Lightroom adjustment brush or photoshop adjustment layers?

[Frankie_82]

Hi all,
I have being experimenting with both the lightroom adjustment brush and adjustment layers in photoshop for some of my landscape work. Both certainly provide a great way of processing to guide the viewers eye through the image.Initially I relied entirely on the adjustment brush in lightroom, but lately after viewing some tutorials, I have found adjustment layers in photoshop to be quite useful also.

Having become reasonably comfortable using both methods, I am interested to hear what others who have access to both lightroom and photoshop use when this type of processing is required. Do people prefer to start and finish in either lightroom or photoshop, or is it normal practise for some to jump between different software packages to make use of better features?

Thanks for any feedback

[Merlin_AZ]

I usually do my global adjustments in Lightroom, and the specific ones in Ps.
I find making changes to masks easier than making changes using the Adjustment brush.

[stock28]

I have both but use LR for 99% of adjustments. Just find it easier and it does what I need it to do.

[tonylong]

I've gotten some great results with the Lightroom local adjustment brushes, and Lightroom keeps getting better with new releases.

But, I've never been one to downplay the "power of Photoshopping" -- Photoshop can, of course, do things that are impossible with Lightroom, but also can do some tasts that the Lightroom brushes can do but do them more efficiently/effectively.

Really, it comes down to your personal experience with each app and then your preference derived from that experience.

You can say I have a "bias" toward Raw processing and the Raw workflow for my "normal" photography and so rarely leave my Lightroom workflow. But, I try to stay at least a bit agile with my old Photoshop CS3...

[tzalman]

I find the brush and the grad filter or the two of them used in combo to usually be enough to save me from having to store a tif, however the LR tools I really find inadequate are the clone and warp (perspective) tools and they will drive me to a second editor.

[Frankie_82]

Thanks for the feedback. Recently I have been leaning more towards photoshop to process those images that I want to give extra attention too. Although it´s more time consuming, I enjoy it.
Also agree on the clone tool in lightroom is pretty basic. I always jump to photoshop for any complicated cloning. Although I´m sure future versions of lightroom will impove this feature.

[tonylong]

Originally Posted by Frankie_82

Thanks for the feedback. Recently I have been leaning more towards photoshop to process those images that I want to give extra attention too. Although it´s more time consuming, I enjoy it.
Also agree on the clone tool in lightroom is pretty basic. I always jump to photoshop for any complicated cloning. Although I´m sure future versions of lightroom will impove this feature.

I think it's valuable and rewarding to spend plenty of time in Photoshop or a similar app, at least to learn of its capabilities so that when you need it it's there and you don't have to beat your head against the wall trying to figure out how to use it!

That being said, for my day-to-day "stuff" Lightroom suits my workflow and I'm happy with the Raw processing. Photos that would really benefit from a Photoshop "treatment", well, sure, except that as Raw processing capabilities have increased over the years, well, I'm happy! The adjustment brushes were a "revolutionary" step for Raw processing!

But yeah, the cloning tool is pretty "aged" -- it's great for spots, but it lacks the versatility of the brushes. And, when I want a "healing" effect rather than the spot removal clone, I've used the adjustment brushes pretty effectively (things like portrait/skin touchup) although the healing tool can have its place.

Interestingly, I've occasionally used the Cloning tool for some more "extensive" stuff and gotten OK results at least for something like a Web post, and so saved the work and resources of opening a tiff in Photoshop, just sayin', but still the LR approach is not as good for that type of thing.