for me, but possibly there are other killer features of Lightroom that I'm just not aware of today 😉
I know that Lightroom offers me the possibility of image management - I wouldn't actually need this as far as I know.
What I do know is that you can load presets in Lightroom. AdobeCameraRAW basically offers me this feature as well, though I don't know if I can load Lightroom presets into AdobeCameraRAW as well, for example.
So, besides file management, what are the strongest arguments for you to use Lightroom that Photoshop / AdobeCameraRAW doesn't offer me?
Thanks in advance for your answers and tips, Ehrich Lehnsherr

macOS

This topic has been closed for replies.

Rob_Cullen

Community Expert

Your first step is to understand and identify WHICH VERSION of "Lightroom" you are asking about.

This link explains the difference between the 'new' Lightroom and the 'well established' version that is now called Lightroom-Classic. This link helps explain those differences-

COMPARE LIGHTROOM & LIGHTROOM-CLASSIC FEATURES

You need to decide whether you want your image files stored 'locally on hard-drives' or in the 'Lightroom Cloud' and select the appropriate version of "Lightroom".

Now if you are coming from only ever using Photoshop, and possibly Adobe Bridge (or simply a file browser), then this youtube link below makes a comparison between using Bridge (or file browser) and a Lightroom (database) system. *NOTE: This video was recorded before a name change to Lightroom-Classic, so all references to "Lightroom" in the video should now be applied to "Lightroom-Classic".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tp2AThZiaBY

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 .

M

Markus KleineAuthor

Participating Frequently

thank you, but in the video of Julieanne Kost is talking about lightroom and bridge. But I dont think about to use Bridge.

I am just asking myself, wihich of both versions of Lightroom is the right one for me.
I am user which didn´t use lightlroom before – I drag the foto-files which are worth it from the SD-Card on my NAS and work on them with Photoshop and the Camera Raw Extension. My Sister also has access to those files and she also retouches the images and we both store them later locally. So I guess our choice should be the classic version – not the cloud-based.
BUT – if we are one a photoshooting outside and want to check, if the images are really sharp, we just dont want to check it on a zoomed in camera-display but on our iPad Pro.
So my question is now, if I connect the camera to the iPad and activate the tethering-function, which version of Lightroom would be the right one for me?
Actually I want all the files still stored on our NAS for a later retouching. Everything – the database-files should be stored on or local NAS. Is LightroomClassic the right version for our needs?
And how do the both versions of LightroomClassic do “communicate”?

M

Markus KleineAuthor

Participating Frequently

after a new research, I will try cascable for tethering and Lightroom Classic for editing and organizing my images…
By @Markus Kleine

Sounds good, because no Adobe app on mobile does tethered shooting as far as I know. If I do wireless tethering with iPhone/iPad, it’s either with Cascable or the camera manufacturer’s app.

Regarding the desktop apps, in case it helps your final decision:

If you also want to do tethered shooting on the desktop, and manage originals locally with the help of the organizational features in a catalog, and you want to print, then use Lightroom Classic.

If you don’t need tethered shooting on the desktop, and want to upload all originals to the cloud and manage them there, then use Lightroom. Lightroom does have a new Local tab for browsing and editing originals in local folders, storing edits in XMP sidecar files, and that will work about as well as using Camera Raw, so maybe you’d be happy with that. But keep in mind that Lightroom Local mode cannot take advantage of many features in Lightroom that are cloud-managed, such as version control and virtual organization (albums).

if we are one a photoshooting outside and want to check, if the images are really sharp, we just dont want to check it on a zoomed in camera-display but on our iPad Pro.
By @Markus Kleine

If you are using Cascable, you can review each captured image in the app. Captured images are stored to the apps’s own private storage on iPad by default. You can define other storage locations and have Cascable automatically copy photos there, using its Storage Link feature. For example, you can have Cascable use Storage Link to copy captured images to an external SSD connected to the iPad USB-C port. Later, you connect that SSD to a Mac or PC, and copy the images to your NAS. Then have Lightroom Classic import the new images at the NAS without moving them (using the Import/Add or Synchronize options). The catalog remembers the images at that path. You might need to test all of that, but I think it would work.

Lightroom Classic can catalog images on an NAS, but the catalog itself cannot be stored on an NAS, only on DAS (direct attached storage) or internal volumes.

Important note: Lightroom on iOS has a new Device tab, but unfortunately it doesn’t work as well as the Local tab in desktop Lightroom. It can browse only the device photo library; it cannot browse photos in a folder in the iOS Files app (I wish it could), which is the iOS equivalent of a computer desktop folder hierarchy. For this reason, I do not think it’s practical to use Lightroom on iOS to do quick review of images captured by tethered shooting on that device, because it will try to upload them to Lightroom Photos in the Adobe cloud.

Hey Conrad, thank you very much for your detailed answer and your invested time for helping me. Really, thank you!!
Right now, my thoughts are, that I only want to check, if the photos me or my sister has shooten in the studio are sharp. So I leave them on my camera sd-card and copy them after shooting onto my NAS.

But your hint concerning the DAS unsettles me a little bit. Sure, my computer hast got a DAS, but I dont do safety-copies of my mac and the same for my sisters mac. We just work on the NAS, which surely has got safety-copies. And what is, if I sell the computer? Than I have to remind those annoying catalog-files from Lightroom classic? Is this what Adobe thinks is an appropriate usage!?? Sounds bit strange 2 me…
Or is this fact just the exclusion for LightroomClassic and I should use Lightroom?

dj_paige

Legend

It seems as if you have posted in the wrong forum? You are talking about Lightroom and not Lightroom Classic, but this is the Lightroom Classic forum. Questions about Lightroom ought to go in the "Lightroom (ecosystem)" forum.

Or are you really talking about Lightroom Classic?

M

Markus KleineAuthor

Participating Frequently

…is there any admin who can shift the post, or do I have to delete and repost it!??

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