Is Lightroom for You?
Young boy and his father in Kolkata, India. Original unprocessed RAW file.
Photography doesn't have to end in the camera. Here's how Lightroom can dramatically improve the quality of your photos.
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom is a post processing application that will enable you to take your photography to an entirely new level.
Have no doubt the communicative power of your photography will increase dramatically after you master Lightroom.
It’s one of the tools photographers use to create unique photography and, in doing so, separate themselves from the competition.
RAW Or JPEG?
It’s fine for most folks to make photos with their camera set to JPEG. For them the fun is in the moment the shutter is released and in the event surrounding that moment.
But for those wanting the best possible results and the opportunity to continue the journey, beyond the camera, software like Adobe Lightroom offers so many creative possibilities.
It’s important to note that, while Lightroom does a perfectly good job processing camera generated JPEG images, the greater capabilities of RAW files really come into their own with applications like Lightroom.
As a way of helping to illustrate my view let’s examine four versions of a portrait I made of a young boy in front of his father’s shop in Kolkata, India.
What You See On Your Camera’s LCD Screen
It’s important to understand that, when the image quality on your DSLR or Mirrorless camera has been set to RAW, what you see on your camera’s LCD screen after engaging the Review or Playback button is not the actual RAW file.
In fact it’s a tiny, temporary JPEG that the camera has generated for the purpose of image review.
By selecting either the previous or next image the camera deletes the temporary JPEG you’ve been looking at and generates a new one based on the image you’ve just selected.
In the production of this tiny, temporary JPEG file the camera has made basic decisions and, potentially, made corrections to image brightness, contrast, color and sharpness.
A RAW file is an unprocessed file which you’ve decided to process for yourself on the desktop.
With that in mind, if you’re photographing in RAW mode, you should consider the image displayed on your camera’s LCD screen as just a rough guide.
Other than allowing you to confirm basic exposure, focus and composition an image displayed on the camera’s LCD screen can give you an idea as to what the RAW image in question might look like after fairly basic processing on the desktop has been undertaken.
Young boy and his father, Kolkata. RAW file after basic Lightroom processing.
RAW Files are Not for Sharing or Printing
The original, RAW data needs to be processed (a little like what Kodak, Fuji or Agfa labs did for us in the days of film based photography) and converted to a format like jpeg that’s designed with output to a print or screen in mind.
The original RAW file at the very top of this post looks surprising good and much better than most RAW files generated by my camera.
Normally they look much lower in contrast, less colorful and less sharp.
The version you see just above features a few basic adjustments to the Hue and Saturation of the image.
That’s because I wasn’t happy with the orange tinge in the lad’s skin, nor the over saturated colors of the bags of confectionary behind him.
This particular rendering is a little more subtle, which I think is preferable. I could have done more, but I knew at the time I made the original photo that it was destined to end up as a black and white image.
Young boy and his father, Kolkata. B&W version processed entirely in Lightroom.
Lightroom Processed Black and White
The obvious difference with this next version of the photo of the young boy in Kolkata is that I’ve employed Lightroom to render the image into black and white.
I think it’s a smart move as it takes away the vividness of those bags of confectionary, the impact of which I’ve also reduced by cropping the image.
We still get a sense of the environment in which the photo was made. But our attention is now more easily placed on the young lad and then, secondary to that, on the relationship between him and his father.
Young boy and his father, Kolkata. Warm tone, black and white version.
Lightroom And Photoshop Black and White
This final version of the original RAW file has undergone more aggressive processing.
After basic processing in Lightroom I’ve taken the RAW file into Photoshop where I’ve made a series of local changes to brightness and contrast to better shape certain areas of the image.
I believe these changes further emphasize the mood and place even more attention on our primary subject’s face and expression.
You might also notice the extra sharpness and creamy warm tone I’ve added to this final version of the image.
I made those changes in Photoshop, though it would have been possible to quite easily achieve a similar result in Lightroom.
This final, warm tone version is the one I prefer. I think the young lad’s expression is more poignant and the overall mood more sombre.
I believe that particular type of melancholy beauty is well suited to this image.
JPEG Or RAW, Only You Can Decide
Whether you're a confirmed JPEG snapper or a RAW devotee, image processing with programs such as Adobe Lightroom is well worth considering.
If you're just not interested in spending the time processing all your photos that's fine, stick with JPEG.
However, if you want to expand your photographic horizons, start thinking beyond the camera.
Remember, Adobe Lightroom offers great advantages for RAW and JPEG files alike.