Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Adobe Lightroom Q&A => Topic started by: RoyReddy on May 09, 2020, 05:44:43 pm
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in a couple of LuLa posts now, @DanWells has predicted a doom & gloom future for Lightroom Classic(desktop installed version)
Dan does not pull any punches he has quite pessimistic about the future of LR Classic.
He cites his experience at an Adobe show and scant features delivered in recent releases. It is possible that his projections are insightful.
But there are other voices.
from another source there was a recent clip of an Adobe rep explaining how the development efforts swing from platform to platform. The rep acknowledged that Classic has had few features recently and that other versions had the focus of efforts in recent releases.
Wish I could provide a link to that clip but it eludes me.
Question for the group;
Do you see a long-term future for Lightroom Classic? or are you investing large efforts to locate an alternate?
I am interested in the wisdom and confidence of the group about LR longevity.
I am not asking whether there are other products you use for post-processing. Dan and others have outlined a list of alternates strengths/shortfalls.
thanks Roy
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in a couple of LuLa posts now, @DanWells has predicted a doom & gloom future for Lightroom Classic(desktop installed version)
Those that actually know can't speak. He's a beta? Not to my knowledge (I am). He's an Adobe employee or on the LR team?
Those that don't know assume and speculate. Don't pay any attention to such rubbish speculations.
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in a couple of LuLa posts now, @DanWells has predicted a doom & gloom future for Lightroom Classic(desktop installed version)
Question for the group;
Do you see a long-term future for Lightroom Classic? or are you investing large efforts to locate an alternate?
I am interested in the wisdom and confidence of the group about LR longevity.
Sorry to appear so cynical, but it wouldn't attract so many clicks if he said the opposite, would it?
What he does say is that it remains a strong, balanced solution.
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Sorry to appear so cynical, but it wouldn't attract so many clicks if he said the opposite, would it?
Yeah it seems the 'agenda' is generating clicks by writing stuff that's both unproven, speculative and not to up to the smell test IF it's the same fellow here: (https://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=134796.msg1167879#msg1167879):
Dan Wells writes that "if you leave [an Epson printer] idle for a significant time in between jobs, that is dangerous for the head."
That concept is AFAIK (and I've worked with and for Epson for two decades, including as an instructor for the Epson Print Academy) utterly made up.
I did ask who at Epson said this to him, never heard. I've worked with many of the Epson product managers, and engineers; the idea that turning off the power between or having it idle between jobs is dangerous to the heads is silly talk.
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Those that actually know can't speak. He's a beta? Not to my knowledge (I am). He's an Adobe employee or on the LR team?
Those that don't know assume and speculate. Don't pay any attention to such rubbish speculations.
+1 Just a bunch of pedantic bushwah as far as I could see. Josh must be desperate for content at any price from the looks of it. Every article of Dan’s that I’ve read here has had a depressing, almost nasty undertone, about “something or other.” I don’t think any of them would have passed Michael’s generally forward thinking, objective, editorial perspective.
Rand
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I have already commented in Site and Board Matters/Article Discussions. I have used LR since LR2, so have got used to it, but there are still features that I do not know enough about. LR Classic meets my needs for develop and print. I use Helicon for focus stacking (I have Fuji kit) and PTGui for stitching panoramas. I am not discontented with LR so have not seen the need to change to C1 or DXO. That would change very quickly if Classic were discontinued for all the reasons others have cited.
Best wishes,
Jonathan
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I don't know what Adobe is going to do in the future, but I see it possible that an online solution could make sense if technology advances to the point were future network speed equal the current read speeds from SSDs and the computing power in the back-end is equal or better than a current high end workstation.
In regards to functionality, I don't see why it cannot equal or surpass the current LR Classic, and nothing of this precludes the possibility of a local data backup.
Moreover, a cloud solution is more likely to implement (hopefully) concurrent multi-user capabilities than the stand alone one.
You may think I'm dreaming or that this is just wishful thinking, and maybe it's true, but having started not too long ago with punched cards and 300 baud modems, I think a scenario like that is very likely in the not too distant future.
Now if the choice is to do the change today, with the current LR functionality and tech limitations, I would definitely say not.
In regards to the article, It find it highly biased and speculative, not worthy of being paid content. I find much better information in the forums.
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I don't know what Adobe is going to do in the future, but I see it possible that an online solution could make sense if technology advances to the point were future network speed equal the current read speeds from SSDs and the computing power in the back-end is equal or better than a current high end workstation.
In regards to functionality, I don't see why it cannot equal or surpass the current LR Classic, and nothing of this precludes the possibility of a local data backup.
Moreover, a cloud solution is more likely to implement (hopefully) concurrent multi-user capabilities than the stand alone one.
You may think I'm dreaming or that this is just wishful thinking, and maybe it's true, but having started not too long ago with punched cards and 300 baud modems, I think a scenario like that is very likely in the not too distant future.
Now if the choice is to do the change today, with the current LR functionality and tech limitations, I would definitely say not.
In regards to the article, It find it highly biased and speculative, not worthy of being paid content. I find much better information in the forums.
I don’t doubt that it is possible, perhaps even likely that they will be able to do this. The question for someone like me is, “Do I want to depend upon a fast internet connection to be able to process files?” And, “Do I want my work product out in the cloud somewhere, or do I want it secure in whatever DAM and backup scheme I choose?” I suspect that if Adobe wants to hang on to the user base who currently see these options as essential, they’ll think long and hard before pulling the plug on “LR Classic” as we have it - or will need some sort of hybrid version that accommodates.
Rand
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It’s a mature product. What more new features should they introduce, particularly as you are paying for it anyway?
They may change the model to being cloud based only at some point to increase the rent they charge, but that’s not going to happen overnight.
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::) thanks folks. Your comments align with my thinking about the future of LR.
Roy
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It’s a mature product. What more new features should they introduce, particularly as you are paying for it anyway?
I would like to see sophisticated masking.
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I would like to see sophisticated masking.
Peter, could you provide examples of what you mean by “sophisticated masking”?
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I didn't read the entire article as it was simply way too long and in many ways uninteresting for me. He ends up by saying that Lightroom Classic is recommended but he will also be surprised if LR Classic exists in 3 years from now. His logic that Adobe will pull the rug from under LR Classic and replace it with LR CC and force users into pay for tons of cloud storage does not make any sense to me. Why should Adobe do this when they can have happy customers and get $10 per month from each of them and they don't even have to spend that much R&D to capture that amount of money. If Adobe was to make LR Classic redundant they would definitely not do it by pulling support for LR Classic. They would do it by offering a replacement that has all the functionality and that current users would be happy to migrate to and migration tools would be provided. I also don't believe that a cloud only solution would be the one that Adobe would offer. Maybe Starlink from SpaceX will provide high speed internet anywhere even in the bush but other than that a cloud only based solution would be totally a disaster. But a hybrid of cloud and HD based should be a nobrainer anyway. The main thing is to have all the functions of LR classic before a potential change. I believe that when it happens there will be quite a transition period and why not? I don't see why Adobe would not do that.
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I believe that there will be a transition to “Cloud Based” applications and computer hardware. This is already beginning an eventually be completed when the cost of Cloud Storage is less than the cost of tradition computer equipment and physical storage replacement replacement costs. We saw camera manufactures that did not transition from film to digital imaging quickly, when the out of business.
Sony, Panasonic and many successful producers of digital Imaging equipment including, phones and tablets did not produce film cameras.
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It’s a mature product. What more new features should they introduce, particularly as you are paying for it anyway?
@ I'd like to see:
Focus stacking (maybe not possible in the parametric realm but it could manufacture TIFFs or DNGs), and a multiple exposure effect, layering at least five files "on top" of each other emulating multiple exposure in a film camera.
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Peter, could you provide examples of what you mean by “sophisticated masking”?
Perhaps I should have said sophisticated selection tools, but they are closely related. I am thinking of some of Photoshop's tools, such as magic wand and magnetic lasso.
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I believe that there will be a transition to “Cloud Based” applications and computer hardware. This is already beginning an eventually be completed when the cost of Cloud Storage is less than the cost of tradition computer equipment and physical storage replacement replacement costs.
If everything goes "Cloud Based" there will be a significant amount of rural American who will be disadvantaged. I spend a good deal of time in the Blue Ridge where the FCC currently thinks of 2Mbps download/upload speeds as sufficient. A pox on Ajit Pai at the FCC.
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@ I'd like to see:
Focus stacking (maybe not possible in the parametric realm but it could manufacture TIFFs or DNGs), and a multiple exposure effect, layering at least five files "on top" of each other emulating multiple exposure in a film camera.
If you have the PS/Lr subscription that's already available. Am I missing something?
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Perhaps I should have said sophisticated selection tools, but they are closely related. I am thinking of some of Photoshop's tools, such as magic wand and magnetic lasso.
If you have the PS/Lr subscription you already have those tools available in PS. Help me understand why that should be duplicated in Lr.
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Unfortunately Dan Wells has consumed too much of the bitter Kool-Aid from petapixels and fstoppers. All the same weak arguments are there. They are a bunch of Anybody but Adobe types. I have worked my way through alternatives and found each one wanting. Some of the things I see requested now for Lightroom are resident in Photoshop. There is nothing I do that I can't do in LR\Photoshop. I LIKE the subscription. I am now a big fan and also have the full Office 365 subscription because it make s such sense. I don't see LR disappearing anytime soon. This is not Apple where they just did not care about their professional users.
Mike
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Now why on Earth do I need every large raw file I capture in the Cloud instead of locally on my massive hard drive? Ditto with the rendered images. And all the previews (smart and otherwise)?
The time will come when uploading and downloading to and from the cloud will be as fast, and as inexpensive to do as I can today on a fixed drive? And when I want multiple local backups, backups made unattended at night, every night, from the cloud?
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And when I want multiple local backups, backups made unattended at night, every night, from the cloud?
A hybrid cloud configuration will be a great option for this. Many corporations, including financial institutions, are using similar approaches to handle large volumes of sensitive & critical data.
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Now why on Earth do I need every large raw file I capture in the Cloud instead of locally on my massive hard drive? Ditto with the rendered images. And all the previews (smart and otherwise)?
The time will come when uploading and downloading to and from the cloud will be as fast, and as inexpensive to do as I can today on a fixed drive? And when I want multiple local backups, backups made unattended at night, every night, from the cloud?
+1 i like to have my work and information local. Never needed a 'cloud' and if i do need some i have my own. I don't need adobe for that.
I use 'little Snitch' on my mac and it is interesting to see just how much information goes out of your computer to the internet without any notification.
I like to control that part. I believe in decentralizing storage of information. So the opposite of a Cloud.
The word Cloud is well chosen- you don't see a thing what is going on.
Apart from that i work with images that take many GB's.. a lot of it is half baked rubbish... I am sure everybody is pleased i do not send it over the internet all the time...
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The last thing I want is a different cloud storage program. Every vendor wants to provide this service to you. Right now all of my wife's and my stuff is backed up on Amazon Web Service which is pretty low cost. I have MSFT Office 365 but don't use the web service at all. I only use Google web storage for my phone but it gets transferred to my home PC and eventually to Amazon.
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Now why on Earth do I need every large raw file I capture in the Cloud instead of locally on my massive hard drive? Ditto with the rendered images. And all the previews (smart and otherwise)?
The time will come when uploading and downloading to and from the cloud will be as fast, and as inexpensive to do as I can today on a fixed drive? And when I want multiple local backups, backups made unattended at night, every night, from the cloud?
Perhaps some day in the future when the pandemic is a fading memory we'll all have inexpensive GB internet connections and Cloud storage will make more sense to me. Like Andrew, I'm not there yet.
I have 3 Drobo DAS boxes with capacities of 16 TB, 16 TB and 64 TB and I have my photography work on all three for even more redundancy. I'm happy with that arrangement for me. YMMV.
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I believe in decentralizing storage of information. So the opposite of a Cloud.
Nothing farther from the truth
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"Many immigrants able to save money keep their savings under the mattress because they distrust financial institutions"
Book: Parish Ministry in a Hispanic Community by Charles W. Dahm
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Kind of sensationalistic stuff that I really really dislike. Adobe has its flaws (for those who remember, would you rather have Quark?) but they have been very very good to me, I don't at all complain about the monthly subscription. In the _many_ years I've been an Adobe customer (15 different products? + fonts) I have always liked the products. Sure, nothing is peerfect. But I can't imagine they'll leave me hanging. Even if I have to pay a bit to update Classic every once in a while, or even if I have to go to CC, I suppose local storage will always be an option, and maybe there will be a path for those like me. But I am not willing to throw everything out because some guy is yelling that in 3 years I'll be in dire straits. How does he know?
Disgruntled in California
Mike
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Nothing farther from the truth
I should have said "I believe in decentralizing storage of personal information. So the opposite of a Cloud."
I am a big fan of Wikipedia.
and please react with more than 5words- or maybe you think it is enough to explain what you think.
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Apologies if my message was not clear. I'm not thinking of a specific implementation (i.e. Adobe Cloud) but about what is available as "Cloud" and is being used today at corporate level. You can choose how centralized or decentralized your data will be stored and replicated.
I agree that today's solutions at personal level (and affordable to the common user) are very limited and look like behind a "black wall" where you don't have a clue of what is going on.
Also, the legal framework has to evolve to prevent things like a provider that disappears overnight or clarify topics such as inheritance of assets.
We are still in the infancy of "Cloud", but it has the potential to evolve to something really useful where the benefits will outperform the current drawbacks.
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I'm not concerned that Lr Classic will cease to exist three years hence, but I am surprised that Adobe hasn't moved to develop what comes next. After a decade and a half of maturity, offering something more than Lr CC as the next generation of solutions for photographers and their need for DAM and RAW image processing tools would do more to bolster customer confidence. One would hope they have learned a lesson that you can't simply add on to the same app basic foundation for decades on end and not avoid bloat and endless conflicts of code like that have done with Photoshop and other offerings since the early days at Adobe.
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Yeah, that 30 year old Photoshop sure isn't what it used to be :P .... Thankfully not!
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If everything goes "Cloud Based" there will be a significant amount of rural American who will be disadvantaged. I spend a good deal of time in the Blue Ridge where the FCC currently thinks of 2Mbps download/upload speeds as sufficient. A pox on Ajit Pai at the FCC.
Not only this, but working remotely is an issue Adobe already “backed up” on earlier, by allowing LR/PS to work without checking-in to the mother-ship for an extended period of time. So, it if goes 100% cloud based, you might have a hard time doing any editing in remote places. Can’t edit, can’t store . . . no bueno. And you don’t need to be in the middle of Africa or the Outback of Australia for this to be a serious issue. A few days dry camping in the Alabama Hills west of Lone Pine will suffice.
Rand
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Yeah, that 30 year old Photoshop sure isn't what it used to be :P .... Thankfully not!
I didn't say that I thought Photoshop and Lightroom were not as useful as days gone by or that I desired to argue with the Digital Dog over semantics once more ... I was simply offering that there is considerable dead weight, duplication and outright cruft in the code that we call Photoshop and hoped that game plan wouldn't be the future for Lightroom Classic as well.
Heck, there are plenty of apps now for mobile devices that can achieve many of the tasks photographers desire with a far smaller footprint and much more modest use of resources. I'm not saying those apps are totally on par with Ps ... only that their code base and footprint can achieve more with less effort by comparison.
I don't think it's too much to ask for a solution that is leaner, meaner and more efficient to take us into the next 3 or more decades. Maybe it's time to re-think the database structure for Lightroom since much has changed in technology since it was first written. Or should it take several more decades to reach that point?
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Some of us are working on the next big thing from Adobe.
Some are just speculating. ;)
I hope it’s not too much to ask for them to wait.
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. . . Heck, there are plenty of apps now for mobile devices that can achieve many of the tasks photographers desire with a far smaller footprint and much more modest use of resources. I'm not saying those apps are totally on par with Ps ... only that their code base and footprint can achieve more with less effort by comparison.
I don't think it's too much to ask for a solution that is leaner, meaner and more efficient to take us into the next 3 or more decades. . . .
Is this what Lightroom CC is supposed to be? My impression is that it is "leaner, meaner" than Lightroom Classic and rewritten from the ground up.
I don't use Lightroom CC on my Mac because it lacks many features from Lightroom Classic that I find valuable, viz. printing, book creation, snapshots, virtual copies, and access to cheap storage. However, I very much enjoy using Lightroom CC on my iPad Pro and iPhone.
I look forward to seeing what Adobe has in store for us next.
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@ I'd like to see:
Focus stacking (maybe not possible in the parametric realm but it could manufacture TIFFs or DNGs),
You can get this now with Helicon Focus Pro. Does an amazing job and returns a RAW file to Lightroom if you send it raw files. Not cheap, but outstanding quality and flexibility.
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You can get this now with Helicon Focus Pro. Does an amazing job and returns a RAW file to Lightroom if you send it raw files.
Linear DNG; so not as raw as the original raw and in reality, not a raw. ;)
https://www.heliconsoft.com/raw-in-dng-out/
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Linear DNG; so not as raw as the original raw and in reality, not a raw. ;)
https://www.heliconsoft.com/raw-in-dng-out/
OK, partially cooked. ;) Thanks for the clarification.
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You can get this now with Helicon Focus Pro. Does an amazing job and returns a RAW file to Lightroom if you send it raw files. Not cheap, but outstanding quality and flexibility.
Just found out it is now blazin fast on new hardware: it uses the GPU and the CPU; only a few seconds to stack 10 46MP images.
(You have to go in the preferences to tune it)
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Just found out it is now blazin fast on new hardware: it uses the GPU and the CPU; only a few seconds to stack 10 46MP images.
(You have to go in the preferences to tune it)
Unfortunately they don't support Quadro cards, but the software is really great.
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As I mentioned in a post in the articles section, when you append Lightroom with "Classic", that means the end of the road. Idiots. I will never, ever use Lightroom CC. In my mind, it's amateur driven, not pro. Others may argue that's not the case, but I do personally know any pros who would exclusively store and work with their image library/catalog in a cloud-based environment. Can someone really tell me that's more reasonable to use than local when going through hundreds of gigabytes of images? My average week long catalog shoot produces 500-750GB of images.
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As I mentioned in a post in the articles section, when you append Lightroom with "Classic", that means the end of the road. Idiots.
"All generalizations are false, including this one." -Mark Twain
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While you are more far knowledgeable than I about Adobe and its inner workings, I stick to my original assertion -- Classic = Death. Otherwise, why not use Lightroom CC for desktop and Lightroom Cloud for it's dreaded counterpart?
Perhaps you meant to use this quote instead ;D:
"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."
-- Mark Twain
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While you are more far knowledgeable than I about Adobe and its inner workings, I stick to my original assertion -- Classic = Death.
You are most welcome to you assumptive opinions. My understanding of an assertion is: a confident and forceful statement of fact or belief.
Without facts and data, you are just someone with an opinion.
Yes, the reports of LR's death are greatly exaggerated mostly by people who are looking for attention by posting about topics they have no direct understanding of. Nothing new on the net. ;D
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While you are more far knowledgeable than I about Adobe and its inner workings, I stick to my original assertion -- Classic = Death. Otherwise, why not use Lightroom CC for desktop and Lightroom Cloud for it's dreaded counterpart?
Two different products for two different audiences is the simple answer. For some Lightroom Classic was too much club. For others Google/Apple Photos wasn't enough. For those people there is the Lightroom Ecosystem (Desktop, Mobile and Web). For those who need more/different there is Lightroom Classic. Both products have robust teams and active development.
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Thanks, Rikk!!!
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I didn't say that I thought Photoshop and Lightroom were not as useful as days gone by or that I desired to argue with the Digital Dog over semantics once more ... I was simply offering that there is considerable dead weight, duplication and outright cruft in the code that we call Photoshop and hoped that game plan wouldn't be the future for Lightroom Classic as well.
Heck, there are plenty of apps now for mobile devices that can achieve many of the tasks photographers desire with a far smaller footprint and much more modest use of resources. I'm not saying those apps are totally on par with Ps ... only that their code base and footprint can achieve more with less effort by comparison.
I don't think it's too much to ask for a solution that is leaner, meaner and more efficient to take us into the next 3 or more decades. Maybe it's time to re-think the database structure for Lightroom since much has changed in technology since it was first written. Or should it take several more decades to reach that point?
Cost of rewrite is huge, cost of maintenance is huge. A company needs to evaluate cost versus benefit with their products. Right when Adobe's cost of maintaining and enhancing their old code base is greater than the cost of a rewrite...we'll see a new product...until then computers are always getting faster and cheaper.
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... Both products have robust teams and active development.
And ... both teams (and their respective end users) suffer from the same inept, verbally challenged marketing department that confuses more issues then they solve.
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And ... both teams (and their respective end users) suffer from the same inept, verbally challenged marketing department that confuses more issues then they solve.
I used to go away for weeks in a state of confusion.-Albert Einstein
When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has the greater will be his confusion.- Herbert Spencer
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And ... both teams (and their respective end users) suffer from the same inept, verbally challenged marketing department that confuses more issues then they solve.
Seriously? Is anyone forcing you to use LR?
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I am a bit confused by the way to make default develop-profiles now...
Had all iso's covered for my d850 and then they change it in such a way that i don't even understand how to use the new version.
have to add some text here and there i believe...
I wait with upgrading till they have changed that for something frontend that i can understand.
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I am a bit confused by the way to make default develop-profiles now...
Had all iso's covered for my d850 and then they change it in such a way that i don't even understand how to use the new version.
have to add some text here and there i believe...
I wait with upgrading till they have changed that for something frontend that i can understand.
https://laurashoe.com/2020/02/11/whats-new-in-lightroom-classic-9-2-raw-defaults/
Video: https://youtu.be/XGCnR9qEqA4
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I use and like several products of the Adobe Creative Cloud. Having said that, I find the naming product strategy strange. First they add the CC and say the names of the product don't need to change, then they add the year because they are different versions, then they remove the "CC" maybe because there is no point.
In regards to Lightroom, If you are going to offer a lighter version because "For some Lightroom Classic was too much club. For others Google/Apple Photos wasn't enough. ", then why you don't name it Lightroom lite or cloud instead of changing the name of the full featured version?
And finally, you have a Senior Director of product development who publicly declares that the perpetual licence of lightroom will be offered indefinetly, but a few years later it turns out it wasn't true.
So yes, there is absolutely no justification for people to speculate and be confused.
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https://laurashoe.com/2020/02/11/whats-new-in-lightroom-classic-9-2-raw-defaults/
Video: https://youtu.be/XGCnR9qEqA4
alas
I don't blame her if see doesn't grasp it...
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And finally, you have a Senior Director of product development who publicly declares that the perpetual licence of lightroom will be offered indefinetly, but a few years later it turns out it wasn't true.
It's only untrue if one thinks "indefinitely" means "forever", but you can't blame folk for wishful thinking.
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alas
I don't blame her if see doesn't grasp it...
It does feel unfinished. For a couple of workarounds, see http://lightroomsolutions.com/iso-dependent-presets/ and especially the link in the comments.
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I used to go away for weeks in a state of confusion.-Albert Einstein
When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has the greater will be his confusion.- Herbert Spencer
"How old would you be if you didn't know how old you are?" -Satchel Paige
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Seriously? Is anyone forcing you to use LR?
Is anyone forcing you to read my posts or respond to them?
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Is anyone forcing you to read my posts or respond to them?
Or take you seriously? No.
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It's only untrue if one thinks "indefinitely" means "forever", but you can't blame folk for wishful thinking.
Thats what it means but I never took his statement as anything but a stupid untruth to promise.
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It’s a mature product. What more new features should they introduce, particularly as you are paying for it anyway?
How about they just fix the existing features?
e.g PtGui eats it for breakfast, lunch and dinner when it comes to panorama stitching.