I’m looking at upgrading my main editing machine and thinking of going back to a Mac. I used a Mac from like 2002 to 2013 before switching over to Windows (I had my reasons).

My current windows laptop is showing its age, and when I buy a new laptop I’m considering going back to a MacBook, since I hear great things about the new silicon chipsets.

My main concerns is performance in Lightroom classic primarily with also the ability to do some light video editing in Davinci resolve (4k 30fps).

I know from research I want at least 16gb of RAM. But I was actually thinking of going all the way to 24gb.

I’m basically trying to decide between 16gb with a 1tb SSD or 24gb with a 512gb SSD. I’ll be editing off external SSD drives anyway.

Just trying to decide if I’ll even need the 24gb of RAM.

Does anyone running a MacBook m3 with 16gb sometimes find they could use a bit more? Or anyone running 24gb find they never need that much?

Hi all,

TL;DR: How to find the most recent LRCAT file among many?

There are archived posts in this sub with an answered question about an issue I face today, so here's a solution. This relates to Lightroom Classic.

Problem:

I have to open an old LRCAT catalog of mine, probably built with LR6 or LR7. I know my current LR12 will upgrade the catalog, but I'm not sure which catalog file to pick: i have countless file and backups and multiple supports, all ending with LRCAT and having a lastModified date from the Operating System, which could be when the file was last copied or transferred. All of them are years old, so I don't remember what I did in this catalog. So how do I know, out of all my LRCAT files, which is the most recent one? i.e. with the latest edits.

When importing an old catalog in a newer version of LR, LR will immediately convert it to the most recent LR version. The timestamps Created, Last Backup and Last Optimized, in the Catalog Settings, will all be set to the current time. Therefore, without reinstalling an older version of LR (which may be tricky if it's not running on the latest OS version), it's hard to know when was an old LRCAT file last edited.

Solution:

A LRCAT file is a sqlite database, which can be viewed with a SQL viewer. With Win11, there's a free app in the Microsoft Store called SQLite Viewer Web.

I opened all the LRCAT files that I suspected to be the most recent ones. See screenshot:

SQLite Viewer Web with LRCAT files

The Table "AgLibaryFile" contains a row for each image imported in the catalog. The Viewer app will show how many records there are. In my case, I had the same number of files in all candidate catalogs, so it was not enough to tell me which catalog was the most recent.

The next step is to head to the table "libraryImageDevelopHistoryStep", which lists all steps taken on an image, be it a Develop step or a Publish step.

In the screenshot, we can see that one file has 47433 records, with a dateCreated timestamp bigger than the biggest one of the other file. I then knew that it was my most recent file. Problem solved!

I hope it helps future queries.

As a side note, I don't know which format is Adobe using for dateCreated and dateModified, it's not an epoch time, if you know feel free to share, thanks.

I have been using my gaming laptop to edit my photos in Lightroom Classic (latest version), but I noticed it will often struggle and lag. Applying multiple masks seems to be especially challenging for my laptop to handle. My laptop specs:

• Ryzen 9 5900HS
• RTX 3070 8gb GPU
• 1tb ssd (I think it's pcie 3 nvme m2)
• 16gb of DDR4 RAM (I know this kind of sucks for editing, but one of the 8gb sticks is soldered into the board. So idk if it's worth it to upgrade the 2nd stick since it wouldn't be fully dual channel memory)

I also have an older desktop PC in storage, and I'm wondering if it would perform better. PC specs:

• Ryzen 5 3600x
• RTX 2060 Super, 8gb GPU
• various older Sata (non PCI/nvme) SSDs and HDDs
• 32GB of DDR4 RAM

Do you think my older desktop PC would perform any better since it has double the RAM and a similar GPU, despite having slower storage and CPU? Or are both my setups just too dated to run LRC smoothly?

Any other Lightroom performance tips would be appreciated!

I am wondering if any other Lightroom users have tried using the Linear Profile technique when editing their RAW photos in Lightroom?

I have been playing around with it for about a couple of years now and am really noticing the beneficial difference with using the specific profile for my Sony a9 versus using Adobe's default Profiles. There are plenty of videos on YouTube on how to make a Linear Profile that's specific to your camera.

In a sense (as I understand it), when you import a RAW photo in Lightroom, a default Profile designed by Adobe is layed-over the image that you are editing. This helps to keep the integrity of your original image and allows your editing to become "non-destructive". Other editing programs also use their own versions of a default profile, which is why some programs will display your RAW image as looking better or worse than others. In basic terms: what we have been seeing as our RAW images in Lightroom is NOT the camera's exact RAW image. We've been lied to y'all! :)

The Linear Profile essentially flattens the image to a more linear tonality across the image. On the plus side, it lets you recover highlights dramatically, and produces cleaner transitions between the highlights, shadows, and consequently, cleaner noise. On the down side, the image tends to have a lower exposure, and may require slightly more editing time and effort to adjust all of the settings to your liking. However, it seems like the editing sliders have a lot more range power when using the Linear Profile. Plus, you can always create new Presets based on the Linear Profile.

While some of you may not be happy with what you thought was your camera's out-of-camera dynamic range, it could be because of the "limited-range" Profiles that were set by Adobe.

What I have in my examples below are the differences between the a9-specific LP, Lightroom's default Profiles, and a couple of dynamic editing range examples. (btw, the screenshots are from LR v.10 when I first tested using a Linear Profile)

Would love to hear your thoughts!

Adobe Color vs. Liner Profile

Liner Profile vs. Adobe Standard

Liner Profile vs. Adobe Neutral

Liner Profile Auto vs. Adobe Color Auto

Liner Profile dynamic range vs. Adobe Color dynamic range @ 100% (bridge)

Liner Profile dynamic range vs. Adobe Color dynamic range @ 100%

Liner Profile dynamic range vs. Adobe Color dynamic range @ 200%

I've had lightroom for a while now and mostly used it for messing around but now I'm taking it more seriously. I want to make presets for my edits but I don't know how to so it. I check on google but could find the paths they said to take. I don't have premium as well incase that helps with anything.

Hi, not sure if anyone else has had this issue but on the Lightroom mobile app an edited image will look how it is intended within the app whether edited from Lightroom on my laptop or the phone, but when I export the image to be saved to my phone the image that gets saved does not look the same as what was in the app.

It is still an edited image so not the original file but it just does not look how it should based on the Lightroom image.

Is this a common issue and is there a fix at all?

Thanks for any help.

Hello, I am currently working on photos I took for a friend's music gig in Lightroom 13.2. When I import the photos they are fine but when I go to edit them, their contrast is boosted and I lose the detail I have. This is only happening to me now. They also change when I click embedded preview, which is a new option that I have not seen before. Is there any way I can prevent this?

https://preview.redd.it/zywuok8oj0sc1.png?width=702&format=png&auto=webp&s=2b00486b9670bbe0ff9d6966d5718290bcfde729

https://preview.redd.it/4ks57l8oj0sc1.png?width=702&format=png&auto=webp&s=d649cf72315678d2c20b6e30080621d247afb2ce

Hey, so my Lightroom is working extremely slow and constantly showing me the color wheel load. I went to preferences and performance and increased my cache setting to 50 GB. I also have the latest Lightroom so idk what to do. Could it be that I’m uploading my photos wrong? Please help

Hi All,

Just noticed with some new images need an AI mask every time I return to them, even when there has been no edit - the image attach shows I had to regenerate 4 times, with no edits between! I don't recall this ever being an issue. This is with Lrc 13.2.

Is there a new setting/or ways to minimise this recalc (esp, if no edits have been made)?

https://preview.redd.it/13313xppnyrc1.png?width=317&format=png&auto=webp&s=c87c85d47a01db70c13fa2e0a6af544d254a696b

https://preview.redd.it/4tnq9caqnyrc1.png?width=386&format=png&auto=webp&s=4f707c08b6401678a23eb2ae40679b9ef51dfc79

I just bought a brand new laptop. It's a Macbook Pro with the M3 chip and 36 GB ram. Every 3-4 photos in Lightroom, everything freezes. I get the rainbow wheel. Can't switch to other apps. I feel like I've spent at least 50% of the last 9 years being annoyed by this program and I really thought the extra RAM would help but it's just not?

​

ETA: Lightroom Classic - most up to date version.

Every time I import photos in Lightroom I manually go through each photo and apply lens correction and auto transform. Is there any easy way to do that in Lightroom classic?

Heya all.

I know that in theory a photo catalog/LR database can be used on both windows on mac.

I‘ll be traveling with a macbook and intent to work only on the images I‘ll take while traveling. After that, I‘d like to continue working on these images on my windows Pc.

What‘s the best approach for this? Can I somehow ‚export‘ all modifications and then continue to work on PC with my main database? Or should I move my main LR database to the Mac before the planned journey and then move it back once I’m back home?

Any info would be appreciated.

I have a list that contains the names of some files that I want to select. But they are mixed with other files that I don't want to select. How can I select them without doing it one by one? There's a way to just paste that list into an automation, a search bar or a filter and select only the files that I want all at once?

When using Lightroom on either iPhone or iPad, i can see my device camera roll and edit the pictures directly there, but the original image in my camera roll remains unchanged unless I save a copy to the device. This then creates a duplicate in my camera roll. Why can’t Lightroom save back to the original file in the camera roll like many other iOS photo editors? Or am I missing a setting?

Hi all,

​

Trying to understand how Lightroom CC uses folder space. I have a folder on my 1tb drive called "Lightroom CC" and as far as I can tell it just contains duplicates of the files I load into Lightroom CC. In fact, the subfolders in this folder are called "originals" and organized by year. Is it safe to just delete this or do I need to keep it around to access the edits I applied to these photos? It's eating up about 350gb right now...

​

Thanks!

So i was just wondering about this. In your experience, do they share the same noise reduction system or do you prefer one over the other?

I’m not talking about UI in general, I am simply asking about the noise reduction function in both programs and which one you believe is best at reducing noise without degrading too much the picture.

Thank you all!

Just started using LR after switching from Darktable. DT ran extremely smooth on my pc, but LR seems to have a lot of issues espeically after I start masking. But usually the overall experience is really laggy and slow in all aspects. Would upgrading RAM alone make it smooth? While using it I've only seen my RAM usage peak to about 13 gb, but I do know that programs will use less when less is available.

Here are my PC specs:

- Ryzen 7 5800X3D

- Asus GTX 1080Ti

- 16 gb DDR4 RAM

- Vulcan Z Sata III 6 gb/s SSD

I'm not saying I have the best PC out there but I definetly thought just using LR alone would be a very smooth experience. Do I need to double my ram to 32 gigs?

​

What do these icons mean? I am new to the program uso el LRC 12.4

https://preview.redd.it/r19na2zsxsrc1.jpg?width=1175&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a2ae0311aa94b28ca44b6675010f1a59a592e540

I want to edit in HDR so bad, but when sharing with friends and family their iPhones and the like wont take AVIF or JPEG XL. (or send in this washed out quality) Other file formats like PNG or TIFF are way too large to send.

This has left me editing in SDR, leaving so much on the table, and only editing in HDR when it's for print exc. When I edit something that looks great in HDR, exporting as a JPEG looks over sharp/contrast. And clicking the HDR box on export JPEG does nothing as far as I can tell (and yes I am using a HDR display)

Does anyone have a workable HDR file format they use? Does adobe plan on supporting other file formats that allow HDR like HEIC or HEIF?

I'm processing about 100 headshots taken in one setting, and would like to run a Soften Skin mask across all skin in all photos.

Currently, I'm having to select "detect people" on each photo, wait for it to process, then selecting Face & Body Skin on each photo, wait for it to process, then selecting Soften Skin.

Surely, there must be a way to automate this, or bulk process it? What am I missing here?

v12.5

This appears to be just a lighroom issue. I thought I’d was better in ios15 or 16. Interesting my iPhone 15 pro imports faster than my m1 iPad Pro.

The iPad has thunderbolt, but most cameras and drives are not thunderbolt but just usb c. I’m guessing the newer iPhone has a faster usb c spec than the iPad m1 when thunderbolt doesn’t come into play.

Or is there a way to fix this?

WHY is there no face refinement tool? LOL this is one of the biggest software for photography but no sliders like enhace eyes or remove racoon eyes? is this a joke? every other new software has it

Hi everyone. I'm testing Lightroom (CC and Classic) in my Adobe plan free week, considering getting the photography plan. I've used CC in the previous days, and today decided to move to Classic after watching a bunch of YouTube videos.
I think I've just found a bug in the color mixer tool used while HDR is on.

Basically, when HDR is on, the target picker of the color mixer doesn't recognise the correct color, while disabling HDR and picking in the same exact spot, the picked color is correct.

You can see this in the attached screenshots.
Has anyone of you experienced the same?

By the way, speaking of HDR, do you suggest using this function? I have a MacBook Pro with an XDR display, so HDR is available on the display, but I am no yet sure if it is better to edit in non HDR to get a perfect result for any screen.

Thank you!

​

ODR off - correct color picked (blue) in the red circle spot

​

ODR on - wrong color picked (magenta) in the red circle spot

Hi all,

​

I know this has come up before, but I couldn't find an answer to this particular question... For some reason my photos have just started to look different in Develop vs Library modules, it's only just started happening, and when I look at a photo in library view, the colours are muted/washed out. In Develop they look as they should.

​

I tried disabling GPU acceleration, and that made the photos look the same in both modules, but both look washed out instead of with the correct colours.

​

Any advice would be much appreciated!

I'm newer to lightroom, so I apologize for any misunderstandings. I'm currently using Lightroom Classic on my PC, the way I work it is I Sync to the folder, and then when I edit i go through and delete any pics I don't like from the drive. That way it clears up space while also letting me sort the pics i do and don't like

I'm in the process of getting a laptop because I'll be on the road, think 2 weeks at home, 2 weeks away, etc. I'm looking for a way to edit photos from a session on both devices, being able to transfer them back and forth while also being able to delete the pics from a drive as needed. This is because I usually take around 1800-3000 pics per session, and will end up with 200 or so I like (and then filter further after that). I have a 2tb portable SSD that I can use. How can I go about transferring the catalogue between both devices while also being able to sort through the photos and delete the ones I don't like? I'm not fully sure how smart previews work for what it's worth, i keep looking it up and get confused.

I'm having an issue where i'm editing in HDR mode on LR mobile or Lightroom Classic and it looks incredible but when I try to upload it to Threads or Instagram it looks terrible. it even looks terrible just in my iphone 15 pro max photo library. what am I doing wrong? thank you in advance.

Recently imported bunch of (sony) raw files but when I went back later on to edit, LrC says 'file not found'. But I can't re-import from the card - LrC says files already imported. Seems like something strange going on w/ the jpeg preview files - is there a way for me to prompt LrC to "finish" its import and/or preview creation without viewing each file in loupe one at a time?

hello I seem to have a freezing problem with lightroom.

each time i try to click something the program freezes up.

my drivers are updated and i should have good enough hardware (pc: cpu: ryzen7 4800H GPU: Nvidea Getforce 1660ti and 16gb of ram)

lightroom 7.2

Recently broke my phone so had to get a temporary one (iPhone 7) I can’t download lightroom from AppStore as it requires iOS 16 which the iPhone 7 can’t upgrade to, does anyone know anyway I can download a previous version or something where iOS 16 is not needed, I use my phone for all my editing so it’s really important for me to use lightroom.

Any information and help is greatly appreciated

I have 1TB of cloud storage in lightroom. I've used around 40GB of that so far. I thought lightroom would use the data directly from the cloud, but apparently, my lightroom needs equal phone storage too. My phone sais my lightroom mobile uses 40GB on my internal phone storage. Is that how it's supposed to work?