I was really hoping LR would be a revelation. Quick loupe viewing, light table, lots of good adjustments, great meta data info etc. But after a frustrating couple of hours I'm left wondering why I would delete $200 from my bank account for Lightroom.
I'm currently using Capture One Pro which I find satisfactory. I know it doesn't have some of the features of LR but I've never felt the need to create a static PDF "slide show" or a budget looking web page. I don't run an image library yet I do create about 2TB of images a year. I find a simple folder system is really all I need to organise my images. Each to their own I guess.
What's more disappointing is the folder structure. Particularly when trashing images. This is the beauty of C1, if you delete an image it goes into C1's own trash folder, you can then easily search through these and grab something out if you need it. Incredibly useful on a large edit when you accidentally delete something. When the shoot is delivered I can then delete the trash and raws leaving only my processed tiffs to save file space. Or I can keep the raws and processed tiffs (in folders that C1 has created for me) if I decide to work on them at a later date. I couldn't see how LR does anything similar without a long winded work-around.
The UI is so small that I struggle to get the mouse on the sliders and read some of the numbers. I have a 30" cinema display so I know it can make fonts look small but LR is a step beyond, It looks like they've used 6 point type. I guess this is handy on 12" laptop but at the other end of the spectrum it's just bad. And what's the squiggly design thing.... Is that really necessary on a professional image editing program.
I know the basic "developer" is slightly bigger but the controls are very basic. Oh, what is "Vibrance?" Is basic colour saturation just too advanced for most users?
Is it just me that finds the Develop module a little too control heavy. I can't remember ever looking at an image and thinking, yep, I just need to adjust the aqua-luminace and push the split-toning-shadow-saturation a tad.
I would love LR to work with a similar folder structure to C1, to be able to customize the UI particularly when it comes to its visual size and perhaps create a fluid Flash slide show that could be edited with Flash as well. If any of this is easily done please let me know.
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i have been using C1 for years with my canons and phase backs, so most of my files are in the C1 folder structure...LR works beautifully with it....oyu have to remember that it is that structure that turns most people off c1 in the first place! C1 creates huge previews (LR is much more efficient in that aspect...)
most of the things you are complaining about can be turned off in prefs....
i actually prefer the color controls in LR to the coloreditor in C1...the little sliders that can be placed on the image are genius....
as far as tonal controls go (same little sliders!!!!) LR is lightyears ahead of C1...the curves (with the tones mapped in), fill light, recover,....
sharpening is much more controlable (i have never had a shot in C1 that could handle anything but the absolute minimum of the settings...)
and we haven't even touched editing, comparing, virtual copies, printing!!!!!, spot/healing, and all this in V1....
plus the fact that i can have my entire library with me at all times....
c1v4 will be out soon and i am sure it will be an improvement...the layover feature is nice, live-preview does not do anything for me....either way i still have to go through C1 to shoot tethered anyway.....
do yourself a favor, really check LR out....i think you will get hooked...