Getting Satisfaction ...or Ignored?

I hope Adobe know they really aren't helping me to stay loyal. I have put the creative cloud frustration behind me, by not using it! However I am still interested in upgrading to Lightroom 5, specifically I do like the new radial filter also the healing brush and upright are nice improvements, but the beta versions I have tried out so far (LR5beta, 5.1beta & 5.2beta) all seem to be a bit too sluggish and all have some inconsistent issues (I assumed these were bugs and would get fixed, so I am waiting for the bug free version to purchase). I have downloaded and successfully installed lr5.3 beta anticipating good things. Yet I can still see the sluggishness (at least on my windows 7, 64 bit PC with 4 GB RAM) compared with LR 4.4 on the same machine. However I have now noticed significant performance deterioration on lr5.3 when I leave it open while working on other programs, (eg word & powerpoint) and/or having the computer hibernate. Reopening lr5.3 is then incredibly slow and lots of disc activity. I wonder if this is memory leakage and just classic virtual memory disk thrashing? I have to exit lightroom and restart it to get decent response and occasionally rebooting the computer is required. So I'm not encouraged to upgrade just yet.

So I decided to put my observations on the Adobe user forums, and see if other are seeing the same issues. Well the old forums don't seem to exist and I was guided into community powered support (aka getsatisfaction.com) so I pressed on and tried to post my query. That wasn't so easy and involved not only supplying my adobe log in details but also signing up for a getsatisfaction account as a member of the photoshop family. I seemed to be going around in circles. However the code to authenticate my email address for getsatisfaction didn’t arrive until a day later, so I couldn't do that at the time. Also I was guided to look for similar posts in the forums (and there are actually a lot about sluggish performance) before mine was accepted as something different, new and accepted as a new post. I did get a link to my post via an email BUT if I try to find it in the forum menus I can't, so I'm guessing others won't either. I suspect my observation are just going to be ignored, such is life I guess.

I also made an effort to check that I was part of the "improve adobe products program", which supposedly collects anonymous data on how lightroom is used and it seems adobe does realise I already was registered. This is another of those worrying things with benign sounding names where you provide information but never actually see any results or feedback. A thank you for participating and this is a summary of what we found would be nice.


I am still interested if others have seen this behaviour, but I'm not so confident getsatisfaction photoshop family is anything more than deflecting support rather than supplying it. The emperor’s new clothes in a cloud based crowd sourcing new fabric.

PhotoProject :: Photographing Art & Lr5b Upright

One of the biggest issues when photographing art is getting rid of the lens distortions.This barrel morphing of the edges and keystoning, (that trapezoidal effect you see when a projector is at a slant to the screen) means that the frames will not align with the edges. There are some steps you can take when you are taking the photo, like using a prime lens , rather than a wide angle, or especially a wide angle zoom and photographing the work straight on and avoiding strong direct light.

Perspective correction in Photoshop can be used to fix these effect, albeit with a bit of a learning curve. The new upright feature in Lightroom 5 beta is a very easy to use alternative, and ideal for “Fine Tune” straightening up the edges. The above snaps where taken of my art works hanging in private homes, taken hand held in place they hung on the wall, so I was not always able to take a distortion free set up.In Lightroom 5b before I do any other editing I go down to the Lens Correction/Basic Tab and then use either the Auto (which tries to fix the main distorts or the Full (which I probably prefer) which attempts to align both vertical and horizontal strong lines, like the picture frame. I then crop to the art work and do any other exposure adjustments. Remember it is important to get the white balance right but avoid over post processing so you keep the colours real,  It’s that easy!

Numbered Stacking, is great BUT…

I often take a number photos, in a specific set, usually bracketed groups of +/- EV settings, or adjacent & overlapping images for panorama stitching, etc. These can clutter and overwhelm your grid view or film strip. Light room has a great feature called stacking (it has been around since LR3 days) that lets you, hide the rest of the series behind the first image. It works a lot like having a set of photos underneath the first photo (normally the first photo taken, although it is possible to select the photo you want to be on top of the stack. The photo stack are identified in the library model and grid view by two vertical lines on each side of the photo. Clicking on either line will expand the stack, click on the vertical bar again with close the stack, The short cuts for this is S to open the stack (and once the stack is open press S again to close it). There are a few more stacking options under the menu item Photo/Stacking.I use this feature a lot and couldn't help noticing a very nice new way the stacks are displayed in LR5b (that's lightroom 5 beta). The stacks now have a small stack icon displayed (the icon is simple overlapping rectangles with the number inside the inner rectangle) at the upper left which shows you the number of photos in the stack. This is much more obvious than the two vertical lines (which are still there) and because I know what it is I usually leave the stacks compact. The problem at the moment is if I am showing others my recently loaded photos, they are immediately inquisitive and expand the stacks, or  want me to expand each stack. So I got to wondering was it possible to toggle off the stack numbering (and I can't find a way to do it) Then I realised it would be wonderful to be able to flag these boxes with colour (or a different shapes) to differentiate the type of stacked images, (eg HDR set, stitched panorama, group photos). Oh that’s right lightroom doesn’t yet support any form of photo merger (yet!)!
So here are a couple of interim solutions that work fine for me.

1. I must remember only show others my lightroom collections (not original folders) so they only get distracted by what I want to show them.
2. I have started to use the colour flagging to identify what are bracketed EV ranges (red) versus overlapping images for stitch panoramas (green)

Underwhelming or out of balance?

Looking at the Adobe Forums and the social net, it is apparent that many users (not everyone) share my private view of the Lightroom 5 beta. It is very light for a major release, There is quiet an imbalance between what it delivers and the general user needs/expectations.Here is a incomplete list of things different folk (including me) had expected or desired to be included the next upgrade to Lightroom, but alas none have been delivered -

• LAN support, Catalogues on the server

• MultiUser access to shared catalogues
• Face Recognition
• Multi-image merges, HDR, Pano, Photofuse

• Better Publish Services to #social #net #hashtags

• Multi-Catalogue Sync/Exchange

• Custom Brush Shapes

• Non Alphabetical #keywording

• Book –> eBooks (e-Pub)
• Folder Flagging/colour

I still think Lightroom is great but I have drawn the see-saw so unbalanced because I fear Adobe might not realise, rather than achieving an equilibrium, the plank could break and the users will either just stick with version 3 or 4 or maybe abandon lightroom altogether, while they go looking for solutions to their needs elsewhere.
Version 3 was a dramatic improvement, I think everyone knows that and version 4 has some beautiful improvements in the Development module.. The Map, Book, Slideshow and Web stuff have had less universal appeal and are often not used. I can see the advanced brush healing feature saving a lot of tedium and time, but is that compelling enough for the majority of existing and potential new users? .
On a very cynical level, maybe more frequent, lighter and hopefully a little cheaper updates are just be a way for Adobe to make their Creative Cloud Service a more attractive proposition.

What is so important about 2048?

• This is the size in pixel of photos you can upload to google+ for free (as long as the longest side of your image is 2048 or smaller the image can be loaded and does not count against your 2GB limit.
• It is also the size of the DNG files (again the longest dimension) stored as the smart previews in Lightroom 5 beta.
• 2058 by 1536 is equivalent to 3.1 megapixels
• Most current smart phone cameras are around this size, or a little larger.
• Probably Ok for a 10" by 8" blow up.
• Definitely fine for a 6" by 4" print.
• It is bigger than necessary for an email or blog post.

Dimensions in pixels	Mega pixels	Jpeg File size	DNG File Size
2048 X 1536	3.1	0.5-1MB	1.2-1.8MB

 If you click on this photo you will see what 2048 by 1361 looks like on your screen. Big isn't it

Photos that are 2048 across apparently are now considered Standard Size! (at least for the web)

Autumn is upon us

Autumn is upon us, originally uploaded by imageo.

Experimenting with Lightroom 5 Beta's new Upright feature, on a natural landscape with the horizon hidden and no strong uprights or horizontals (ie no buildings). It seems to have made sensible decisions, but I'm puzzled what it based those decisions on? Perhaps the shadows and trunks of the trees? The poplar in the left?

Smart Previews in Lightroom5 (aka Offline Mode)

The second thing that grabbed my attention in the Lightroom 5 Beta is what is being termed Smart Previews (aka Offline Mode). Not that you will see much at all, the only hint they exist will be an empty square rather than a square with a question mark when the photo is actually on an external drive that has been removed. If you do have smart previews set up in this situation you can continued to edit and updated the image and metadata (as if the photo was accessible). then next time you connect the missing drive the updates and metadata changes will be synched back into your catalogue. For those that have big phone collections, stored on external hard drives this is a massive thing, and will make life much easier for a travelling photographer (like myself).

Despite all the excitment in the adobe forums,the smart previews it isn’t a panacea for working with large collections in a collaborative environment or even distribution across a LAN, I’ve had a good play around and I really like the feature BUT it is really best described as just Offline Mode, it is still very much single user, single computer oriented.. The smart previews are stored in a separate smart previews. lrdata file  beside your active catalogue, storing smaller version of your originals (not thumbnails) and associated metadata. They also maintain the link back to the original photos. So these previews are not suited to transferring your edit settings and metadata around to other locations (eg moving parts of a library of photos to a another computer or hard drive). What several users have noticed is that working on the smart previews rather than the library of originals on an external drive is a lot faster, and so it should be, its working on smaller files and on the local hard disk.

Dust removal & Advanced Brush Healing Tool in Lightroom5

Its been a long time since I first mentioned DSLR's dirty little secret, dust on the sensors. Back then (late 2006) I was also looking at the beta that was to become Lightroom and I was severely flamed in the user forum for asking about a brush adjustment. to fix dust spots among other things. The volume of negative comments didn't bother me because at the time I had already "discovered" how to fix the dust spots with a cloning tool. Well I lot has transpired since then and perhaps a little behind its counterparts Lightroom does now have good dust spot removal, shown here. Spot being the important word (it does circular clone or heal), so trying to fix a linear tear or hairline might involve a lot of fiddly cloning. In reality I still prefer to do any dust and other tidying up in Corel Photo Paint. Now I find myself trying out the Lightroom 5 beta and the first thing that grabbed my attention is its Advanced Brush Healing Tool, which could well be the very tool I asked about 8 years ago. The "hardedge" surreal visualize spots view is particularly useful, like my photograph the blue sky trick, at helping you find the dust spots. I think a fair bit of drudgery might have just disappeared. This time I dare not ask the obvious question about synchroninzing these fixes across a series of photos (because the dust spots will be in exactly the same place). Phew someone has already asked that, thanks Juergen. Providing you just use the auto selected “source” for the clone or blend (blend is better) you can go ahead and synch the dust spot removal, with other photos, its just that occasionally you will want to shift the auto selected source location in some, hopefully only a few, of the synched copies. By the way you can do this in Lghtroom version 4 as well.

Adobe’s video on YouTube does a nice job of explaining the advanced brush healing features, make sure to pay attention to short cuts and tricks towards the end.

Lightroom 5 Beta is available for download now. Remember, as advised in the video, it is a beta version, so don't work on your existing catalogue, and don't use your original photos!

A proper connection to SkyDrive

I must admit I have only just had a look at the on-line Windows 8 Consumer Review, but the one feature that did strike me as something they have finally got right is the integration of Skydrive. Right now you need to get to SkyDrive via Windows Live Gallery (if you don’t have it it can be downloaded for free from here) or use the Web based access via Hotmail/Windows Live Messenger. The windows Live Gallery is fine for photos and give you a web Album, but you have to remember and manage the two locations. The integration in Windows 8 appears to make the issue of weather you have the file on your computer or in the cloud irrelevant, their slogan is your windows, everywhere.
The other area that may be of most interest to photographers will be what apps are available, I expect there to be a great rush of Photocentric apps developed by third party, probably a lot more or the same as those currently available for the android or Iphone/Ipad. So do you really want to want to run something that runs on your phone on your PC as well? Probably yes because you really need more screen real estate to get the most out of most photo applications. Also a few apps might give you all the photo processing you want and needed and this will be much cheaper than a blotted photo/image software package that costs the earth and takes for ever to learn how to use.
There is a beta version of widows 8 (its a pre release trial rather than a true beta release) that you can download and test now. You can even create a portable version that can be booted from a USB key or external drive. This will be of most use for those wanting to develop apps for this new platform.
The interface, based on the Metro design language, looks a lot more tablet or touchscreen oriented than I expected and yet disturbingly familiar! Then I realised I had seen it before, its exactly like the XP version of Windows Media Center, which I actually still like and use because I can work it from the couch via a remote. I have an older PC connect to my wide flat screen TV and it is perfect to show family and friends Slide shows and home movie.

On the darker side of Lightroom 3 beta

I was trying to do beta tests of two well know software packages, Adobe’s Lightroom 3 beta and Windows Office 2020 beta . Both are hardly beta versions, they are more consumer tryout. Unlike older beta software programs, they don’'t have direct access back to the developers. You have to go through on-line help, meager user forums or the weird send a smile/frown offered by Microsoft. Which means if you encounter legitimate problems you are pretty much on your own. I fondly remember the days when you could email the developers of the beta version and they would promptly email back. They even seemed to value your feedback. Unfortunately those days have gone for independent beta testers and are both these unsupported consumer previews are annoying the hell out of me.

The thing that is most irritating me about the Lightroom 3 beta is how it has taken over so many tasks like loading photos or any graphic images without asking. It not only popup interrupts unexpectedly, it is slow at even telling you what its trying to do and is so stubborn about constantly refreshing and finding things on its own, I just gave up. So if you want to load a lot of photos be prepared to get very annoyed about images flickering on and off and moving about. I mistakenly aborted one of these session and now my card has stated playing up in my camera and other computers. (I reformatted it in the camera, which seems the safest way to fix this, and it does seem to be ok now). Actually the importing photos is probably a lot better than it was. I guess I am just used to picasa now. The trouble is Lightroom has to construct a catalogue, which includes metadata, thumbnail preview and managements task like finding duplicates. If this was truly a beta version Adobe could probably iron out a lot of niggly data management/usability before a final release. I’m not so confident.p>

From a very preliminary first look two features of Lightroom 3’s Development Tab look like winners. The first is the digital noise filtering and the second is brushes, which now do a broad  range of touch up tasks.

Now where about in the Lightrooom beta forum does it give advice on uninstalling the beta?

very disillusioned with blogger & google

I still think blogger is a good tool and a wonderful way to record what I am doing and thinking about my photography as I go along. Best part it is free.

However, trying to maintain a some enthusiasm and pride in what I am doing is becoming very tedious.

1. I am finding my photos used in a lot of place without any acknowledgement to me, presumably that have been found in google images or flickr. Ok I am putting copyright noticed into many of the likely to be stolen images now, but I would rather trust people just to acknowledge me. I actually like the creative commons approach to sharing.
2. At least two groups of "camera reviewers" steal my blog posts, copy and paste the lot and repost it as their own in sites. in total. The moral problem here is I am not acknowledged and the sites involved use google's own ad sense, so google is potentially rewarding them for stealing my and many other bloggers work.
3. I have a very persistent "hacker" automatically posting gibberish Chinese comments as me (they are reported as if they were comments by me, which they are not). They have numerous links in the comments. I haven't checked where the links go and I strongly advise you not to follow any of those links, i'm present certain no good lurks there.
4. The final staw is, have you ever tried to report any of these or similar problems to google? The silence is deafening.

These are not really problems I should be wasting my time on, or am I naive in thinking they are issues google should be addressing? In the very least I would like someone in google to stop paying those who steal my post and if they want to pay someone give that revenue to charity.

The tenderils of the vine

  

I'm not sure if it is the lastest picasa update (version 2.6.0 Build 35.83.0) or a change to blogger log in, but the result is I can once again upload photos to blogger beta using the blog this button in picasa.

Strike three, "Blog This" from flickr requires resetting

Hmmm..... the blogger beta is not such a good idea... the "blog this" button from flickr doesn't work with blogger beta either.... well it does give you a half decent warning and link to change your blog setting.

The trouble is, you to have to delete the old blog setting and add a new one (there is no way to change your blog so I guess most folk will realise this is necessary eventually. It did take me a while to figure out)


As part of that process (if you have not already done it) you must grant flickr access to your google account so flickr can may make posts on your behalf. If you are worried about this sort of thing it will pay you to read the learn more link.

Picasa "blog this" not working either

Thought I should also check out picasa's "blog this" key, which is a handy one click way to upload a photo to a blog. Well it doesn't work with Blogger beta either.

(see also my goodbye hello post)

Goodbye Hello

Seems I'm a late try out going over to blogger beta (which I like by the way), BUT now I have just discovered that bloggerbot in hello can not log into the new blogger beta.

Not such a big deal, I seldom used hello anymore to upload photos to blogger (I used the direct upload most, followed by links from flickr or photobucket). It was just that I was going to do some screen captures and multiple images in one blog, something bloggerbot could do easily. WELL NOT ANY MORE because hello doesn't want to talk with blogger beta. This is a bit strange since picasa and blogger are both google products now. I know I''ll go and look on the google groups forum on the topic, YEAP lots of folk have discovered this already. HANGON you can not add to the post because it is more than 60 days old! Ok I might be late but I did want at least say goodbye to hello


You can easily remove hello from you picasa world using the tools/configure buttons.. option from picasa's main menu