On Dec 10, 2013, at 6:33 PM, Moose wrote:
> I think you may be selling PS short. Yes, it's about layers for many of us,
> but it's also about more, and more capable,
> tools for adjusting the things you say you are concerned about.
>
> Then again, Bob uses mostly LR for his even larger, and absolutely beautiful
> prints. He says LR has the best proofing
> and printing capability he's seen. He may weigh in here?
>
> There are way too many factors to be complete, and few folks who will know
> all the details thoroughly, but this is what
> I know and surmise.
>
> My opinion? You shoulda jumped at the Photographer's CC offer of $120/yr for
> both LR and PS. There will probably be
> another one.
Okay. Other Bob's questions are complex, but not unmanageable. I agree with
what Moose said, except, as he notes, I tend to do a lot in LR exclusively. And
I have the PSCC and LR package. I frequently port over to PSCC for refined
selections, precise sharpening (I use Pixel Genius) and re-rezzing, if I need
to do that. Unlike Moose, I use the Clarity slider almost exclusively for LCE,
unless I'm applying LCE to only a part of the image. If it's a simple area, I
just mask in LR and use the brush panel's sliders to bring out what I want. If
it's complex, I do it in Photoshop with old-fashioned LCE using USM.
Moose is correct that the Shadow/HIghlight in PS is different from Shadow in
LR. For the most part, I use LR's Shadow, and if it goes a little too milky on
me, I refine with Clarity or Contrast. It's possible with a little back and
forth to negate the negative effects of too much Shadow. I haven't done this in
a while, but in PSCC, you can use Shadow/Highlight radically, then place a copy
of the original on top, and erase where you want the S/H effect and leave the
rest of the image alone. But that's effectively working in layers.
Even though LR has refined it's healing capability to now do area and
non-circular work, it's still a very clunky tool for getting shed of anything
more than small objects in the image, or dust on the sensor spots. For real
cloning and healing work, it's necessary to go to PSCC.
I prostrate myself to the LR gods mainly because of its print engine. You have
an image ready to print in LR. You click on PRINT. Templates, LR's and your
own, come up. Say I have a need for a 13.2x19.2 print, to show in a 13x19 mat
opening. I just create the template, click on it, and LR does all the resizing,
and it does it quite well. Never failed, in fact. But my printers only handle
17" wide paper, so I've never put it to the test on a really large image. A
16x24 is the largest I've done out of LR. But it was very nice.
One disadvantage is that LR does not have a resize capability, at least not one
I've found. The PRINT module does it, but nowhere else can you do it. And you
can't save the print file, as far as I've been able to determine. So for
resizing, I have to go to PSCC.
I also use some plug-ins, specifically, Silver Effex Pro 2.0, and onOne. They
are easy to access from either LR or PSCC or as stand-alones. I believe this is
true with elements, too. Not all images need a plug-in, but they can create
some nice effects much more simply (for you) than doing all the work in PSCC
with lots and lots of layers. I use onOne, for example, to add different kinds
of glows to images. A subtle glow can add an effect that is not readily
identifiable to the viewer, but adds a little something that makes a
difference. Silver Effex is what I use for b&w, but onOne has beefed up its b&w
conversions, so I'll be exploring that avenue as well. Again, you can do it in
LR or PSCC, but the plug-ins make it faster and simpler and in most cases, more
easily refined.
--Bob Whitmire
Certified Neanderthal
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