What I like in new Lightroom 3.0 Beta
Adobe recently released for public new Beta version of Lightroom 3.0. Even if on the first sight it looks pretty much the same as the older 2.x version, there are quite a few new things that were improved.
First thing you will probably notice is the improved Import dialog, now it’s more intuitive and user friendly. You can toggle between two modes, with and without thumbnails. Also it is possible to easily apply selected Develop settings for all photos during Import.For Black & White photos Adobe also improved the handling a bit. You can find separate switch for Color and B&W photos in the Basic options dialog. Selecting desired color mode is then changing other options in other dialogs. I like also new feature that was added to Lightroom 3.0 - Film grain. With this tool you can simulate film grain on your B&W photos. It looks pretty good, you can even modify the size of film grain which is perfect. What I would like to have is the Film grain presets for most popular B&W film materials such as Ilford FP or Kodak Tri-X.
When exporting photos for web usually you would like to use some sort of watermarking. This option is now available in Lightroom 3.0 under Export dialog. The settings are just basic, you can use text or image and change the opacity. You can also save the watermark settings as a New preset and use it later when exporting your pictures. The complete list of new features from Adobe is available here:
- Brand new performance architecture, building for the future of growing image libraries
- State-of-the-art noise reduction to help you perfect your high ISO shots
- Watermarking tool that helps you customize and protect your images with ease
- Portable sharable slideshows with audio—designed to give you more flexibility and impact on how you choose to share your images, you can now save and export your slideshows as videos and include audio
- Flexible customizable print package creation so your print package layouts are all your own
- Film grain simulation tool for enhancing your images to look as gritty as you want
- New import handling designed to make importing streamlined and easy
- More flexible online publishing options
You can download the new Lightroom 3.0 Beta here.
