When the light from your flash enters your subject’s eyes it bounces back from the retina. The retina is rich with blood vessels and colors the returning light red. If your flash is close to the lens (as are many on camera flashes) that light bounces right back into the lens and the eyes appear red. The farther away from the lens you move your flash the more you decrease the chance of red-eye. So the best way to fix red-eye is to get your flash off of your camera. I think more people are beginning to realize this.

However, if you happen to have some shots with red-eye, Lightroom provides a good red-eye removal tool in the Develop module.

It’s easier to work on this problem if you zoom in and get a closer look at the problem.

When you choose the tool you will get a scope-like cursor. If it is big enough to encompass the eye you can click otherwise you can click and drag to adjust the size.

Click and the tool will seek and destroy the red. Now if you put your cursor over the red-eye circle it turns into a hand. This allows you to move the circle and better align the removal area. If you hear a warning tone when you first click it means that the tool did not sense enough red to perform the removal. Try clicking a different part of the eye.

If the tool leaves some red fringe you can adjust the size of the removal area. Bring you cursor near the edge of the circle and it will change to a bar with outward point arrows. Click and drag to alter the size and shape of the removal area.

Lightroom’s red-eye removal tool provides two sliders to let you fine tune the removal: Pupil Size and Darken. Sometimes when the redeye is removed the pupil will appear light or ghostly. Use the sliders to adjust the size and darkness of the pupil. This will enhance the effect and provide for a more natural looking eye.

Once you are happy with the result on one eye go ahead and start on the other.

So if it’s not Halloween then let Lightroom help you get the red out!

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Since you are reading this on a site called Lightroom Secrets you must know how this will turn out. Right? But the answer may not be as black and white (no pun intended) as it may seem. There are many factors that go into a decision about which application to choose. Either will be a major investment in time, learning, personal/professional workflow, and so on. So let’s start with a little background.

I was a long-time Windows user and switched to Mac about two years ago. I still use both platforms but do prefer Mac. Obviously, as a Abode Certified Expert in Lightroom and one of the Adobe Community Professionals for Lightroom, I am a Lightroom user. I am not, however, an Adobe employee.

I’m also comparing Aperture 3 to Lightroom 3 Beta. In the past Adobe has always included more features in the final release than they exposed in their public betas so there may be things coming that we’re unaware of right now. So there you have it. What follows is editorial in nature and, to the best of my abilities, objective. Let’s get started…

Operating System

Aperture 3 is only available on a Mac. So if you are a Windows user there is no question to be answered here. Apple does not provide an alternative for you. And therein lies the first advantage that Lightroom has. According to the Professional Photographers of America 65% of Professional Photographers use a PC, 14% use a Mac, 11% use both, and 10% don’t use a computer. The Digital Photography School has more recent numbers: 50% for PC, 40% for Mac, 7% Both, and 2% Other. Either way, that’s a large number of photographers ignored by Apple.

Ecosystem

Both Aperture and Lightroom gain strength by being loyal to and well integrated into their respective ecosystems. And this is a matter of personal preference which will inform your decision.

If you are comfortable in the Apple ecosystem of iPhoto, iMovie, Final Cut, etc. then Aperture will make you feel more at home. It will seem more intuitive and the workflow will make sense to you out of the box. Lightroom will seem like an intruder. It won’t integrate as elegantly in the Apple ecosystem.

If you are a fan of the Adobe ecosystem with Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Premier, InDesign, etc. then Lightroom will probably make more sense to you. In this ecosystem, Aperture is the intruder.

Both applications can play nicely with your other applications. Both handle integration well and have brilliant moments and clumsy moments. Your first question to answer is which ecosystem have you grown accustomed to.

Footprint

Aperture 3 is huge! It weighs in at 585Mb versus Lightroom 3 Beta’s 68Mb (Mac) 120Mb (Windows) download size. Aperture’s library and vault seem to grow exponentially as you work on images. Lightroom catalog barely grows at all while performing equivalent tasks. Many photographers working on the go on laptops are drive space conscious and Aperture 3 seems to pay no heed to limited drive real estate.

Responsiveness

Aperture 3 wins the import contest for speed. It performed much better than Lightroom 3 Beta. On the other hand, I found Aperture 3 sluggish in many other areas. Lightroom stayed speedy overall and didn’t make me wait as much as Aperture did.

Responsiveness while working is more important to me than during import. I can let import run while attending to other tasks but I want speedy performance while I’m editing. Lightroom 3 Beta wins this one.

New Features

Many of the 200 features touted on Apple’s website are merely catch up features to Lightroom 2.6. Things like presets and non-destructive localized adjustments are features Lightroom users have enjoyed for some time now. Given that it’s taken Apple nearly two years to do this, I remain unimpressed.

Aperture 3 does have some outstanding features that the Lightroom team over at Adobe should pay attention to, however. Photo books in Aperture continue to be an amazing thing. The ease of creation along with some stellar templates make this a hands down winner for Aperture!

Another way out in front feature is Aperture’s slideshows. Lightroom made some inroads here during the version 2.x time frame but it pales by comparison to Aperture’s robust and feature rich slideshow implementation.

Photo books and Slideshow alone might tempt me to add Aperture to my tool set but it’s not enough to make me switch.

Lightroom wins the website battle without question. Its Web module is far more flexible that what Aperture has to offer. Several developers I’ve spoken with commented on how they can easily develop website engine for Lightroom but cannot get cooperation from Apple to open up web development in Aperture.

Lightroom 3 Beta introduces custom print layouts. Its Print module yields superior output than Aperture. Aperture remains more flexible on the layout side.

Geo-tagging goes to Aperture with it’s Places feature. Aperture 3 implements a very robust interface for working with GPS data. Lightroom does work with GPS data once embedded but is no where near Aperture in this regard.

Faces, while interesting, doesn’t have much of a place in a pro application. I think it’s amazing in the consumer iPhoto app but there are a limited number of situations where this technology is useful for the Pro.

User Interface and Workflow

This is an area of much debate. I think it goes back to which ecosystem you are more comfortable in. However, there are some points that should be addressed. Aperture 3 touts full screen browsing and image editing as an advantage over Lightroom. Sorry, Lightroom has had this for quite some time. Command-Shift-F (Control-Shift-F on Windows) puts Lightroom into full screen mode with all panels out of the way. That works in the Library Module as well as the Develop Module. You can set your panels to auto hide and show so they slip in and out of view quite easily.

Some Aperture users complain of having to scroll and scroll to reach tools in the side panels. Set the sections to Solo Mode and they will expand and contract as you need them. No scrolling needed.

Here is where I am biased by which ecosystem I’ve grown accustomed to. I find Aperture to be horribly disjointed and unorganized. The modular approach of Lightroom just makes so much more sense to me. I can easily jump here and there from the keyboard yet I can also concentrate on one logical task at a time when I need to. Aperture can do this but it takes some effort to get it organized and set up an efficient workflow. I’m sure devoted Aperture users will argue the other way but again, this is a personal preference item. The workflow has to work for you. If Aperture’s approach fits you better then that’s a good thing.

RAW Interpretation

Comparing Lightroom 3 Beta’s RAW engine to Aperture 3’s I found that Lightroom did a better job at processing RAW data. Adobe Camera Raw is the underlying technology for Lightroom and remains the industry leader here. Combined with flexible camera profiling and much improved noise reduction performance in the Beta, Lightroom wins on this.

Corporate Culture and Developers

I found that when I tried to use many plugins, Aperture required me to restart in 32 bit mode since the plugins weren’t 64 bit. Other plugins just weren’t compatible. While this will be addressed by developers in the coming days it raises an important difference in the corporate cultures at Adobe and Apple.

By being open and soliciting input from the user base, Adobe’s public betas have gathered useful information and helped make the product superior. Additionally, developers have a chance to see what’s coming and have adjustments made to their plugins so that on day one of the final release, compatible plugins are usually ready to download.

Apple’s obsession with secrecy means that the general user population doesn’t get any input until the product is released. Developers are kept in the dark so their plugins need to be updated after the release date for Aperture.

Adobe remains much more nimble at addressing Pro photographers needs. Lightroom has a much more lively development cycle with frequent dot updates and timely version upgrades. Apple just seems to not care. Why does it take nearly two years for a new version of Aperture to arrive? That’s just not the kind of cycle I want to get involved with.

Wrapping Up

I am going to revisit the feature for feature comparisons later on after the final release of Lightroom 3. That will be more of an (and here comes another pun) apples to apples comparison. For now I will answer the question “Is it time to switch?” with an unequivocal no. Lightroom, even at version 2.6, remains a better application than Aperture 3.

As I mentioned going in… this is my opinion and not a statement of fact. I still recommend that you download the free trials for both and see what fits you better. More to come…

No related posts.

I’ve always generally been okay with how fast Ligthroom supported new cameras, but the discussion got me thinking about how fast both these tools support new cameras.

The following are the results of my research. You can scroll to the bottom of the post for a bit more information on how I collected the data. As you can see, it isn’t exhaustive, but it is composed of over 30 models, primarily from Canon, Nikon and Sony.

While this may not guarantee how fast Lightroom and Aperture will support the RAW files from your new camera in the future, it is interesting to see how fast they’ve done so in the past.

A few interesting things to note:

• Lightroom is faster (yah!), but that the gap isn’t huge.
• The only exception to the previous point is in support of newer Sony models. At the time of this post, Aperture isn’t supporting a single one of the 6 Sony DSLRs released in 2009 that I used to compile these charts.
• Nikon is generally supported a bit faster than Canon.

A Look at the Charts

All charts show the time, in days, needed to support the RAW files for a particular camera model. These are measured between a camera’s announcement date and the date Lightroom/Aperture released an update supporting the model.

Data Sources & Info

Camera Announcement Dates were pulled from press releases and Wikipedia. Announcement dates were used because the data was more reliably accessible than the dates that the cameras were actually available for purchase.

Lightroom/Aperture release dates were based on Apple tech notes and Lightroom release notes.

Sample Sizes:

Canon: 9

Nikon: 9

Sony: 7

Olympus: 1

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Anita is one of the driving forces behind Lightroom’s Community Help. She is always gathering input from the community, tweaking articles to make them clearer, updating links, clearing out old help items, and on and on and on.

I asked Anita to tell us a little about herself and here’s what she had to say…

I’ve always appreciated great photography, but I never produced great photographs myself—and never thought I could—until Lightroom.

I’ve been a journalist, tech writer, and editor for more than 20 years, for newspapers, magazines, books, websites, and more. I joined the Adobe Learning Resources team as the doc writer for Lightroom 2. Since starting to work with Lightroom, I’ve gone from capturing JPEGs with a point-and-shoot Nikon CoolPix P4 to capturing raw photos with a Nikon D70 and making them look halfway decent. (They impress my friends and family, at least.) Being able to write and play with pictures all day—er, become a subject matter expert in Lightroom—what a great job.

Another part of the job that I love is bringing software documentation into the 21st century through Adobe Community Help. If you haven’t explored Adobe Community Help, you should. It offers access to up-to-date product documentation as well as to community-created learning content from around the web. Features like expert-moderated comments (thanks, Gene), user ratings, and a custom Google search engine with advanced search options make it easier for you to find answers to your learning questions. Here isLightroom 2 Community Help and here is Lightroom 3 Beta Community Help. At Lightroom 3 Beta Community Help, you can also download and test-drive our new Community Help AIR viewer. Check it out and let us know what you think. Share you feedback on the Community Help Forum.

One of the measures of great software is the depth and breadth of its help feature. Anita’s efforts go a long way in making Lightroom the great application it is! Thanks Anita!

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Monthly (or so) we feature a Lightroom related site. Check the Featured Site section in the sidebar. There is also a list of Interesting Sites for you to explore. Give them a look. Perhaps you will find another site to add to your list.

Another excellent source is Alltop. Alltop aggregates sites in a wide range of topics. Here’s how Alltop describes what it does:

The purpose of Alltop is to help you answer the question, “What’s happening?” in “all the topics” that interest you. You may wonder how Alltop is different from a search engine. A search engine is good to answer a question like, “How many people live in China?” However, it has a much harder time answering the question, “What’s happening in China?” That’s the kind of question that we answer.

We do this by collecting the headlines of the latest stories from the best sites and blogs that cover a topic. We group these collections — “aggregations” — into individual web pages. Then we display the five most recent headlines of the information sources as well as their first paragraph.

Lightroom Secrets is honored to be among the top sites on the Lightroom Page at Alltop. The Alltop widget in our sidebar will show you a random selection from Alltop.

If you have a great Lightroom resource let us know!

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Not surprisingly, I love Lightroom. I’ve used it since the first public beta and haven’t put it down since. It’s the best workflow tool for professional and amateur photographers alike. Period.

So, on this, my maiden post, I thought I’d briefly share the top 5 reasons why I (and you should if you don’t already) use Lightroom. I look forward to future posts where I can continue to share my knowledge and passion about Lightroom and photography.

Reasons to Use Lightroom

Reason 1: The Adjustment Brush
This is my single favorite feature. If you aren’t familiar with it, it allows you to apply affects (exposure, clarity, color, etc.) to just parts of the image. It was new in version 2 and is, by itself, worth every penny they charge for Lightroom. In version 1 I would open nearly 50% of my final photos to apply local sharpening and other adjustments. With the addition of the adjustment brush that number shrunk to 5-10%.

Reason 2: Adobe Makes It
I know that this reason has nothing to do with specific features. It deserves to be near the top, though. There are folks out there that don’t like Adobe, but I’m not one. I like Adobe’s products. All of them. Adobe makes solid tools and hasn’t let me down in the 10 years I’ve been using them. I have confidence that mastering their tools will pay off in the long run as they continue to release new versions that make it worth sticking around for. (Note: I’m not employed by Adobe or paid for how I feel.)

Reason 3: Input
I’ll be the first to admit that getting used to how Lightroom handles files can be tough to grasp initially (the fact that it points to files anywhere on your computer, but keeps track of edits, etc. in a database inside Lightroom takes a bit to get used to). As I’ve come to have a firm grasp on it, though, I love it. The balance between storing photos where I want them, but with the ability to pull them all together in the Library module just seems right to me. I also like the new Import dialog in Lightroom 3 Beta. It’s a major improvement (especially for new users).

Reason 4: Output
The ability to easily output to web galleries, easily print and (as of LR 3 Beta) natively export to Flickr is huge for me. Combining all of these directly into the tool in a way that makes sense saves me a LOT of time.

Reason 5: It’s 64-bit
This last one may not mean much for some. For those that have larger amounts of memory, though (typically more than 4GB), this is huge. Having an available 64-bit version allows much better performance when editing large photos (or when keeping Photoshop and other applications open at the same time).

So, there it is. My list. It almost hurts to leave it at 5 – there are so many other reasons. If I list them all here, though, you’d stop reading and then leave and then I wouldn’t be invited back. Trust me – it’s best that I stop.

You don’t have to stop, though. What are some of the reasons you use Lightroom?

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Brian lives and breathes Adobe products and loves using pretty much all of them. He was recently named an Adobe Community Professional for Lightroom! As an Adobe Certified Expert in Lightroom and User Group Manager for the Denver Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop User Group, Lightroom is at the top of the list!

When not shooting and using Lightroom (or other Adobe products), Brian is an IT professional living in Denver, Colorado. You can find Brian enjoying time with his great wife & kids or out playing sports or shooting (pictures of course) in the Rocky Mountains.

Welcome Brian!

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Organization can come in many forms and at many levels. You can organize your images at the drive level (by using a system of folders, subfolders, and file naming conventions) and/or at the metadata level in Lightroom. You must first decide what organizational workflow fits for you. There are many websites and books devoted to this topic. You should do a little research before embarking on this adventure.

The best website I can recommend to you to delve deeply into industry standard organization practice is dpBestFlow.org from the American Society of Media Photographers and funded by the Library of Congress. The site is full of suggestions and videos. Get ready to spend some time there!

The best book on this subject is The DAM Book: Digital Asset Management for Photographers by Peter Krogh. Peter is a major contributor to the dpBestFlow site and his book is the most thorough treatment to date on the art and science of digital asset management. I heartily recommend this book to anyone who really wants to dig into digital asset management.

Lightroom has the tools but you need to plan. Start by deciding how you want to organize your images. I suggest you have one master folder into which all other folders and files will go. Doing so gives you an advantage when you decide to move the collection to a larger drive. Lightroom can relocated things better when they are in a logical folder structure like this.

There are four key components to any organization plan in Lightroom: folder/file naming, metadata, keywords, and collections. And, it all starts at import!

When you bring up the import dialog there are several sections that allow you to start organizing from the start. The first is the File Handling section.

From here we can specify where the images will wind up on our drive. We can organize them using the built in folder templates.

If you adopt an organization scheme where you use event or place names you can edit the directory template by double-clicking on the name and editing it.

You can also choose to do an initial back while importing your image.

A quick note about this feature – currently Lightroom will not apply any file name changes you set up to the backed up files. However, this has been addressed in Lightroom 3 Beta. Any file name changes you make during import will be applied to the backup files as well. That will make it much easier to locate a file for a renamed image.

So, whatever folder structure scheme you have adopted can be implemented in the import dialog.

The next section is File Naming. Here you can apply the file naming convention you have adopted.

By using the drop-down from the Template field you can choose an existing template or create a new one.

In the Information to Apply section, the two critical organizational fields are Metadata and Keywords. You should have at least one metadata template set up with all your contact information, copyright, and rights usage data. Choose this from the drop-down or create one now. In the Keywords field enter all the keywords that apply to the entire set of images you are importing. (You can add additional keywords to individual images later on.)

Now when you import the images they will be placed into your folder structure as planned already tagged with essential keywords and critical metadata will already be applied. Adopting this discipline will give you a large head start on organizing your images!

Now, within the Library module we can continue our organizational magic with collections. On the left panel you will find the Collections section.

Collections are virtual groups of images that you bring together for some purpose. You can use this feature to further organize your images. There are two types of collections: regular and smart. With a regular collection you deliberately include images by dragging them into the collection. These are more static. Smart collections, however, are based on rules you set up. So they are more fluid and automatic.

For example, if we shoot regularly for ABC Corp we may want a collection of all the images we’ve taken for that client. From the example above we tagged the images on import with the keyword ABC Corp. Knowing that we can create a Smart Collection to gather all these images into one place.

Start by clicking the + next to Collections and choosing Create Smart Collection… from the contextual menu.

This will bring up the Create Smart Collection dialog box.

Give your Smart Collection a name in the Name field. In the rules list choose Keywords as your field, contains all as your operation, and then enter ABC Corp as the keyword you are looking for. Click Create and a new smart collection will appear under Collections.

As you can see it shows that there are 11 images in the collection. Now, whenever you tag any image with the keyword ABC Corp it will automatically appear in this collection.

Collections are a deep and powerful feature in Lightroom and we have only barely scratched the surface here. Play with them and discover how rich they are.

Whatever organizational plan you adopt one of the most important things you can do to make it work is to be consistent! You can always reevaluate your plan. Until you do be strict and stick with the plan you have. If the plan makes sense to you then you will be able to locate any image very quickly and that is the real benefit to being organized.

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Several of my digital cohorts have also been named as Adobe Community Professionals. Congratulations to Sean McCormack (Lightroom), Geoff Walker (Lightroom), A.J. Wood (InDesign), Chris Tarantino (Photoshop), and J Schuh (After Effects)! Well deserved my friends!!!

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Lightroom is an excellent program but it still needs you to feed it images. If you find yourself in a creative slump or the shooting doldrums don’t despair! Leave all that in 2009 and look to the new year with fresh eyes!

Here are ten suggestions to help you rekindle that passion for photography! You may have seen some (or all) of these elsewhere but it never hurts to see them again.

1. Give yourself an assignment

Don’t just wander around aimlessly wondering “what will I shoot?” Make use of your time with an assignment. Go out and shoot BLUE things. Or restrict yourself to TRIANGLES. Not a street shooter? Go downtown and do some urban hunting. Giving yourself an assignment can force you to take a new look at things and places you might see every day.

2. Zoom with your feet

Many a great shot is the result of a small change in perspective. A slightly different angle can open up a world or possibilities. So if you usually work with a zoom lens switch it for a prime. Don’t have a prime lens? No problem. Pick a focal length on your zoom and get a piece of gaffer’s tape (or other mild tape that won’t leave a residue) and tape your zoom lens at that focal length. Now if you want to get closer you’ll actually have to use your feet. That will change your perspective and may open up some new opportunities.

3. Play with light

Learn to play with light this year. If you don’t usually set up lighting for a subject give it a try. You don’t have to go out an buy expensive studio lights. Go outdoors. Use a reflector (or anything with a  reflective surface). Filter light through shower curtains or bedsheets. Try this indoors with lighting at hand or some inexpensive work lights. See how it changes the shadows an highlights of the subject. Learn how it gets soft or harsh. Just play with light and see what you come up with!

4. Play with light — QUICKLY

As a corollary to suggestion #3, learn to work with flash. Get your speedlight off your camera. Try filtering the flash. Learn how to use fill flash for backlit subjects. Learn how your ETTL or ITTL flash systems work. Lucky enough to have multiple speedlights? Try multi-light setups. Learn to drag the shutter to capture some ambient light in addition to the flash. In short, overcome your uncomfortableness with flash.

5. Get out of your comfort zone

Are you a portrait shooter? Get out there at 0-dark-30 and shoot a sunrise. Like to do macro shots of flowers and insects? Go get your friend to sit for a portrait session. Give HDR a try. Walk up to strangers on the street and ask if you can take their picture. Try doing some product shooting. Grab a bottle of wine or a jar of mayonnaise and stage it. Whatever type of photography you are comfortable with — forget that once in a while — and try something new.

6. Tell a story

Give yourself a project that you cannot complete in one or two shoots. Try telling a story. For example, find an interesting location and document it every month. Over the course of a year that location will change as the seasons change. Things may disappear or appear since your last visit. This time next year put your best shots together to tell the 2010 story of that location. Or, try documenting the life of a town, diner, church, club, family, whatever. Tell the story in images. There’s a whole new level of creativity waiting for you there!

7. Try out some new gear

Yes, I know. Gear doesn’t make the image, the photographer does. But still. Did you think I could get through this list without at least mentioning new gear once? C’mon! And this doesn’t have to land you in the poor house. Are you a Canon shooter? Borrow a friends Nikon for a day. Never shot with a 70-200mm lens? Borrow one from a friend or rent one for a week. Do you always head out with your DSLR? Try using that little point-and-shoot for a change. New gear doesn’t have to be new — just new to you.

8. Lock yourself in a room

Perhaps your family or friends have given you this advice. It might be for a different reason! LOL Seriously, spend 30 minutes in one room. It could be the kitchen or the bathroom. Take at least 100 shots in those 30 minutes. Look for interesting things. Intriguing angles. Great lighting. Rearrange items. Whatever it takes to get your 100 shots. The first 30 or 40 may come quickly. The rest will force you to look at things differently. So go ahead. Lock yourself in a room. But don’t forget your camera!

9. Share

Seek out a local camera club. Look for photowalks (keep an eye on NAPP, they sponsor one every year). Put some images on the web. You could join a Flickr group and get comments on your work (and give them to others as well). Introduce photography to a friend or relative who has an interest. Sharing your passion for photography reminds you of what led you down this path.

10. Enjoy yourself

Rule 5 applies as much to photography as it does to Lightroom. Enjoy! If photography is becoming a chore, walk away from the camera for a while. Watch a movie. Read a good book. Socialize. Then come back to your camera refreshed and ready to enjoy yourself. Your curiosity and love of photography put that camera in your hand originally. Remember that. Rekindle that passion. Enjoy yourself!

I wish you all a happy, healthy, and CREATIVE new year! Thanks for stopping by Lightroom Secrets. I look forward to seeing you in 2010!

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