Ask Tim Grey

Today’s Question: Is there a way to see the Folders list while working in the Develop module [in Lightroom Classic]? Sometimes I need to work on various photos from different folders for a project, and I find it frustrating to have to switch modules back and forth between images.

Tim’s Quick Answer: There isn’t an option to view the Folders list while working in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic. However, you can work around this limitation by using a collection for this purpose.

More Detail: While the modules in Lightroom Classic can be helpful in terms of providing context for specific components of your overall workflow for organizing, optimizing, and sharing photos, there are situations where the division of modules can get in the way of your workflow. One of the most common of these scenarios relates to needing to switch to the Library module to select a different source folder for images you want to work on in the Develop module.

Personally, I would love it if Adobe would add a Folders section to the left panel in the Develop module or otherwise made it easier to switch among different tasks when you also need to switch among different images. But at least so far, they haven’t done so.

Fortunately, one way you can work around this limitation is to use a collection.

Since there is a Collections section on the left panel in the Develop module, if the images you want to work on are grouped into a collection you can easily switch among various images or groups of images. This makes it easier to work with a set of images that are stored in multiple different folders without having to switch to the Library module.

So, when you have a group of images for a project that are stored in different folders, simply add them to a collection before switching to the Develop module. If you have more than one project you’re working on, you can even switch among various collections for the different projects without leaving the Develop module.

Today’s Question: You’ve referred to Camera Raw being non-destructive in terms of editing photos. Am I correct in understanding, however, that if you use Camera Raw as a filter in Photoshop that it is destructive to pixels? Is there a way to make it non-destructive in this context as well?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can use the Camera Raw filter in Photoshop in a non-destructive way by first converting the applicable image layer to a Smart Object. This, in turn, will cause the Camera Raw filter to be applied as a Smart Filter, which provides non-destructive editing.

More Detail: When we say that Camera Raw (or Lightroom Classic) is non-destructive, what that means is that the source file is not altered by the adjustments. For example, when you process a raw capture with Camera Raw you aren’t altering the source raw capture file. Instead, once you open the image Camera Raw is rendering pixels for a new image and opening that in Photoshop, leaving the original raw capture unaltered.

The Camera Raw filter, however, is destructive by default. What that means is that when you apply the Camera Raw filter (Filter > Camera Raw Filter from the menu) to an image layer, you are changing the pixel values for that layer based on the adjustments you applied.

However, it is possible to use the Camera Raw filter non-destructively. To do so, select the image layer you want to adjust, and then choose Filter > Convert for Smart Filters from the menu. This will convert the image layer to a Smart Object. When you then apply a filter such as the Camera Raw filter, the filter will be applied as a Smart Filter. This means the filter settings are not applied directly to pixel values in an image layer, but rather as metadata updates to an embedded image.

This enables you, for example, to return to the Smart Filter controls for a Smart Object layer by double-clicking the applicable Smart Filter on the Layers panel. In the case of the Camera Raw filter this would bring up the Camera Raw dialog, where you could adjust or reset or add any adjustments you’d like. This enables you to apply a wide range of adjustments using Camera Raw within Photoshop, but with the flexibility of being able to reset or otherwise change the adjustments at any time without any negative impact on image quality.

The only thing to keep in mind is that with this workflow it is possible to get a mismatch in areas of the image if you also use pixel-based layers. For example, let’s assume you applied Camera Raw as a Smart Filter to convert an image to black and white. You then use a separate image layer to perform some image cleanup work. If you later decide to go back to the Camera Raw filter and change the image back to color, the image cleanup work would still be in black and white because that work was done on a separate image layer.

As long as you don’t make use of other image layers that could conflict with a Smart Filter layer, however, you can apply the Camera Raw filter (or other filters) as a Smart Filter to maintain greater flexibility in your workflow.

Today’s Question: Is there a way to make the color labels in the grid view in Lightroom Classic easier to see? They’re a bit faint on my screen.

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can increase the opacity of the tint for color labels in the grid view in Lightroom Classic in the Library View Options dialog.

More Detail: By default, in the grid view in Lightroom Classic the cell (or frame) around the image thumbnails will be tinted with the assigned color label, at an opacity of 20%. You can increase the opacity to make the color labels easier to see, which is what I do, for example, when teaching Lightroom Classic so students are able to better recognize when color labels have been assigned.

To get started go to the Library module and choose View > View Options from the menu. If you weren’t already in the grid view display choose the Grid View tab at the top-center of the dialog.

In the Options section under the Show Grid Extras checkbox you’ll find a “Tint grid cells with label colors” checkbox. You can turn this checkbox off if you don’t want the cells to be colored to reflect an assigned color label, but I prefer to keep this option enabled. Then, with the checkbox turned on you can click the popup to the right and choose the desired opacity setting.

The maximum setting is 50%, which is what I usually use when teaching to ensure the color label assignment is clear. But you can set a value ranging from a minimum of 10% opacity to 50% opacity based on your personal preference.

Today’s Question: What’s your take on the new Feather and Edge sliders in Lightroom Classic in terms of how helpful they are and how they should be used?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I consider the new Feather and Edge sliders to represent one of the most important updates to Lightroom Classic (and Camera Raw) in the context of the Masking adjustments. While they aren’t needed for all masks, they can be incredibly helpful in improving the quality of many masks.

More Detail: The Feather and Edge sliders for refining masks for targeted adjustments are features that have been at the top of my wish list since the Masking adjustments were first added to the Develop module in Lightroom Classic. These two sliders provide relatively simple and yet very helpful options for refining the shape of the edge of masks used for targeted adjustments.

There has long been a Feather control for refining masks in Photoshop, along with a Shift Edge control that is effectively the same as the new Edge slider in Lightroom Classic. The Feather control enables you to blur the mask edge, helping to smooth out the transition between areas being affected by the adjustment versus not being affected.

The Edge slider enables you to shift the mask edge outward (with a positive value) or inward (with a negative value) relative to the area that was originally selected for the mask. For example, if you have a Sky mask then increasing the value for the Edge slider will expand the adjustment into the landscape beyond the sky, while decreasing the value will pull the adjustment away from the landscape.

While the effect of the Feather and Edge sliders is relatively simple, their impact can be significant. Together they enable you to fine-tune the overall shape of the mask edge, so it better aligns with the transition within the image from the area you want to adjust versus not adjust with the targeted adjustment.

In general, I recommend applying an exaggerated adjustment when you want to refine the Feather and Edge controls, so you can better evaluate when you have the transition size (Feather) and position (Edge) for the mask edge fine-tuned to best match the area you’re adjusting. You can then reduce the strength of the adjustment based on the intended impact on the image.

Today’s Question: If you had to guess, when do you think Photoshop will be discontinued, at least for photographers?

Tim’s Quick Answer: If I had to guess, I would say February 19, 2030, could be the date that Photoshop is discontinued. But that is really just a tongue-in-cheeck guess, and my real answer is quite a bit more nuanced than that.

More Detail: First, let me be clear that I don’t have any information about when Photoshop might be discontinued, and obviously the software could be around for many more years to come. My “guess” of February 19, 2030, simply reflects an upcoming milestone, representing 40 years since the original release of Photoshop 1.0 in 1990.

To me the real question is when Photoshop will no longer be a meaningful part of a workflow for photographers, and for many photographers that date has already passed.

Consider, for example, how much can be done with Adobe Camera Raw, and by extension Lightroom Classic. For a great many photographers, there’s no need to use Photoshop at all for most of their images, because so much can be done with Camera Raw or Lightroom. Keep in mind that for the most part Camera Raw and Lightroom maintain feature parity, so regardless of which you’re using you will have access to (nearly) all the same features.

When Lightroom was first released, very few (if any) photographers would have considered it a replacement for Photoshop. Over time, as the software improved, more and more photographers found that they were using Photoshop less and less. Some photographers, of course, have gotten to the point that they don’t need Photoshop at all (other than the fact that Camera Raw is effectively tied to Photoshop).

As Camera Raw and Lightroom continue to improve, this trend will continue. Added to this is that for many creative effects you can get better results processing your image with AI tools rather than using the filters and other adjustments in Photoshop. I suspect at some point in the future, Adobe will recognize that they have improved Camera Raw so much, and that so few photographers are using Photoshop for much of anything, that they can unbundle Camera Raw from Photoshop and therefore they can stop developing new features for Photoshop.

But again, all of this is just based on my own thinking and opinion and is not informed in any way by any information I have about the future of Photoshop. And considering how much Camera Raw and Lightroom have been improved by Adobe over the years, I think it is only natural that there will be a shift at some point in the (perhaps near) future in the overall landscape of the tools from Adobe that photographers use.

Ultimately what this all means is that Adobe has done, in my opinion, a great job improving the editing capabilities of Camera Raw and the Lightroom ecosystem.

Today’s Question: I’ve procrastinated for years on getting some kind of off-site backup storage, and now recent events have motivated me. What’s your recommendations for cloud storage services? I’m probably looking for at least 7TB of storage.

Tim’s Quick Answer: I recommend Backblaze as an excellent cloud-based backup solution. Specifically, I recommend the “Personal” version of their Computer Backup product, which provides unlimited online backup for around $100 per year.

More Detail: A cloud-based backup solution provides an easy way to have an “extra” copy of your photos and other important data at an offsite location. I recommend this in addition to maintaining at least one (but ideally two or more) backup copies locally.

I have been using Backblaze for years and have assisted many photographers in getting this cloud-based backup service in place as well as assisting them in recovering photos after a drive failure or other issue resulting in lost data. Files can be recovered individually or in bulk, with various options for recovery such as downloading from the website or having a hard drive shipped to you.

I recommend the Computer Backup Personal product, which sells for around $99 per year (though prices will vary by region and currency). I also highly recommend upgrading to their one-year Version History option, which means you only need to connect hard drives to your computer once per year to maintain all online backups for each drive.

This backup service provides unlimited data, so while it may take some time to upload all your existing data to the Backblaze servers, there’s no limit to how many hard drives you can back up with a Backblaze subscription. You only need an individual subscription per computer, but otherwise the backup service supports unlimited data.

You can learn more about the Computer Backup Personal product from Backblaze on their website here:

https://www.backblaze.com/cloud-backup/personal

Today’s Question: I saw a reference to automatic dust removal in Camera Raw, but I don’t see that in Lightroom Classic. Is it available, and if so do you recommend using it?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, the automatic dust removal feature is available in Lightroom Classic and can be found by going to the Remove tool and going to the Dust heading after expanding the “Distraction Removal” heading. I do recommend enabling this feature if there are visible dust spots in a photo.

More Detail: While the Distraction Removal features were added to Camera Raw before they were available in Lightroom Classic, those features have since been added to Lightroom Classic as of version 15.

To get to the dust removal feature, first select the Remove tool from the small toolbar below the histogram on the right panel in the Develop module. Next, expand the Distraction Removal section if it isn’t already, by clicking on the heading on the right panel. You can expand the Dust controls by clicking on the heading within the Distraction Removal section. There you can turn on the Apply checkbox to enable the automatic dust removal.

If you want to first get a sense of where the dust spots are found in the image, you can turn on the Visualize Spots checkbox and drag the associated slider through the full range to vary the contrast. This will enable you to see dust spots that are visible to varying degrees based on the slider movement.

My experience has been that this automatic dust removal feature has been very helpful at removing spots caused by dust and other debris on the image sensor in the camera. Note that it won’t automatically find other things you might consider to be blemishes, such as power lines running through the image or a small bird that creates a distraction within the frame.

Today’s Question: When I click the HDR option in the Basic section for Develop in Lightroom Classic, why does it always overexpose the whites?

Tim’s Quick Answer: The issue you’re describing is a matter of how the image is being presented, and your experience suggests you are not using an HDR display to view and edit the image.

More Detail: The HDR button in the Basic section of the right panel in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic enables you to switch to HDR editing mode. As the name implies, this mode is for HDR image, but is also best employed when you have an HDR-capable display.

When you click the HDR button the image will be displayed in HDR mode, which among other things includes a histogram with sections for SDR (standard dynamic range) and HDR (high dynamic range). If you’re seeing blown highlights in the image as soon as you switch to HDR mode that generally suggests that there is some image data that extends beyond the SDR tonal range and that your monitor does not support HDR.

Only a limited number of monitor displays support HDR, and printers do not support HDR. Therefore, there are limited options for sharing HDR images with others unless they have been tone-mapped to SDR (standard dynamic range).

The HDR editing mode enables you to exercise greater flexibility and control over true HDR images, but is mostly only useful if you have an HDR-capable display. Even then, you most likely want the final image to be shared as SDR so it can be printed or properly viewed on monitors that do not support HDR.

You’ll notice, for example, that the histogram showing both SDR and HDR ranges shows data in the HDR section, which can’t be viewed on a non-HDR display. You would therefore want to either not work in HDR mode at all, or work in HDR mode but optimize the image so the tonal values do not extend into the HDR range based on the histogram.

Ultimately, I consider the HDR editing mode to be a bit of a niche feature that is mostly applicable only to photographers who are passionate about creating HDR images and also have an HDR-capable display for viewing the image data.

You can learn more about the HDR editing mode on the Adobe website here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom-classic/desktop/process-and-develop-photos/hdr-output.html

Today’s Question: Can you explain the difference between the process of capturing bracketed exposures and merging them in Lightroom Classic to an HDR image and simply taking a single image and choosing the HDR option in the Develop module?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Processing bracketed exposures to create an HDR image results in an image that is capable of containing a much wider range of tonal values than would be possible with a single photographic exposure. The HDR mode in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic merely provides an option to leverage an HDR-capable display when editing an HDR image.

More Detail: The whole point of HDR imaging is to enable a single image to contain greater detail than would be possible with a single exposure. Achieving this result requires creating an HDR image from multiple bracketed exposures. The HDR feature in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic is only focused on enabling you to leverage an HDR display while editing and won’t magically create an HDR image from a single exposure.

A somewhat extreme example of the benefit of creating an HDR image from bracketed exposure would be a situation where you’re including the sun in the frame. With a single exposure it would be impossible to retain any level of detail in the sun while also retaining detail in dark shadow areas.

By capturing a series of bracketed exposures and then merging those images into a high dynamic range (HDR) image, you can effectively compress a tremendous range of tonal values into a single image.

The HDR editing option found in the Basic section of the right panel in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic doesn’t create an HDR image, but rather enables you to leverage an HDR display with an HDR editing mode. With this workflow you can better optimize an image based on the full capabilities of both the HDR image and Lightroom Classic in the context of an HDR-capable display. You can then further refine the adjustments for the image for standard dynamic range (SDR) output, such as for normal online sharing or printing.

The key thing to keep in mind is that the HDR option in the Develop module is an editing mode, not an option that will create a true HDR image. The latter requires that you merge multiple exposures, such as by using the Photo Merge > HDR command in Lightroom Classic.

Today’s Question: I was intrigued by your comment [regarding Lightroom Classic] that you could “update the virtual copy to represent the original, demoting the original to a virtual copy”. How would you go about doing that, and are there any pitfalls to doing so?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can update a virtual copy to represent the original image by selecting that virtual copy and choosing Photo > Set Copy as Original from the menu while in the Library module in Lightroom Classic. There aren’t any pitfalls, as long as you don’t discard an image that contains important metadata.

More Detail: Today’s question is a follow-up to my answer from the July 28th Ask Tim Grey eNewsletter, where I addressed a question about discarding unexpected (and potentially unwanted) virtual copies. As noted in that post, a virtual copy represents an additional set of metadata for a single original image. For example, the original image could be optimized in color, and the virtual copy could be optimized as a black and white image.

In general, it doesn’t really matter which version of an image is the original versus a virtual copy, unless you have a particular preference. For example, it doesn’t really make a difference if the original image is edited as a black and white rather than color, and the virtual copy is in color rather than black and white, and vice versa.

One scenario where it would matter which set of metadata was associated with the original versus the virtual copy, however, was if you wanted to discard the virtual copy. Let’s assume the original is in color and the virtual copy is in black and white, but you only want to retain the black and white version of the image. Discarding the original image would involve discarding the original capture, which in turn would cause virtual copies to be discarded. On the other hand, discarding a virtual copy will not impact the original image.

In the example above, to preserve the virtual copy metadata while discarding the metadata currently associated with the original image you could effectively swap metadata between the original and the virtual copy.

So, you could select the virtual copy in the above scenario, make sure you’re in the Library module, and then choose Photo > Set Copy as Original from the menu. This will swap the original and the virtual copy, so that in this case the original would be in black and white and the virtual copy would be in color. You could then discard the virtual copy if you wanted to, retaining the black and white version (and all other applicable metadata) with the original image.

In the absence of wanting to discard a virtual copy for an image, there’s no real need to convert a virtual copy to the original, as you could simply retain all applicable versions of the same image.