Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Adobe Lightroom Q&A => Topic started by: rdonson on November 02, 2017, 06:01:09 pm
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I've remarked prior to Lr Classic on Lr CC 2015 how I've had to go to "Preferences, Performance" and disable the graphics processor. It was horribly slow after doing extensive work with the brush tool.
Well.... this is one aspect of performance not improved for me with Lr Classic.
My wife and I both experience this on our machines.
Both of us have 27" 5K iMacs with 40 GB RAM and hefty graphics processors. My wife's has a AMD Radeon R9 M395 2048 MB and I have the AMD Radeon Pro 580 8192 MB.
Adobe's "Learn More" is of little help to me other than to suggest to disable the option.
https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/kb/lightroom-gpu-faq.html
Does anyone know if Adobe is going to work on the graphics processor performance in Lr Classic? This seems like a leftover from several years ago.
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I also had to turn off GP in Lightroom Classic's prefs until this workaround https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qozuHWU60so
In a nutshell download a 28 byte Adobe document (open GL related) from Adobe https://shared-assets.adobe.com/link/082f4efd-be2b-4a84-7dda-5b672f7f766e
On a Mac, copy the document to the main library > application support > Adobe > Lightroom (restart Lightroom for the difference to take effect).
Hope this might help.
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The contents of that file, which is executed by LR upon startup:
Develop.PreferOpenGL = true
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Thanks so much, Nick.
Incredibly simply fix that works.
John,
Thanks for the explanation.
Boggles my mind to wonder why Adobe doesn't include the appropriate detection and fix during installation. Is Adobe asleep at the wheel (still?). Stunning.
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The contents of that file, which is executed by LR upon startup:
Thanks, John. I have been working well on a Win10 system with nvidia card. Noticed in LR system info that the card was set at DirectX. However, I was not having any apparent problems.
Reading the Adobe spec for GPU cards, it appears that OpenGL is important to them as it is mentioned, not DirectX.
So my question....is it best to use this code to force into OpenGL mode?
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I really don't know, John. I only contributed to show what the file is doing, but I wouldn't say more without knowing the context which led to it being posted.
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Turned on the graphics processor on my MBP with LR Classic and finally no performance hit. Not sure at this point if any performance gain, however. Intel Iris Pro GPU.
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On Windows I suspect that this file would go in the "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Lightroom Classic CC\Support" folder. Other versions of LR would choose the respective folders. Is this where other Windows users are placing it? Could this line simply be added to the preferences file?
I've been leaving the graphic processor selected, though I don't think I see a huge improvement.
Having this file added, maybe there is some improvement - if it is being recognized - but not enough to rule out "wishful thinking"
Too bad Adobe doesn't provide something more definitive in this area.
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Too bad Adobe doesn't provide something more definitive in this area.
Like https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/lightroom/kb/lightroom-gpu-faq.html
The file is called config.lua, a special name for LR. Config.lua's contents can vary depending on what the software engineer is trying to test, so it might enable logging, for example, or here it's switching on OpenGL. It is not intended for general use.
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I too have a 27" iMac 5k with the AMD Radeon R9 M395 2048 MB processor. My LR Classic preferences show that and the OpenGL engine. So, in my case LR is aware of what my system has, and I did not have to go about downloading a fix. I have no issues in the developing module.
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I'm glad to hear it didn't affect everyone.
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The file is called config.lua, a special name for LR. Config.lua's contents can vary depending on what the software engineer is trying to test, so it might enable logging, for example, or here it's switching on OpenGL. It is not intended for general use.
Yeah, I got the file from the messages above. I was just wondering where it would need to be placed on a Windows system. I only saw a path for Mac.
The FAQ link I'm familiar with. It doen't mention the config.lua file that I've seen... though I have not read every word on the page either. I may be missing something..
Thanks!
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I also had to turn off GP in Lightroom Classic's prefs until this workaround https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qozuHWU60so
In a nutshell download a 28 byte Adobe document (open GL related) from Adobe https://shared-assets.adobe.com/link/082f4efd-be2b-4a84-7dda-5b672f7f766e
Oddly, this fix—forcing Lightroom to bind to the OpenGL graphics shared library—originated as a way to work around an abnormal exit (Lightroom "crash") on Windows with Microsoft's Direct X (https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/kb/crash-gpu-directx-enabled.html) and was later proposed as a way to deal with a Develop Module display issue on MacOS with Apple's Metal graphics library (https://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/lightroom-cc-classic-lut-color-profile-problem?topic-reply-list%5Bsettings%5D%5Bfilter_by%5D=all). No mention at either of those links about it resolving the performance problems many users have experienced on both platforms with GPU acceleration enabled.
I have a feeling that using a graphics subsystem as a secondary general-purpose processor has turned out to be considerably more complex than the Adobe developers thought.
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Yeah, I got the file from the messages above. I was just wondering where it would need to be placed on a Windows system. I only saw a path for Mac.
It goes in the 'root' of your presets folder. You can use "showLR presets folder" within preferences.
On mine, it would be:
C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Lightroom\config.lua
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I too have a 27" iMac 5k with the AMD Radeon R9 M395 2048 MB processor. My LR Classic preferences show that and the OpenGL engine. So, in my case LR is aware of what my system has, and I did not have to go about downloading a fix. I have no issues in the developing module.
Same here, never had a problem with Lightroom with my Mac since mid 2015 when I purchased my iMac. I have my GPU active and do not see and significant difference if it is on or off.
Based on what I see on the forums on the net its an irrelevant issue, if it works for you leave it on otherwise turn it off. Maybe some day it may have some relevance.
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I think it's unfortunate that the Adobe engineers are using OpenGL rather than OpenCL. That (and some of their comments) indicate that they are using GPU acceleration only in rendering for display, not to accelerate their processing algorithms. That's where there is real potential for acceleration.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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I'm glad I ran across this thread. It was not recognizing my card either (Nvidia 1060). I just put in the config file and it is significantly improved with GPU acceleration.
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I think it's unfortunate that the Adobe engineers are using OpenGL rather than OpenCL. That (and some of their comments) indicate that they are using GPU acceleration only in rendering for display, not to accelerate their processing algorithms. That's where there is real potential for acceleration.
Well, admittedly I have no knowledge of Lightroom's internals, but from an end-user's perspective the bottleneck in the Develop Module has always been rendering—especially when making local adjustments, zooming to 1:1, and performing other drawing operations that are computationally expensive. Again, just an impression, but LR otherwise seems to have enough CPU cycles to do what it needs to do on a modern multi-core machine: when it blocks, it almost always seems to be when it is updating the display. I presume the Adobe developers use DTrace and something similar on Windows to determine for what functions greater parallelization would be useful.
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Going by that linked YouTube video showing the shadow rendering differences between Library & Develop modules (same problem I have in non-CC LR4-fixed by my loading a matrix color working space in Soft Proof left on in Develop module): I would think it important to test the OpenGL 28K file "hack" or any other fix by examining the black point and rate of ascending shadows in a color managed 21 step wedge grayramp in both modules AND comparing side by side in a non-Adobe third party color managed image viewer. I'm on a Mac so I use Preview.
I don't use LR at all because of this and other interface issues but that YouTube video was new to me because what I've read in the past were only performance speed issues and NOT the changing previews between the two modules.
I just can't believe that all it took was to load a small file to fix this. How is this not a hack?
This has been a very interesting thread and an eye opener on what I thought was a problem that didn't relate to me but now see that in a way it does.
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Tim, for me it wasn’t just shadow rendering. I was baffled by the lack of detail of the photos in the Develop Module.
Once the “hack” was deployed I saw the detail again.
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Tim, for me it wasn’t just shadow rendering. I was baffled by the lack of detail of the photos in the Develop Module.
Once the “hack” was deployed I saw the detail again.
Which machine do you have and GPU model? I see no issues on a late '16 MBP 15" with an AMD Radeon Pro 460 GPU.
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Well, admittedly I have no knowledge of Lightroom's internals, but from an end-user's perspective the bottleneck in the Develop Module has always been rendering—especially when making local adjustments, zooming to 1:1, and performing other drawing operations that are computationally expensive. Again, just an impression, but LR otherwise seems to have enough CPU cycles to do what it needs to do on a modern multi-core machine: when it blocks, it almost always seems to be when it is updating the display. I presume the Adobe developers use DTrace and something similar on Windows to determine for what functions greater parallelization would be useful.
I do not agree - perhaps we differ in the definition of rendering. Absolutely, the bottleneck is in processing the image. However, I believe that it is in processing the image prior to display, not actually mapping the processed image to the display. On the other hand, the sensitivity of speed to screen resolution does suggest that the simply displaying it is a major bottleneck. I've always found that difficult to accept, given the speed with which other software can display an existing in-memory image.
I would suggest that LightRoom may use an internal representation that is fairly easy to process, but difficult to display, but the processing required for local adjustments has clearly been a bottleneck.
For general-purpose processing, OpenGL is rarely a good choice. OpenACC is easy to use, but is not as widely supported as I'd like. CUDA is Nvidia-specific, but provides a reasonable programming environment. OpenCL runs on almost anything, but had rather primitive development tools the last time I looked. (That was several years ago, and is probably no longer the case. I hope OpenCL has a good development environment and toolchain by now.) I would expect any of these to be preferable to do the sort of processing needed to apply adjustments to an image.
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Which machine do you have and GPU model? I see no issues on a late '16 MBP 15" with an AMD Radeon Pro 460 GPU.
As I stated in the opening post:
2017 27" 5K iMac with 40 GB RAM and AMD Radeon Pro 580 8192 MB.
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To the OP, please clarify, before the "fix" was LR not seeing your card? thus you could not turn on openCL?
Mac or Win, LR has always seen my Nvida cards or whatever is running on Macpro, but checking the enable openCL, really does nothing.
Does this fix, fix the way LR works with openCL? or just fix some situations where LR can't see a particular card?
Thanks
Paul Caldwell
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As I stated in the opening post:
2017 27" 5K iMac with 40 GB RAM and AMD Radeon Pro 580 8192 MB.
My fault missing your specs. It is odd, as a late '16 MBP with AMD Radeon Pro 460 has no such issues...
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Tim, for me it wasn’t just shadow rendering. I was baffled by the lack of detail of the photos in the Develop Module.
Once the “hack” was deployed I saw the detail again.
By detail I'm assuming you're referring to overall sharpness appearance viewed at full frame (not 100% zoom) much like I saw going from CS3's PV2003 to CS5's PV2010 in ACR/Bridge (with Bridge's main preview in film strip mode was somewhat soft with sRGB colors). LR4 full frame Develop module preview for me on a Mac Mini/OS 10.6.8 looked detailed and sharp but did show the lighter black point which I still recommend anyone having LR Develop module preview with any version on any system first do the step wedge black point test.
In LR4 I hadn't noticed the black point preview issue because you can't see it unless you compare it to how it appears in other color managed apps which is how it was originally discovered years back. This will make the user darken shadows in their edits more than they should and then when converted to sRGB for web will make the shadows even more dark in non-color managed browsers and mobile devices.
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Tim, yes I saw overall sharpness diminished on full screen and it wasn't exactly sharp either at 100%. Using OpenGL seems to have cleared things up but I'll withhold final judgement for a while.
I'm a bit of a nut for detail. One of my ongoing personal projects really needs the detail and that's what got me worried.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/WMnTvVegqZME70hP2 (https://photos.app.goo.gl/WMnTvVegqZME70hP2)
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To the OP, please clarify, before the "fix" was LR not seeing your card? thus you could not turn on openCL?
Mac or Win, LR has always seen my Nvida cards or whatever is running on Macpro, but checking the enable openCL, really does nothing.
Does this fix, fix the way LR works with openCL? or just fix some situations where LR can't see a particular card?
Thanks
Paul Caldwell
Paul, I'm not sure what you mean by "Lr not seeing your card". It does show up in "Preferences, Performance" as "Metal: AMD Radeon Pro 580". Without the file with the OpenGL command it behaved in an unusual manner as I described. It worked better turning off "Use Graphics Processor".
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Which machine do you have and GPU model? I see no issues on a late '16 MBP 15" with an AMD Radeon Pro 460 GPU.
I've detailed the specs on my 27" 5K iMac previously.
My MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012) is a different kind of a beast. It features 2 graphics cards: Intel HD Graphics 4000 and NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M.
Lr "Preferences, Performance" sees the "Metal: NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M"
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Ron
Thanks. I will look more into this for my win machines.
Paul Caldwell
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One other question,
I stil have LR CC installed on my Mac, along with Classic CC. I added the file to the location in the library and LR CC sees it and passes for open CL, however the Classic version doesn't.
Do I need to go ahead and uninstall the previous version of LR? to get Classic CC to see this config.lua ?
Thanks
Paul Caldwell
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Paul, I'm hoping that John Beardsworth can answer your question. I'm reluctant to guess.
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Hi Ron,
Thanks again for the post, great info.
Interestingly, placing the file in the suggested location for the windows machines I have all win10, both Classic CC and the older CC LR see it and pass it for open CL.
Went back to look at the Mac, and Classic CC only seems to want to use open GL, as I get a long series of statements about GL, Must be something to do with having both the older and new versions installed. Not a big issue to uninstalled the older one, but I am curious as to why only the older version sees the change on Mac. (Sierra not sure of version) but can get that.
Paul Caldwell
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Do I need to go ahead and uninstall the previous version of LR? to get Classic CC to see this config.lua ?
No, both versions use the same application support folder (templates, presets etc) and should both read any config.lua . But there's no guarantee that the version will know what to do with the variable set in the file. It's not really meant for general use.
I tried the file on my Windows machine and couldn't see any effect - other than a black screen when I tried to crop!
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Tim, yes I saw overall sharpness diminished on full screen and it wasn't exactly sharp either at 100%. Using OpenGL seems to have cleared things up but I'll withhold final judgement for a while.
I'm a bit of a nut for detail. One of my ongoing personal projects really needs the detail and that's what got me worried.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/WMnTvVegqZME70hP2 (https://photos.app.goo.gl/WMnTvVegqZME70hP2)
Your image demonstrates what I've noticed about hobbyist photographer's prints in my local art gallery where the overall image looks tonally correct for that kind of lighting but the shadow roll off into black seems to go wrong in a noticeable way that makes me suspect the LR's shadow and black point preview may be the cause that gets the photographer to create what I term a black hole or drop out in the image that shouldn't be there. See the screengrab and sRGB readout of a daylight lit image that shouldn't have that dense of a black for that kind of lighting.
Unless you did intend to make it look like that, I can't be sure if it's due to LR's black point preview. Your linked YouTube demonstration of this is far more pronounced than what I get.
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Tim, I intentionally took the black that low in that area. I may revisit that choice after I print and see what it looks like. It's not a finished photo but representative of the detail I look for.
For the record, yes, I'm a hobbyist or amateur and have been for almost 50 years. I've done work from time to time that I was compensated for but it quickly lost its appeal for me. It was much more interesting for me to earn my living in computer technology.