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Feedback...and the latest batch of DSLRs
Once a week when I sit down to write a blog post for the Inside Lightroom site I struggle to come up with interesting topics - after all in the last year I have written over 50 blog posts and two feature articles for Inside Lightroom. And the reality is Lightroom isn't really that complicated. So, to start off this blog post I put it to you the reader: What do you want to hear about? Respond via the comments section and I'll try to work through the most popular requests over the next few weeks or months. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and discussing those topics.
Of late, I have realized that my workflow hasn't changed in over a year! That is something completely new. Pre-Lightroom, my workflow seemed to change every three or four months without fail. I have come to take Lightroom and its workflow for granted to some degree and that is the highest praise I can find for it - or any software for that matter.
More than my workflow or any new tricks, the new cameras announced by Nikon and Canon are going to improve image quality more than any workflow tweaks. I am really excited to check out the Nikon D300 and the D3 here soon. 14-bit processing is the most exciting new feature of these cameras for me - as that allows a wider exposure latitude as well as a more solid file - especially if an image needs extended manipulation. I'll write about my experiences with the D300 and Lightroom here in the next few weeks as I get more experience with the camera and processing its files.
A few years ago I wrote that "we are in the dark ages of digital photography" in an article for my newsletter. Technology has now improved to the point that I think we are starting to come out of the digital dark ages with the latest crop of cameras and the dependability of the software we now have available. Of course, the next round of software and cameras in a few years will most likely have us drooling but for now digital has never been better.
That's it for this session. See you next week.
Adios, Michael Clark
Comments (5)
Hi Michael,
Well I'm really looking forward to hear more about the storage resolution - because I'm in the same situation, and I'm banging my head on the same issues as everyone else... So I really need some inspiration!
And then another thing. I found this one missing on your "pipeline 2008" post. Please Adobe - make the LR database support networking!! I'm going crazy trying to keep my two LR databases in sync - they share the same photos, but one database is on a mac, the other on a pc - I want the database on the network, so both places are updated all the time.
Thanks for some great posts!
/Kasper
Kasper: More will be coming on the storage resolution tomorrow. And, I'd actually be interested to see what some of the other Inside Lightroom bloggers are doing on the storage front as well.
As the old saying "eat your own dog food" goes, my team leverages our offsite storage system for cataloging both raw, jpeg files, and online proofs from all our shoots. Somewhat similar to the multitude of storage services out there, whereas most services offer the 100gb to 500gb lines of storage we are specifically tailored for photographers needs with accounts that offer 1TB to 5TB in storage accessible via samba, ftp and secure ftp.
We do, although, use in house usb and/or raid servers for our working files - pushing to the online storage location(s) as needed. So I feel the inhouse system for working files and intermediate backup/archive will always be there.
Since I am a nut about backups and the like, I use rsynch to keep a rolling 7-day backup of files stored both in house and online. Linux is your friend ;-)
Over time, I feel the storage solution will go the way of email in the early days - from homegrown systems to purely web-based, outsourced commodity services that manage all the complexity so that we can get back to doing what we love most ... make images!
I have answered more posts about problems with printing from Lightroom than I can keep up with. I have no problem with a 3800 or 2200, but others seem to struggle--and I can't seem to get through to them. IS there a difference due to printers or OS (I know that Mac folks have had some issues)? I find it extremely easy--though I miss softproofing and PKS (and do go into PS for critical printing).
I have pointed to your blog as well as many other LR sites, but the posts go on and on of problems. Are the paper profiles for some of the older printers, esp. with Vista, really awful and causing problems--or do the posters not really quite understand all the steps in using LR (and I have gone step by step through it--and given links to LR printing sites).
Diane
This is my first post. I am a true believer in lightroom, and it has given me the absolute best workflow I could have dreamed of. I have a friend, a commercial photographer, who claims that he has maxed out his LR catalog and has switched back to Photo Mechanic. The type of photography he does requires very heavy shoothing. Often they are shooting 3-4K images a day for severalweeks or even a month or two. What's up with that? Ever heard of this? Just Curious. As for network Storage. I am about to move all of my archive to a RAID network server. Is this going to create problems for working on or retreiving the images in LR? If this is a mistake please let me know ASAP.