Lightroom creative cloud iPad edits

[thekillergazebo]

So I wanted to ask if we have any photographers who edit a lot on an iPad or tablet, and if so do you use Lightroom mobile. It seems like adobe is letting people with the CC edition edit right from their catalog and use their presets they created. 

 

I wanted to see if people like editing like this an have found any benifits from this work flow. Pro or cons?

[AkiraDaarkst]

1 hour ago, thekillergazebo said:

So I wanted to ask if we have any photographers who edit a lot on an iPad or tablet, and if so do you use Lightroom mobile. It seems like adobe is letting people with the CC edition edit right from their catalog and use their presets they created. 

 

I wanted to see if people like editing like this an have found any benifits from this work flow. Pro or cons?

Well it doesn't compare to using a proper keyboard, mouse and stylus/graphics tablet.  But if you wanted to do some quick editing it serves it's purpose.

 

How you integrate it into your workflow is up to you, and if you're already paying for a CC subscription (even if it's just for Lightroom) the service is free.  I use the iPad as a mobile portfolio, showing examples of my works to clients or quickly taking it to present work for the times I don't want to unplug my MacBook or obviously my desktop workstation is not a mobile machine.  So instead of using a separate app where I have to upload and sync photos, I just do a selection in LR and it syncs to the LR mobile app.

 

The main drawback I see is if I wanted to start out with LR mobile after taking photos with the camera, I don't carry memory card adapters that can connect to the iPad and I don't think there are adapters for XQD memory cards.  And I usually always have my MacBook Pro with me.  So 100% of the time the memory card gets offloaded into LR non-mobile.

 

Second issue (at least for me) is of course the wireless connectivity.  While I do have an unlimited mobile data subscription, that's for my phone.  For my iPad I have a pay-as-you-go/prepaid type of subscription and I don't want to use up the charged credits quickly.  Hence the iPad is on wi-fi only for 95% of the time and rarely on 3/4G data.  So this limits the mobility, in a manner of speaking.

 

All I can say is, if you own an iPad or other tablets where LR Mobile can be installed, then try it out and see how you can integrate it to your workflow.

[xQubeZx]

1 hour ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

Well it doesn't compare to using a proper keyboard, mouse and stylus/graphics tablet.  But if you wanted to do some quick editing it serves it's purpose.

 

How you integrate it into your workflow is up to you, and if you're already paying for a CC subscription (even if it's just for Lightroom) the service is free.  I use the iPad as a mobile portfolio, showing examples of my works to clients or quickly taking it to present work for the times I don't want to unplug my MacBook or obviously my desktop workstation is not a mobile machine.  So instead of using a separate app where I have to upload and sync photos, I just do a selection in LR and it syncs to the LR mobile app.

 

The main drawback I see is if I wanted to start out with LR mobile after taking photos with the camera, I don't carry memory card adapters that can connect to the iPad and I don't think there are adapters for XQD memory cards.  And I usually always have my MacBook Pro with me.  So 100% of the time the memory card gets offloaded into LR non-mobile.

 

Second issue (at least for me) is of course the wireless connectivity.  While I do have an unlimited mobile data subscription, that's for my phone.  For my iPad I have a pay-as-you-go/prepaid type of subscription and I don't want to use up the charged credits quickly.  Hence the iPad is on wi-fi only for 95% of the time and rarely on 3/4G data.  So this limits the mobility, in a manner of speaking.

 

All I can say is, if you own an iPad or other tablets where LR Mobile can be installed, then try it out and see how you can integrate it to your workflow.

I agree with the syncing problem and data costing a lot. It's not really so mobile then.

 

I would also probably use the system more if my internet was faster. Right now I have really bad data speeds which would make it a pain to sync a lot of images between the different systems. I will see if I'm going to use it more as soon as I get a fiber connection but right now its way to slow (and/or expensive if I'm not at home) to sync for me. 

[thekillergazebo]

To me the big appeal is I only have a desktop and with something like a tablet I could edit on the sofa or use an adapter for my SD card and pull off the photos in the field (I do landscapes and wildlife shots) and edit them while still enjoying the location I'm at. I'm mostly trying to figure out how much will I be giving up. 

[xQubeZx]

1 hour ago, thekillergazebo said:

To me the big appeal is I only have a desktop and with something like a tablet I could edit on the sofa or use an adapter for my SD card and pull off the photos in the field (I do landscapes and wildlife shots) and edit them while still enjoying the location I'm at. I'm mostly trying to figure out how much will I be giving up. 

Well as far as I know all basics are still left. I doubt noise reduction and sharpening will be there since it requires quite a bit of computing power compared to say changing the whitebalance. I saw Elia Locardi do a great video on how he used the iPad on the go, search for it on YT and I think a lot of your questions will be answerd. 

[AkiraDaarkst]

1 hour ago, xQubeZx said:

Well as far as I know all basics are still left. I doubt noise reduction and sharpening will be there since it requires quite a bit of computing power compared to say changing the whitebalance. I saw Elia Locardi do a great video on how he used the iPad on the go, search for it on YT and I think a lot of your questions will be answerd. 

It does have noise adjustment, sort of.  When you open LR mobile app, at least on my iPad there are 5 items at the bottom.  Assuming that you have a photo selected.

1. Filmstrip, this is basically a navigator to see the available photos in the LR mobile app.
2. Crop, with a photo chosen and this item selected you can crop, rotate, flip, basically manipulate the photo's dimensions.
3. Presets, lets to apply a preset that similar to the presets available in the desktop version of LR.
4. Edit, where you can adjust curves, apply or remove vignetting, B&W conversion, adjust white balance and temperature, tint, exposure, etc.
5. Local adjust, where you can apply radial or gradient filters and adjust similar items that are available in Edit.  You an also adjust noise, moire, sharpness, etc. here, but only with a gradient or radial filter applied.

At the same bottom 'menu' bar, on the side there are 3 dots, if you click on them the bottom bar will slide away to show you options to flag the photos as keep, discard, no flag and give a star rating.  The LR mobile app also shows you basic metadata of the photo.

 

7 hours ago, xQubeZx said:

I agree with the syncing problem and data costing a lot. It's not really so mobile then.

 

I would also probably use the system more if my internet was faster. Right now I have really bad data speeds which would make it a pain to sync a lot of images between the different systems. I will see if I'm going to use it more as soon as I get a fiber connection but right now its way to slow (and/or expensive if I'm not at home) to sync for me. 

The cost and syncing problem is not an issue in a wi-fi environment that you have access to (home, office, studio, etc.).  But yes, 3/4G mobile data plans on the other hand might be an issue if you're on the street or road.  Currently I have the option to add an additional unlimited data plan for the iPad by paying an extra $20 a month on my phone bill.  I choose not to and instead using a top-up system where I just top up like $50 or so worth of credit.  Each time I enable mobile data on the iPad it costs me $5 a day.

 

3 hours ago, thekillergazebo said:

To me the big appeal is I only have a desktop and with something like a tablet I could edit on the sofa or use an adapter for my SD card and pull off the photos in the field (I do landscapes and wildlife shots) and edit them while still enjoying the location I'm at. I'm mostly trying to figure out how much will I be giving up. 

LOL stop being lazy and go sit at your desk.  You should be able to take your iPad to the field and upload the photos to the app, including RAW (I don't have a memory card adapter for the tablet so I haven't tested it).  It may just take you a couple of minutes or perhaps an hour to get the hang of working with the app, since the navigation to the editing tools are slightly different than in the desktop version of LR though they are similarly grouped into common categories.

 

Personally, as I mentioned previously, because I prefer to start out always in the desktop version I do most of my editing there (and because I have bigger screens on my workstation and MacBook) and just create a special collection of photos (for my portfolio) that I sync to the iPad app.

[thekillergazebo]

1 hour ago, xQubeZx said:

Well as far as I know all basics are still left. I doubt noise reduction and sharpening will be there since it requires quite a bit of computing power compared to say changing the whitebalance. I saw Elia Locardi do a great video on how he used the iPad on the go, search for it on YT and I think a lot of your questions will be answerd. 

Thanks that's answered all of my questions. It looks like it would be perfect for what I need, but I have created a few presents of my own and I'm not sure I could use them in a mobile environment. It's to bad people have to buy the CC edition to use this with desktop. I really hate the direction of CC.

 

34 minutes ago, AkiraDaarkst said:

It does have noise adjustment, sort of.  When you open LR mobile app, at least on my iPad there are 5 items at the bottom.  Assuming that you have a photo selected.

1. Filmstrip, this is basically a navigator to see the available photos in the LR mobile app.
2. Crop, with a photo chosen and this item selected you can crop, rotate, flip, basically manipulate the photo's dimensions.
3. Presets, lets to apply a preset that similar to the presets available in the desktop version of LR.
4. Edit, where you can adjust curves, apply or remove vignetting, B&W conversion, adjust white balance and temperature, tint, exposure, etc.
5. Local adjust, where you can apply radial or gradient filters and adjust similar items that are available in Edit.  You an also adjust noise, moire, sharpness, etc. here, but only with a gradient or radial filter applied.

At the same bottom 'menu' bar, on the side there are 3 dots, if you click on them the bottom bar will slide away to show you options to flag the photos as keep, discard, no flag and give a star rating.  The LR mobile app also shows you basic metadata of the photo.

 

The cost and syncing problem is not an issue in a wi-fi environment that you have access to (home, office, studio, etc.).  But yes, 3/4G mobile data plans on the other hand might be an issue if you're on the street or road.  Currently I have the option to add an additional unlimited data plan for the iPad by paying an extra $20 a month on my phone bill.  I choose not to and instead using a top-up system where I just top up like $50 or so worth of credit.  Each time I enable mobile data on the iPad it costs me $5 a day.

 

LOL stop being lazy and go sit at your desk.  You should be able to take your iPad to the field and upload the photos to the app, including RAW (I don't have a memory card adapter for the tablet so I haven't tested it).  It may just take you a couple of minutes or perhaps an hour to get the hang of working with the app, since the navigation to the editing tools are slightly different than in the desktop version of LR though they are similarly grouped into common categories.

 

Personally, as I mentioned previously, because I prefer to start out always in the desktop version I do most of my editing there (and because I have bigger screens on my workstation and MacBook) and just create a special collection of photos (for my portfolio) that I sync to the iPad app.

Yeah I am a bit lazy. Well a lot lazy lol. I rather be editing the photos out on location sometimes, but I think you right about using the full version. It's to bad the iPad pros are not true pro devices. Like how the surface pro can run full desktop programs and the regular surface was just more of a tablet. Seems like Microsoft is really stepping up their game for creative people now. 

[AkiraDaarkst]

19 hours ago, thekillergazebo said:

Thanks that's answered all of my questions. It looks like it would be perfect for what I need, but I have created a few presents of my own and I'm not sure I could use them in a mobile environment. It's to bad people have to buy the CC edition to use this with desktop. I really hate the direction of CC.

 

Yeah I am a bit lazy. Well a lot lazy lol. I rather be editing the photos out on location sometimes, but I think you right about using the full version. It's to bad the iPad pros are not true pro devices. Like how the surface pro can run full desktop programs and the regular surface was just more of a tablet. Seems like Microsoft is really stepping up their game for creative people now. 

You get a 30 day free trial with LR Mobile, try it out and see if it works for you.  Because it will sync with the desktop version the photos that you upload to either should sync, along with the edits.  Maybe the mobile app can be your on the road quick editing tool and when you get back home you can refine everything in more detail.