Adobe Lightroom 2.0 beta
Screenshot showing some new features in action
(in this case, selective-area desaturation and a post-crop vignette)
I like to post right away when there's a new release of Adobe Lightroom, but alas, I've been on vacation for the last few days, and I was at the car-rental return at the Amami Ooshima Island airport when Lightroom 2.0 beta was released earlier this afternoon.
The 2.0 beta has a lot of exciting new features you can read about elsewhere (links below), but the ones I'm most excited about are localized corrections (you can “paint” exposure, saturation, tint, etc.) and multi-monitor / multi-window support. Now you know why I finally succumbed and added a second monitor a few months ago.
For details:
· Official announcement
· The download page
I'll repeat the main points you need to understand before using it:
Adobe is making it available so that you can kick the tires; it's not recommended for production work. By design, you can't work with your Lightroom 1.x catalogs in the 2.0 beta. Furthermore, you can't be sure that the 2.0 beta catalogs will be completely usable in the “real” 2.0 (which will be released, presumably, some time during the summer).
It's free for Lightroom 1.x customers (the beta expires August 31st, by which one presumes the real Lightroom 2.0 will have been released). Anyone else can try it freely for 30 days, just as with the currently-latest production version, Lightroom 1.3.
You can install and use both Lightroom 1.x and the 2.0 beta side-by-side on the same computer.
My existing Lightroom export plugins (for: Zenfolio, · SmugMug · Flickr · Picasa Web) should work fine in the beta. Plugins are much easier to install in 2.0: you place them anywhere on your system you like, then point to them via the new File > Plugin Manager dialog.
Over the last few months that I've been working with Lightroom 2.0 development, I've been rearchitecting my plugins to both take advantage of new plugin support in 2.0, and to make it easier for me to add features across all my plugins (and to add new plugin destinations). Unfortunately, I've had a cold for so long that I'm not ready to release them yet, so it'll still be a while. But as I said, my original plugins for Lightroom 1.x should work fine in the 2.0 beta.
Aperture 2.1 has a plug-in based architecture which allows localized, “pixel-level” editing as well.
Description here: http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/content_page.asp?cid=7-9308-9356
I wonder how close the functionality is between the two.
One disadvantage with the way Aperture handles this is that the program basically hands off the original RAW file to the plug-in, and after the adjustments are made it is “re-imported” from the plug-in, so changes made by the plug-in are not non-destructive, ie they ARE destructive and are not undo-able. It’s almost exactly like exporting to Photoshop and then re-importing, but it all happens within Aperture.
How does LR 2 handle this?
Lightroom’s local corrections are all completely non-destructive. I’ve never used Aperture, although I’ve heard it questioned whether its plugin architecture is as you described, or merely whether the currently-available plugins work that way. I don’t know. Apple is pretty smart, so either way, I’m sure it’s a stepping stone to greater things. —Jeffrey
What about soft proofing in the print module? Nothing?
Jeffrey, with all your great articles about color management, I’m surprised you’d let this one slip past
I’ve got to admit that I don’t know exactly what the term “soft proofing” means. I don’t do all that much actual printing, and when I do, it’s just with a cheap consumer printer, so I guess I’ve never had the motivation to pay attention. Perhaps there’s a cyclical cause/effect loop going on here…. —Jeffrey
I don’t know, Apple hasn’t seen fit to give me a prototype iPhone capable of working in Japan, or a Macbook Air to review for my extremely influential blog. How smart could they be?
I love you exporter to Zenfolio, but I am getting an “Internal Plugin Error” after clicking on login to Zenfolio. Followed by the message saying “logon aborted” and then something about a global all_id.
Any thoughts on how to get around this?
I am using LR Beta 2.0, Mac OS 10.5.2 on a Macbook Pro.
Thanks in advance!
Oops, this was due to a touch of stupidity on my part. I’ve pushed a new version that fixes it. Thanks for the heads up. —Jeffrey
I am trying to upload photos from lightroom 1.4.1 to smugmug and it uploads about 12/44 pictures and then gets and error code () saying that it had to abort. what can be wrong?
I am still using LR 1.3 and I am also getting mysteriously aborted uploads to SmugMug. I fixed one issue by turning off the screen saver, and thought I was OK. But I have always been uploading medium res files (6 MP). Last night I attempted 166 Hi Res (12.1 MP) files and the system stalled at 77. However, all backup .jpgs were written to backup USB hdd. This makes me think it’s either a SmugMug issue, or a plug-in issue. Any ideas?
Wondering if we will have to pay for the LR2 (once released) after purchasing 1.4? Sorry if this is off topic. Btw, I lived in Jpn for many years (from pre-bubble) before returning to Australia.