Finally! A New Lightroom With Promises! But Wait...

As many of you are aware, I have lost my patience with Adobe and Lightroom CC primarily due to how slow the program has become over the past couple of years.  Painfully slow.  I wrote about it previously here, in the form of somewhat of a rant.  It really doesn't matter how many features Adobe improves or incorporates if the workflow is so slow that your frustration results in walking away from your computer with exasperation.

In that post, I set a hard line for myself in that if Adobe hadn't done something to speed up Lightroom by the end of this year, I would actively search for a new image editing application.  Yes, it is that bad that I would change my entire workflow to improve the experience.

Well, unless you've been completely out of touch with any sort of information system, you know that Adobe this week released two new versions of this mainstay photographic editing program.  Lightroom CC, now Lightroom Classic CC, and the new Lightroom CC, which is an entirely new, mobile and cloud based, program.  Who thought it was a good idea to rename the long time existing program to something very similar and then introduce an entirely new program using the existing program's current name?  Who?

In any case, Adobe claims they have increased the speed of Lightroom Classic, which is my primary beef.  They have also added a couple of features to the program in the way of being able to mask areas of your images based upon luminance and color range.  I welcome these new additions and I'm really hoping for speed.

I don't yet know if the program is faster.  I have not yet downloaded and installed it on my computer.  Almost always, I wait for several days before downloading any new version of a program that is introduced.  That is for both my computer and camera firmware updates.  Why?  In the past, I have been burned more than once in downloading an updated version of a program/firmware only to have it break my entire system (or camera) or the program itself becomes inoperable, leaving me high and dry when trying to work.  As thorough as beta testing is, sometimes critical issues are missed or introduced.  So, I wait and see what the early adopters find before I decide to install it.  So far, in my research, I've only seen minor issues with the new Lightroom Classic reported.  If nothing else is found, I will probably download and install it on Sunday.

I'm hoping I am pleased.  I had already looked into MacPhun, Capture One Pro, Affinity, On1 and others as potential replacements.  I saw just yesterday MacPhun is incorporating a database function into their editing program.  I'll keep an eye on that as I've read and seen good things about their software and, with a database included, it sounds as though MacPhun is really making a run at Adobe.

I like Lightroom.  I'm used to it.  I can use it blindfolded and really don't want to change, but, indeed, I will if Adobe can't free up some of the billions of US dollars they have made from all of us users to do some heavy duty research and development to improve Lightroom's faults.

As for the other "new" Lightroom CC.  Well, I'm not much of a mobile user and this new program is for those who are heavy mobile photographers, editors and then share immediately on various social media outlets.  I'm a desktop guy so right now I don't have a real use for this new program.  Also, from what I read, it is very lightweight on tools and can't right now compare to the Classic version for editing.  I'm sure it will improve and I'll bet my next paycheck that, over the next several years, Adobe puts all of their emphasis on applications oriented toward mobile users as that is the way the photo culture is moving.

Also, don't forget that Adobe also updated Photoshop CC, Camera Raw and Bridge.  They added some functonality to Photoshop as well.  I will be studying those new functions in the very new future, too.

Check back early next week and and I'll let you know what differences in speed I see in my workflow using my state of the art (for speed) computer.

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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