PhotoLine and Lightroom

[OldRadioGuy]

Even though there are other alternatives, a significant number of photographers using digital cameras have adopted Adobe Lightroom for non-destructive editing of raw files and digital asset management. Of course, Photoshop is the default editor if you have it, but other external editors can be assigned.

In my opinion, this is good news for PhotoLine because PL works seamlessly as an external editor for Lr. After assignment, just select an image and Lightroom sends it to PhotoLine as a TIF. Do your work with layers, blending, plugins, etc. in PL, then save, and the edited image returns to Lightroom.

Most of the PL tools and the modern 8bf plugins run in PhotoLine are fast and efficient. In addition, PL is about 500+ USD cheaper than purchasing the bloated PS for external Lightroom photo editing.

There are at least a couple of negatives to using PhotoLine for this purpose, however.

First, the layers in PhotoLine must be flattened before returning to Lightroom. It would be good if PL coding would allow processing of PSD files from Lightroom and then return them with layers intact. Probably not practical though.

Second, PhotoLine is not a good option for masking/selection tasks because it has fallen behind in this area, and the "smart brush" concept now used in several other applications, including plugins, is faster and more accurate than PhotoLine's approach.

But as long as you have an alternative editor or plugin to run in PL for complex masking, PhotoLine remains an excellent choice as Lightroom's external editor.

Bob

[greenmorpher]

But as long as you have an alternative editor or plugin to run in PL for complex masking, PhotoLine remains an excellent choice as Lightroom's external editor.

Bob

Suggestions?

Cheers, geoff

[OldRadioGuy]

But as long as you have an alternative editor or plugin to run in PL for complex masking, PhotoLine remains an excellent choice as Lightroom's external editor.

Bob

Suggestions?

Geoff, I use both Topaz Labs ReMask and onOne Software's Perfect MASK.

ReMask works great in PhotoLine as a plugin, and you can call PL from Lightroom and then run ReMask through PhotoLine. To run ReMask directly from Lr, you'll need to download Topaz Fusion Express (free) which serves as the host for ReMask. If you have multiple Topaz plugins, a better option is to add Topaz photoFXlab for the host function, allowing you to apply multiple plugins if needed before returning to Lightroom. photoFXlab works the same way in PhotoLine, too. All of these processes in Lr produce a new TIF file in the Lightroom library. An advantage of the Topaz plugins is once you buy the plugin, all updates -- simple revisions and future versions -- are free.

Perfect MASK, unfortunately, is "Adobe-centric" and does not work with PhotoLine. But it is very good. The files produced when Perfect MASK is called from Lr are PSD format. I hope that someday PhotoLine will be able to run the more advanced plugins like Perfect MASK.

Bob

[SCX]

I have tested Lightroom some weeks ago and didn't buy it. Mainly because for LR the PLD-files just doesn't exist. But I don't like the hole management of the files as well. I don't want TIFs, I want JPGs or PLDs. TIF is just an intermediate format for me, which will be deleted after opening the file in the destination program. So I use the TIF in PhotoLine, work on it, save it and LR doesn't know the resulting file. JPGs have to be imported, with PLDs not even that worked in my test.

[greenmorpher]

But as long as you have an alternative editor or plugin to run in PL for complex masking, PhotoLine remains an excellent choice as Lightroom's external editor.

Bob

Suggestions?

Geoff, I use both Topaz Labs ReMask and onOne Software's Perfect MASK.

ReMask works great in PhotoLine as a plugin, and you can call PL from Lightroom and then run ReMask through PhotoLine. To run ReMask directly from Lr, you'll need to download Topaz Fusion Express (free) which serves as the host for ReMask. If you have multiple Topaz plugins, a better option is to add Topaz photoFXlab for the host function, allowing you to apply multiple plugins if needed before returning to Lightroom. photoFXlab works the same way in PhotoLine, too. All of these processes in Lr produce a new TIF file in the Lightroom library. An advantage of the Topaz plugins is once you buy the plugin, all updates -- simple revisions and future versions -- are free.

Bob

I use Topaz Adjust in PL and get great results. I'll look at ReMask too, given your recommendation. At one point, I had ReMask on for a trial but eventually didn’t do anything with it and dumped it.

Cheers, geoff

[OldRadioGuy]

I have tested Lightroom some weeks ago and didn't buy it. Mainly because for LR the PLD-files just doesn't exist. But I don't like the hole management of the files as well. I don't want TIFs, I want JPGs or PLDs. TIF is just an intermediate format for me, which will be deleted after opening the file in the destination program. So I use the TIF in PhotoLine, work on it, save it and LR doesn't know the resulting file. JPGs have to be imported, with PLDs not even that worked in my test.

SCX, I wrestled with the need to index my images and the lack of PLD recognition in those DAM programs for a long time.

Until its latest version, ACDSee Pro would read PLD thumbnails, send the files to PhotoLine, allow assignment of keywords within its own database, but it would not assign EXIF information. ACDSee was never really satisfactory, but the failure to recognize PLD thumbnails was a deal-breaker for me.

Shooting with a digital camera (resulting in more pictures) has increased the importance of image file management. I didn't like Lr until after I took the online course, learning how to better utilize its potential. The key is using presets, automating export to JPGs, etc. It is very fast. With keywords and collections, you can find raw files, JPGs, TIFs and PSDs very quickly.

Before going back to Lightroom from PhotoLine, I can save a PLD version of the file to the same directory as the other images. Then, if I need to use that PLD file later, I can retrieve it via Windows Explorer. I use a folder naming system of date-location-subject to make files not in the Lr catalog easier to find. It's a messy system, but until opposing software publishers recognize some customers want better integration of proprietary formats, that's all we have.

I'm always open to a better suggestion.

Bob

[SCX]

I use ACDSee Pro. It can't open the PLD-files or even show the preview of the image, which would be quite easy as I understand, if you only put a little bit of effort into it, but I save JPGs like you. In ACDsee I see the PLD nearby the JPG and open it in PhotoLine, in Lightroom I have to guess, if there is a PLD, than I have to search in the Windows-Explorer.