LIGHTROOM 3 or ELEMENTS 9/10

alexam

alexam

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Malcolm
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I have Elements 8 at present and can see the extra benefits of Elements 9, but understand that Elements 10 will be released soon.

I am only just getting used to parts of Elements 8, but would I be better off editing wise, if I move to Lightroom 3 rather than stick with Elements and does 3 have all the present benefits of Elements 9? What are the up's and downs of both. I do not want to pay for CS5.
 
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Do you have to porcess lots of images and want to do it quickly, also things like setting white balance to a whole slew of pics at once in a batch process. Or do you normally open up the photos you like and Edit them one at a time, merge pics together, clone out stuff?

If the latter I suspect stick with elements, if not maybe lightroom. I am not an expert BTW.
 
Thanks Keith,

I generally process one at a time and don't think I would want to batch process even in setting the white balance. I have been happy with Elements 8 and impressed with the improvements on E9, but with a new version about to be launched I thought Elements 10 would be worth waiting for. It's just that I have no idea if another system would offer more, but not at the price of the full blown CS5. Does Lightroom do all the things that E9 would do at present?

Malcolm
 
I have both and they complement each other nicely, LR3 doesn't do everything PSE9 does on the editing front, still considerably less cost than CS5
 
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Thanks Rich,
Apart from the organisation and possibly batch processing, what does LR3 do that E9 doesn't?
 
For a start it has the advanced RAW editing such as found in CS5, think you pretty much described the major differences yourself above though Malcolm

PSE is mainly an editing tool whereas LR3 is a complete workflow process, didn't think I needed (wanted) it until I had a play with an old copy of LR1 I found at work.

Once you get to grips with the cataloguing aspect its really very simple, could easily only use LR, but wouldn't want to go back to just having PSE

Daresay your older version would do fine for the odd editing process not included in LR, upgraded from version 6 myself and 9 was a real bargain at 22 quid on an Amazon Black Friday offer
 
I have both LR3 and Elements 9. To be honest as an amertuer photographer I find that Elements 9 is far more useful to me as I will only generally process one photo at a time. I can see the benifits of LR3 if you have a lot of photo's to process, but for me Elements and DPP get far more use.
 
So there you have it, two opposite views on the subject, no definitive answer and depends on what you want to do

For me sorting out a large number of raw files efficiently, processing then backing up/storing them is more important than messing about with all sorts of editing techniques.

Maybe get the trial 30 day version of LR3 and see how you get on, if you want to buy just pay up and get the registration numnber from Adobe

If you are a student, have one in your family, work at a school or other learning institution you can get Adobe products at vastly reduced prices ( big thanks to my wife who is a school science tech)
 
Thanks again Rich and also Gordon for input to this. I like the Elements editing of Raw and Jpeg and possibly a more advanced Raw editing would be attractive. However, Elements next edition may make some improvements so will wait a few weks to see what comes.

I almost moved fro E8 to E9 a few days ago until I read that Elements is expected to be updated end of September time, so will see what else it offers. Possibly an improvement of the Raw editing or whatever. I do like the upgrade to E9 so will probably go for the E10 and see if I want, or need Lightroom or anything else.

Thanks for the input guys and Craig, should be soon!

Malcolm
 
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