I decided to query my former photo mentor about his present work flow.
He's the one who taught me to use BreezeBrowser 4-up compare many years
ago and I wondered if he was still working the same way. I also knew
that he had started to adopt LightRoom and that he had spoken of getting
Macs some time back. So I asked him how he works today and here is his
response.
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For speed I use Photo Mechanic (not cheap) when I need to take a first
look at images and eliminate bad ones, or the ones that are out of
focus. For going through a large number of images, one by one, it is
unbeatable for speed, especially when zooming in to check for focus.
I still occasionally use Breezebrowser, but I'm mostly on Macs now, and
I don't think that there is a Mac version.
I use Bridge a lot though, especially for client presentations where you
can present images 4 up, or 2 side by side, any number really, up to 9
at a time. And I like the fact that I can show crops and RAW adjustments
- which you can't do in Breezebrowser or Photo Mechanic.
I can't stand Lightroom. It doesn't work across a network, has a
corruptable database, and creates tens of thousands of directories
(about one directory per image) which makes searches and backups just
about impossible.
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I'd never heard of Photo Mechanic so checked it out a little bit. It's
basically a browser with a lot of ancillary function for getting images
off cards and on to disk, out onto the web, etc. It costs $150. It
offers a 20 day trial installation. It does have a nice 2-up compare
function. Select some images. First image takes the position on the
left and pressing a key causes new images to appear on the right for
comparison. If the right is better than the left press another key and
the right replaces the left. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Got tired of
reading and don't know what else it does. Doesn't do 4-up, I'm not
interested. As you can see from the description he's basically using it
not to select the best images but to recognize and cull the duds. Maybe
that's why he says he still uses BreezeBrowser sometimes.
His comments about Lightroom surprised me. I'd thought he was a
Lightroom convert by now.
I did spend a bit more time with Bridge and discovered that you can make
a selection of two or more images, press "Ctrl-B" and you'll get a full
screen compare window. You'll see the full image area if you have 4 or
less selected. If there are more you'll see a central window with one
image and the others arrayed in a circle of overlapping windows behind
it. Arrow keys or mouse motions rotate the background images into the
larger main display window. A down arrow drops the image from the loop.
You can't zoom or reposition an image in its window but you can click
a spot and bring up a loupe. The mouse scroll wheel controls the
magnification which, unfortunately, varies only between 100% and 800%.
(who makes up these silly limits?). Somebody clearly had a different
usage in mind than my own. If you're so inclined you can open loupe
windows on all images and, if you hold the Ctrl key down the loupes will
move around with the mouse in unison.
Chuck 4-up
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