How long did it take you to get comfortable with Lightroom?

kompressor wrote in post #11564542
Thanks for all the input. I'm going to try to stick with it, but I have a feeling it won't become my primary image organizer/processor.

Well, LR won't work for everyone, that's for sure. It's all in the workflow and tools you prefer. To me, having one "workflow central" is efficient and works well so I'm happy!

In the Library module, select the file or series of files you want to rename, then choose Library/Rename. You will have a template to choose how you want to set up your name (including options for date/time/description/​sequencing).

I always do my folder/file naming when I Import and so don't even have to worry about naming unless I screw something up.

You can get good info from Help! For this stuff, just open Help and search for "rename" and you will find out how to Rename files when importing and how to rename files in the Library module.

LR is very different from Bridge because Bridge is a browser and LR is catalog based. That means that Bridge can only access images that are online.
In Lightroom for instance, I have about 20k images that are on several extrernal HDD's. Yet I can add keywords or search images on my laptop. The only time I have to attach the external drive is if I want to export the image again. Also makes it easier to notice if I "loose" an image somhow

I started using Lightroom when it was in Beta. I mainly liked the way the crop tool works, and the fact that (for part of my images) I could go straight from CR2 to web gallery without editing in PS (with the resulting layered .psd file to take up disk space). The color rendering sucked big time in LR 1 however. LR2 was a lot better, and added local adjustments. LR3 is finally where LR2 should have been image quality wise. (All IMHO of course)

Now I use LR for performing arts and event shoots and DPP / PS for images that need to go through photoshop.

I used (and still use) Expression Media for DAM, since it does a few things LR does not, but for a big part of my work I could get by with LR3 alone. And it works faster then the DPP+PS route.
But that is because the end use of the images is web gallery use or sale through a web site.

Then again, I could imagine creating a folder where you export images to that automatically uploads to your printer for instance.

On the renamimg: Images get renamed once, and only once: That's when they are imported from the memory card onto the mac. After that, the name is fixed.
I use a naming sceme rhd_YYYYMMDD_Event_xxx​x.CR2

Some people never do get around to liking LR because of its somewhat restrictive interface. I switched to it from Aperture and really miss being able to organize unsorted images into umbrella folders that don't exist on my hard drive. LR's interface only allows that kind of organization with collections, and in collections you can't do any stacking (because LR wants you to make collections out of images that are already sorted). It's a very annoying restriction for me, but I put up with it because I like processing with ACR.

LR is brilliant for organizing your photographs. You need to let go of the "browser mentality" though. Forget folder structures, hierarchies, etc. Get used to file names and folder names not having any significance at all. Invest time in your keyword strategy and use collections.

LR has solved so many issues for me, I would never give it up.

Buying and reading a book on LR3 is necessary to make your self comfortable and greatly speedup the learning curve. I have Lightroom 2 by Scott Kelby. Highly recommended and worth every penny.

5Dmaniac wrote in post #11570570
... You need to let go of the "browser mentality" though. Forget folder structures, hierarchies, etc. Get used to file names and folder names not having any significance at all. Invest time in your keyword strategy and use collections. ...

The problem I have with that is that Lightroom is not permanent nor transportable. With over 40,000 images in my library and growing what would happen if I need to switch to another program? All those keywords and collections become usless and I have a mass of pictures to sort through.

Think positive and stick with LR3. Once you begin you will love it. Or you can make full size Tiff's and save them as permanent.

René Damkot wrote in post #11569992
LR is very On the renaming: Images get renamed once, and only once: That's when they are imported from the memory card onto the mac. After that, the name is fixed.
I use a naming scheme rhd_YYYYMMDD_Event_xxx​x.CR2

Perhaps that is true on the Mac version but the windows version Library module is happy to rename your files one at a time or as a batch as many times as you want. Just select your image(s) then go to Library/Rename or use the F2 key or click on the file name in the Metadata section.

To answer the OP, I tried LR and went back to Elements Organizer. Tried LR2 and again went back to Organizer. Tried LR3 and went back to Organizer. Finally got tired of how bog slow Elements 8 Organizer was and tried LR3 again. Purchased it and have been using it now for a couple of months. LR3 is light years faster than the Elements Organizer when dealing with my 60K plus main collection. Its keywording tagging and sorting ability is astounding. Something that is critical when you need to quickly locate images in a large collection.

Still getting used to what I find, as a long time PS and Elements user, to be a non-intuitive assignment of shortcut keys. I love the non-destructive editing and the seamless flow to Elements, CS5 and Photomatix. Still playing around with the Zenfolio plugin.

gjl711 wrote in post #11570906
The problem I have with that is that Lightroom is not permanent nor transportable. With over 40,000 images in my library and growing what would happen if I need to switch to another program? All those keywords and collections become useless and I have a mass of pictures to sort through.

You can instruct Lightroom to automatically append the keyword data to your files anytime they are changed or do so in a manual single or batch mode. The keyword data is then readable by other applications. You can also continue to use your current file structure.

I guess is a decent program, I still have ver 2.x on my Mac but my main system is now a Win 7 machine and I'm not going to buy LR3, don't really care for it. I'm quite happy with what Canon DPP and Adobe CS3 does for me, I manage most stuff manually also. Not saying LR is no good, it is a good work-flow type software like iPhoto or Aperture for the Mac but I'm not big on any of those programs either. I do all the PP I need to do with DPP and those that need more than that I do with CS3, my main concept in photography is to get the most you can in the camera when you shoot the image and not after, I hate PP and hate changing the image to make it look much different from the original, that's just me, I'm very old fashion I guess.

Me too. I actually prefer DPP to any other RAW processing program I have tried, including Capture One, Bibble, Lightroom, ACR, ACDSee. It makes better looking images, is simple to use and it just uses your existing folders. I batch RAWs in DPP, make major edits in Photoshop and sort my JPG and TIFF in Picasa for keyword and date searches. You could argue Lightroom replaces those three with one, but I was not as happy with the way the program worked, nor it's output quality.

Couple things I'm having a problem with:

Culling images. I love the way this looks in Bridge. I'm primarily a sports shooter so I have a lot of 8 fps sequences. When I need to cull images of a game, the way Bridge shows you the image just ahead and just below the one being viewed is perfect. I can quickly cull 1,000 shots down to 100-200 in a matter of minutes. I've tried this with LR. I'm aware of the little comparison mode, survey thing. It just doesn't work as good. Pick flags, unpicked, P, U, X, left, right, left, the friggin keys are all over! With Bridge, its up, down, left, right.

I like the edit capabilities of LR becuase I do 90% of mine in ACR. But, I absolutely hate the way crop tool works. (Except for the lights-out part). I hate moving the photo behind the frame. I've always moved the frame around the photo and I'm too old now to learn new tricks.

If I could sell my version of LR3, I probably would, but I got the teacher version. I don't print my own images, never do slideshows, and never post web galleries where I have to make the template.

I do appreciate everyone's input though. I know the original post is a bit whiny, but I truly haven't made up my mind to put forth the effort to learn this thing or not and I knew some input from users would help me make up my mind. Of course, I still don't know for sure. It seems ironic to me that I heard a lot of bad reviews and dismissals of Bridge before I even knew what the program was, and then I used it, and absolutely love it.

Bridge has improved immensely over where it was a few iterations back.

IMO, you've seen bad reviews because at one point, it was truly, truly bad. Crashed constantly and had all the functionality of boxing gloves on a pianist.

Question about Scott Kelby's book. I know it'll be great for the nuts and bolts of lightroom. I.e, workflow, how to store it, tips and tricks about that.

But is it good for improving one's post processing? After messing with LR for a year, I still think my PP is a little lacking. I know, get the great exposure in camera first. And I try. But I also think good PP can elevate a good/great exposure.

I guess I am still part of the old school gang. Here's my workflow.
1) I download my images to the computer with a folder I create with the date and name of the event. Ex: E:\Sports\Basketball\1​2 Dec 10 SPX v Kinkaid
2) I got through the images quickly using Breeze Browser Pro to tag the non keepers.
3) After deleting the bad ones, I import them into LR3 with the Auto Tone set and my copyright info.
4) With a couple hundred sports pics in LR, I select the first one and apply settings that I want to apply globally to all of the images. That might include a custom crop, white balance, sharpness, noise reduction, etc.
5) I select all of the images and synchronize them.
6) Then I go through each one, adjust the crop, rotate the background as needed and make any other tweaks that are needed.
7) Delete the ones I tagged that weren't up to snuff and the export them to a subfolder.
Ex: MP SPX v Kinkaid Varsity (indicates MaxPreps Varsity category)

This has saved me a lot of time because I used to open every image in Elements 8.0. That was very tiresome.

Note: At the end of the season, I will remove the drive and replace it with a new one for the next season. All images are backed up to a raid drive.