Purchase LR3 or Upgrade from CS4 to CS5??

I currently have Photoshop CS4 on my Macbook Pro and do not have any version of Lightroom installed except for LR3 Beta. In your opinion, if you had your choice, would you upgrade to PS CS5 or purchase LR3 when released? Sometimes I think having both is rather redundant. I really do not want to do both. Just wondering what some thoughts on this are. Thanks.

LR3 for me. I own lightroom, and have used CS4. Lightroom for me is much easier, and can do everything i need it to. I guess it depends on how much manipulation of your shots you want to do.

You can't base your decision on what others are doing; you have to make a thorough assessment of your own needs and make the choice that best satisfies those needs.

A user who has mastered Photoshop would possibly choose to upgrade to CS5 but that should drive your decision if you aren't heavy Photoshop user. Likewise, someone who primarily shoots Raw and makes mostly global adjustments may be satisfied with only Lightroom.

Only you know your workflow and what works for you. I agree that it is not advisable to make this decision based on what others do. Be that as it may I will give you my opinion.

If you are going to use Lightroom to its fullest capabilities then it might be a good choice. If all you are using it for is a RAW converter then I would opt for Photoshop. The conversions between ACR and Lightroom use the same RAW engine. The difference is the user interface. I have become used to ACR and find it quite easy to do multiple conversions, sync changes, etc. Lightroom has a nice pretty user interface and if that makes things easier for you then choose that. If all you are ever going to do is a basic RAW conversions and resizing then Lightroom is a reasonable choice.

If you are interested in doing more complex selections, component replacements, text or the multitude of other things to your images then CS5 would be a good choice. I am high on CS5 over Lightroom 3 basically because I was in the beta program and saw the performance and capabilities first hand.

None of these are intended to sway you either way. In the not too distant future you will be able to download the trial for Photoshop CS5. I would go that route and see which one works best for you the way you work, not the way others use the products.

Cost may also be an influence? CS5 will, i suspect, be considerably more expensive than Lightroom 3 (although I'm not sure how an upgrade cost for CS5 will compare vs a new Lightroom install).

DarthSparky wrote in post #10007560
Cost may also be an influence? CS5 will, i suspect, be considerably more expensive than Lightroom 3 (although I'm not sure how an upgrade cost for CS5 will compare vs a new Lightroom install).

An upgrade from CS4 to CS5 will be slightly less than a full copy of LR3.

If I could only have one, I'd have CS5 but I can have both so I am.