Is Lightroom 3 better than Lightroom 4?

[Muse]

I haven't used either but seen a lot of people here referring to Lightroom as a premier photo organizing tool. In the Black Friday threads I saw mention of the fact that Lightroom 4 is on sale right now at Amazon and Newegg for $79.99. I just read a customer review at Amazon by a person who says that they are unhappy with LR 4 because it's way slower for them than LR 3. They said it was 10x as big, evidently bloated. All kinds of LR functions are going much slower.

So, I'm wondering if I should get LR 3 rather than LR 4, or get either, actually. Currently I'm using Picasa or the image processing accessories that came with my ~8 year old Samsung Digimax V3. At least they let me see my shots full screen, go to the next or previous using the arrow keys, and edit a shot by pressing a button, which sends me to editing software. I know, there has to be better stuff. I haven't seen that level of convenience in Picasa. It may be there, but I have found Picasa not too intuitive.

 

[Anteaus]

Lightroom 4 is great. It is true that LR4 can be a little slow when handling more recent raw files, but it's nothing to make a big deal about. I'm not sure what people expect. Raw files are only getting bigger as camera sensors become more advanced. I only shoot raw with my S95 and D7000 and use LR4 exclusively. The 10MP raw files the S95 makes load noticeably faster than my 16MP D7000 raw and JPG edits are super fast so I think you're overall performance will hinge primarily on whether you are editing JPG/TIFF or RAW and how many MP your dealing with.

I recommend you get LR4 for these reasons:

1. It is on version 4.3 now and there have been big improvements since release.

2. It is cheaper than LR3 yet contains more functionality.

3. LR3 is no longer getting camera updates. If you end up buying new gear, LR3 may not be able to natively use the raw files. Sure you can likely convert them to DNG externally, but you lose meta data in the process. Image quality stays the same so that's a individual call.

I guess in the end you need to ask yourself whether new features are worth potential bloat. I recommend you download the 30-day trial and give it a go.

 

[JohnnyRebel]

Anteaus, have you noticed any issues in importing videos from the S95 with LR4?

 

[Kanalua]

Anteaus, have you noticed any issues in importing videos from the S95 with LR4?

I haven't noticed any issues importing video with my S95. How are you importing? Through Camera (Camera hooked up to USB_, or through SD card in reader? I have no idea if that would make a difference.

 

[Anteaus]

Anteaus, have you noticed any issues in importing videos from the S95 with LR4?

I haven't had any problems. I've processed around 1000 S95 images give or take.

 

[Muse]

Ah, I missed out on the BF special for LR 4 for Windows and Mac. It was $79.99 at Amazon and Newegg, now $99.99 at Amazon, $135.99 at Newegg.

Um, maybe they'll renew it for Cyber Monday?

 

[Throckmorton]

You really need a powerful processor. My 2.1ghz Core 2 Duo isn't enough for editing raw

 

[TrueBlueLS]

So my B970 would choke on RAW files from a Rebel XT?

 

[Muse]

You really need a powerful processor. My 2.1ghz Core 2 Duo isn't enough for editing raw

Maybe my desktop's up to it?

Specs:

Gigabyte GA-K8n Pro motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 3200+ (socket 754, FSB1600, E6, Venice, 90nm, L2-512KB)
BFG Tech GeForce 6600GT OC 128MB DDR3 AGP Dual DVI Video Card w/TV-Out
2 sticks Crucial 1GB PC3200 400MHz 184-pin DDR Memory - CT12864Z40B, 2 GB total
Corsair vx550w PSU

Actually that processor is only 2.0 GHz

Or my Lenovo T61:

Lenovo ThinkPad T61
Intel Core 2 Duo @2.40GHz, T7700
4GB RAM


I haven't tried editing RAW images yet, but my DSLR does them.

 

[randomrogue]

You're going to want lots of ram. Photo and video processing requires a lot. I would upgrade to 8GB.

Your 9+ year old CPU though is not going to do you any favors. I think you're going to want to upgrade pretty soon if you're going to really get into post processing.

 

[randomrogue]

I like LR4 better. I can take an old image and process it in fewer steps than I would have had to with LR3. It took me a bit to get used to the sliders but you won't have that problem.

Your computer is the real problem here and I'd look up what the recommended requirements are. Don't look at minimum. Trust me you don't want to run LR on a slow computer. I've run it on my netbook and it's not fun.

 

[JohnnyRebel]

I haven't noticed any issues importing video with my S95. How are you importing? Through Camera (Camera hooked up to USB_, or through SD card in reader? I have no idea if that would make a difference.

The camera hooked up directly via USB cable. The videos did not show on the import pictures screen. It works fine in LR 3.6. Seems like it was LR 4.2, I'll reinstall and update and see if it works now.

JR

 

[CptObvious]

LR4 is much better than LR3, for three big reasons (for me):

-The highlight/shadow recovery is much improved
-CA removal tool (I have a Canon 85 1.8 that is notorious for CA)
-Soft proof function