What has the Adobe LR team been doing since LR5 for 2 years?

[Hans Kruse]

I really don't want to be negative towards the Adobe teams working on the photography related products Lightroom and Photoshop, but given the comment in another thread that the HDR and Pano functions were developed by the Adobe Camera Raw team and given that I see only small enhancements besides this in Lightroom 6, I'm asking: What has the Adobe Lightroom team been doing for the last 2 years? I do know that use of GPU's were implemented but I assume that this is also the case in ACR and likely the ACR team has done the work.

This leads me to the thought that Lightroom as a licensed product should be discontinued in order to allow Adobe to do the logical merge of Lightroom and ACR into a single module that is used from both Lightroom and Photoshop and to get rid of the arcane UI of ACR and therefore allow a tighter integration between Lightroom and Photoshop.

The basic message is that I'm disappointed that there were not more new features in Lightroom 6. Lightroom 5 was even rather light on new features.

One "small" thing about both HDR and Pano in LR6 is that there is not even information about which pictures went into a merge, so basically both HDR and Pano were slammed onto LR6 without considering integrity features like the above.

I have added the compare list of features between LR5 and LR6 and LRCC. Not much in LR6 and most of the list for LRCC compared to LR5 was in LR5 with CC subscription.

Sorry Adobe, I'm not impressed 

[chez]

I really don't want to be negative towards the Adobe teams working on the photography related products Lightroom and Photoshop, but given the comment in another thread that the HDR and Pano functions were developed by the Adobe Camera Raw team and given that I see only small enhancements besides this in Lightroom 6, I'm asking: What has the Adobe Lightroom team been doing for the last 2 years? I do know that use of GPU's were implemented but I assume that this is also the case in ACR and likely the ACR team has done the work.

This leads me to the thought that Lightroom as a licensed product should be discontinued in order to allow Adobe to do the logical merge of Lightroom and ACR into a single module that is used from both Lightroom and Photoshop and to get rid of the arcane UI of ACR and therefore allow a tighter integration between Lightroom and Photoshop.

The basic message is that I'm disappointed that there were not more new features in Lightroom 6. Lightroom 5 was even rather light on new features.

One "small" thing about both HDR and Pano in LR6 is that there is not even information about which pictures went into a merge, so basically both HDR and Pano were slammed onto LR6 without considering integrity features like the above.

I have added the compare list of features between LR5 and LR6 and LRCC. Not much in LR6 and most of the list for LRCC compared to LR5 was in LR5 with CC subscription.

Sorry Adobe, I'm not impressed 

And how do you know that LR6 and Arc are not developed by the same team? And why do you care if they were developed by different teams as long as the results end up in Lightroom?

People sometimes just like to complain. Much ado about not much.

[Hans Kruse]

And how do you know that LR6 and Arc are not developed by the same team? And why do you care if they were developed by different teams as long as the results end up in Lightroom?

People sometimes just like to complain. Much ado about not much.

If you look at the credits for Lightroom they are divided into different groups as attached. Are you impressed with the amount of new features in LR6?

If you think I complain because I like it you are coming to the wrong person. Actually I hate to complain. In fact I don't see this as complaining but rather to ask the obvious question that I'm sure many others are asking. Many also choose the attempt to shoot the messenger approach like you to divert the discussion. For LR5 I was not impressed but not write a post like this, but now for LR6 I really do feel there is a reason for it. If you disagree, fine with me, but it does not change the amount of features in LR6 to not me much besides what is coming from ACR.

Lightroom Mobile was added to LRCC while LR5, but this is a really scaled down version of Lightroom that I kind of like, but is still rather rudimentary.

I hope the reason for not much seen from the Lightroom team in the last two versions is because they are working on new stuff that will come later on. I somehow doubt it, but really hope so. And I hope Adobe cleans up the mess with Lightroom and ACR as mentioned. Therefore licensed LR must go.

[Jimbo57]

People sometimes just like to complain. Much ado about not much.

How else will Adobe know whether they are meeting the needs/wants of its customers?

I agree with Hans. In every other Lightroom upgrade from v1 to v5, I have upgraded on the day of release. This time, because I am not interested in empty gimmicks like second-rate HDR or Pano, I have not found anything to persuade me to upgrade from v5.7 to v6.

Now, Adobe might be able to aggregate customer data to discover that, commercially, the v6 upgrade has been (or not been) a flop but merely aggregating data does not tell them why.

[Hans Kruse]

How else will Adobe know whether they are meeting the needs/wants of its customers?

I agree with Hans. In every other Lightroom upgrade from v1 to v5, I have upgraded on the day of release. This time, because I am not interested in empty gimmicks like second-rate HDR or Pano, I have not found anything to persuade me to upgrade from v5.7 to v6.

Now, Adobe might be able to aggregate customer data to discover that, commercially, the v6 upgrade has been (or not been) a flop but merely aggregating data does not tell them why.

I should probably clarify: I like the new HDR feature a lot and I like that the result of the blending is a DNG file. But this feature came from the Camera Raw team according to Schewe. And even more disappointing there was not even any integrity check built into LR6. I would like that so I do not accidentally delete RAW flles that are merged into an HDR and also know which files or virtual copies were merged. Since LR has a database that holds all the information about the pictures, I was expecting this.

So what I'm seeing is that the ACR team has done a great job. If team members are moved back and forth between the two groups I have no way of knowing. But even if that was the case I'm not impressed with LR specific enhancements in LR6. I hope there will be a focus on the message here rather than shooting back at the messenger. All are free, of course, to disagree but please state why you disagree.

[dreed]

What I get from your list of features, Hans, is that Adobe is trying to shepherd people into using the CC version of LR and at the moment they're using the "carrot" method.

Maybe they feel that they get a much better return or the business model is more sustainable or...?

[digitaldog]

What has the Adobe Lightroom team been doing for the last 2 years?

Given this is speculation as I'm not an Adobe engineer  , one area I'd suggest is Lightroom mobile. A waste of time IMHO.

[Manoli]

[...]  Lightroom mobile. A waste of time IMHO.

+1
Lightroom started life as an almost perfect amalgam of DAM and premium raw converter combined with the Print module. Wherever it goes in the future, I hope the Lightroom team don't lose sight of the 'lean and mean' moniker and keep the ethos of excellence as their guiding principle.

Better to be the yardstick by which others are judged rather than a second-rate jack-of-all trades.

[ButchM]

People sometimes just like to complain. Much ado about not much.

People sometime just like to complain that not every customer believes that Adobe is pure perfection.

Customers are allowed to raise questions, express concerns and seek answers for the products and services they purchase.

[ButchM]

I agree with many of your sentiments, Hans. While I am not ungrateful for the advancements made to Lightroom, I am also concerned about the decision making as to which features are developed and when they are added.

The attitude I am referring to is very apparent in Photoshop as well ... each new version cycle, reviewers and even self-described Adobe Evangelists often cite the advancements of ACR in Ps as the top features for a new version release.

Just look back at Terry White's videos for "My Top 5 Favorite Features in Lightroom 5" ... and his "My Top 5 Favorite New Features in Photoshop CC (2013)" ... the lists he presents are nearly identical.

Now that the subscription model seems to be the primary pathway forward, I don't think it's wrong to at least raise the question and discuss if we end users who are paying for these products and thus making future development possible ... if we are seeing the best effort and decision making from those we are rewarding with our hard-earned currency.

[Robert-Peter Westphal]

I fully agree with all that Hans said :
And the fact that the resulting HDR or Pano is at least not stapled automatically when returned into Lr ( by simply checking a box ) shows me that these function haven't developed for Lr, but were pretty fast integrated from ACR.

What if the version of Lr which has been published a few weeks ago ( CC or Lr6 )  wasn't really planned to be published, but was published due to the announcement of many sites. This could put pressure on Adobe to publish what they have ready - or almost ready - and in the near future Lr CC will be improved with the actual planned funtionalities. This would also put pressure on the people using a perpetual license cause they will not benefit from intermediate updates.

In Germany, we call this 2 flies with one slap killed !

[john beardsworth]

What have the Romans ever done for us?

[gazwas]

I personally think LR6 is the push towards subscription only as a company doesn't have to dazzle every couple of years with new features and as the OP, often dissatisfying existing users.

I've not used LR since early version two since I hated it. I just ipdated to the CC photo plan (for photoshop) and thought I'd give LR another try and I think its an amazing bit of software - couldn't be more happy with LR CC.

[dpirazzi]

What have the Romans ever done for us?

Uhhh... the aquaduct?

I am a bit disappointed with the pano feature and overall performance, but if they can get those right in a not too distant release then I'll be happy with Lr6.

[Chris Kern]

This leads me to the thought that Lightroom as a licensed product should be discontinued in order to allow Adobe to do the logical merge of Lightroom and ACR into a single module that is used from both Lightroom and Photoshop and to get rid of the arcane UI of ACR and therefore allow a tighter integration between Lightroom and Photoshop.

Better yet, how about Lightroom bundled with a new pixel editor that offered the Photoshop features (and only those features) that photographers still turn to Photoshop for.  Stripped of the more esoteric functionality and complexity that other graphic artists require—esoteric from a photographic perspective, at least—it should be possible to equip this new pixel editor with a user agent whose controls were congruent with Lightroom's.  ACR already does this: invoked from Lightroom it is Lightroom-like, invoked from Photoshop, it is ... ahhh ... not so nice.

As I recall, Jeff Schewe mentioned the possibility of something like this a while back.

[Rhossydd]

I think it's a bit harsh criticising the lack of progress in 6 over 5.
The HDR feature seems to work pretty well and has a good hit rate IME.
The pano feature isn't as poor as some here would have you believe. When it works, it works well and delivers decent workable files.
The FR was frequently asked for too. It's just a shame it's not as well implemented as one would hope for.
GPU acceleration was also requested a lot, but seems to be pretty much a dead loss.

So the above seem 'version one' features that might come to maturity in future upgrades.
The last two upgrades have also been dirt cheap, so there's not too much to moan about on that score either.

The real disappointment has been the lack of the little improvements that could make the program more usable, but don't make great headlines.

I have added the compare list of features between LR5 and LR6 and LRCC. Not much in LR6 and most of the list for LRCC compared to LR5 was in LR5 with CC subscription.

There's absolutely nothing at all that appeals to me in the CC offering over the LR6 feature set, so I can't see why people think it's a strategy to move people to CC by adding compelling new 'CC only' features.

[jrp]

LR CC has the feel of a release forced for some other reason, probably to set a baseline for the split between the subscription and perpetual licenses. There was also a lot of fiddle about with the creative suite manager (having to log in and out at least twice to get to the update).

The OpenCL stuff is tricky, but there are plenty of open source programs that use it successfully, so it's not completely intractable. Expertise can be bought in, particularly to overcome the indeosyncracjes of the different implementations, notably Apple's.  So I don't think that they can have spent 2 years playing with that.

Apart from .x.1 quick fix releases, I think that we are still on quarterly camera / lens releases, hoping that Apple continues to go after the amateur market and no one else does anything mould breaking, like Mylio.

[Hans Kruse]

I think it's a bit harsh criticising the lack of progress in 6 over 5.
The HDR feature seems to work pretty well and has a good hit rate IME.
The pano feature isn't as poor as some here would have you believe. When it works, it works well and delivers decent workable files.
The FR was frequently asked for too. It's just a shame it's not as well implemented as one would hope for.
GPU acceleration was also requested a lot, but seems to be pretty much a dead loss.

So the above seem 'version one' features that might come to maturity in future upgrades.
The last two upgrades have also been dirt cheap, so there's not too much to moan about on that score either.

The real disappointment has been the lack of the little improvements that could make the program more usable, but don't make great headlines.There's absolutely nothing at all that appeals to me in the CC offering over the LR6 feature set, so I can't see why people think it's a strategy to move people to CC by adding compelling new 'CC only' features.

Look here https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/features.html and see that HDR, Pano and GPU support came into ACR and then was plugged into LR6. My point in the original post was pretty clear on that. Therefore the point was basically about what was in LR6 besides what came from ACR. Not much.

[Denis de Gannes]

Look here https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/features.html and see that HDR, Pano and GPU support came into ACR and then was plugged into LR6. My point in the original post was pretty clear on that. Therefore the point was basically about what was in LR6 besides what came from ACR. Not much.

As far as I am aware the Lightroom Develop Module improvements to Lightroom (including new raw camera support) are determined by the developments to ACR, so the cost would have always been upgrade LR or upgrade Photoshop CS. Now the option is subscribe to Photoshop CC or upgrade to Lightroom 6.
That's why my opinion is, when you subscribe to the CC Photographers package is you get Lightroom CC gratis. ( to wit there is no specific subscription in Adobe Creative Cloud to Lightroom per say)

[Jim MSP]

I really don't want to be negative towards the Adobe teams working on the photography related products Lightroom and Photoshop, but given the comment in another thread that the HDR and Pano functions were developed by the Adobe Camera Raw team and given that I see only small enhancements besides this in Lightroom 6, I'm asking: What has the Adobe Lightroom team been doing for the last 2 years? I do know that use of GPU's were implemented but I assume that this is also the case in ACR and likely the ACR team has done the work.

This leads me to the thought that Lightroom as a licensed product should be discontinued in order to allow Adobe to do the logical merge of Lightroom and ACR into a single module that is used from both Lightroom and Photoshop and to get rid of the arcane UI of ACR and therefore allow a tighter integration between Lightroom and Photoshop.

The basic message is that I'm disappointed that there were not more new features in Lightroom 6. Lightroom 5 was even rather light on new features.

One "small" thing about both HDR and Pano in LR6 is that there is not even information about which pictures went into a merge, so basically both HDR and Pano were slammed onto LR6 without considering integrity features like the above.

I have added the compare list of features between LR5 and LR6 and LRCC. Not much in LR6 and most of the list for LRCC compared to LR5 was in LR5 with CC subscription.

Sorry Adobe, I'm not impressed 

I've waited to reply. All I can say is that I basically agree. If you have done HDR with PhotoMatrix Pro and made panoramas with PTGui (or even Microsoft's free ICE) then you realize LR has a long ways to go. The performance boost with a GPU has been close to nonexistent for many people, including me. It is a start, but not a complete product. And the Library functions have seemed to have been frozen for a long time.
V6 ?? More like v6 beta.