Camera Raw 9.6 and Lightroom CC 2015.6 / 6.6 updates

Adobe just made Camera Raw 9.6 (and DNG converter 9.6) and Lightroom CC 2015.6 / 6.6 available.

The most exciting update is the new guided upright functionality, allowing you to draw 2 to 4 guides to precicely control the way the image is straightened. In this video by Adobe's Julieanne Kost, Guided Upright is explained in more detail.

The updates are available via the standard application update mechanism.

DNG Converter 9.6 can be downloaded from the Adobe website: Win | Mac

Release information follows below

Lightroom CC 2015.5 & Lightroom 6.5 now available

Adobe has just released an update for Lightroom. This new version fixes numerous bugs and adds support for additional cameras and lenses.
Use the appropriate update mechanism (e.g., the creative cloud application) to retrieve the update. A direct download is also available: Win / Mac.

Bugs Fixed in Lightroom CC 2015.5 / 6.5

Lightroom 6.3 update brings back the original import dialog!

With Lightroom 6.2, Adobe introduced an (in their words) simpler and improved import dialog. This “dumbed down” dialog was immensely disliked by the majority of users. That and the numerous critical bugs that plagued the release got Adobe to apologize for it publicly. With the new 6.3 update, Adobe fixed the bugs and restored the original import experience. Support for additional cameras and lenses has been added as well.

The Lightroom 6.3 update is available for both the stand-alone users and Creative Cloud subscribers.

Lightroom CC / 6.1 updates

Adobe just released a major update to its Lightroom CC and 6 and iOS applications.

The updates provide additional camera raw support, lens profile support and address bugs that were introduced in previous releases of Lightroom.

For the full set of new features, you need to have the CC subscription version of Lightroom, but bug fixes, tethered capture, new camera and lens support updates are available in both Lightroom 6 and Lightroom CC.

From the release notes:

New features in Lightroom CC on the desktop

• Dehaze
  • Many outdoor scenes have some amount of haze due to atmospheric conditions. Dehaze is a new feature for removing/adding haze and fog from pictures.
  • The user can control how much haze to remove by adjusting a new slider in the Effects panel in the Dehaze section. This feature can also be used in the other direction to increase the amount of haze.
  • Recommended Workflow – Adjust the white balance of the image before applying the Dehaze control.
• Local White and Black Adjustment Sliders
  
  • Available with all 3 local adjustment tools:  Gradient Filter, Radial Filter and Local adjustment brush
  • Useful for fine-tuning tonality near the brightest and darkest parts of the picture. For instance, they can be used to increase the contrast of highlights.
  • Recommended Workflow – Make your global adjustments first and then use the local adjustments to fine tune. Use the clip warning indicator to help avoid clipping highlights and shadows.

Lightroom on iOS:

• Video support:  You can now import, and sync your iPhone and iPad created videos from Lightroom on iOS to the web and desktop.
• More adjustment tools
  • Vignettes
  • Adjust the Color channel and B&W mix
  • Tone Curve

New Camera Support

• Fujifilm X-T10
• Nikon 1 J5
• Nikon D810A
• Panasonic DMC-G7
• Pentax K-S2
• Pentax K3 II^*

^* Preliminary support. The multi-shot Pixel Shift Resolution and HDR features are still under investigation.

Tethered Capture Support:

• Canon EOS 70D

New Lens Profile Support

Mount	Name
Canon	Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 STM
Canon	Canon EF 400mm f/4 DO IS II USM
Canon	Tokina AT-X 11-20mm f/2.8 PRO DX
DJI	PHANTOM 3 FC300S (RAW + JPEG)
DJI	PHANTOM 3 FC300X (RAW + JPEG)
Leica	Voigtlander VM 15mm f4.5 Super Wide Heliar III Aspherical
Nikon	Nikon 1 NIKKOR VR 10-100mm f/4-5.6
Nikon	Nikon 1 NIKKOR VR PD-Zoom 10-100mm f/4.5-5.6
Nikon	Nikon AF NIKKOR 85mm f/1.4D IF
Nikon	Tokina AT-X 11-20mm f/2.8 PRO DX
Pentax	HD PENTAX-DA 18-50mm f/4-5.6 DC WR RE
Pentax	HD PENTAX-DA L 18-50mm f/4-5.6 DC WR RE
Pentax	HD PENTAX-D FA 150-450mm f/4.5-5.6ED DC AW
Sony Alpha	Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 ZA SSM II
Sony Alpha	Sony 24-70mm f/2.8 ZA SSM II
Sony Alpha	Sony 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 G SSM II

Bugs Fixed

• Local adjustment brush did not properly use the pressure sensitivity information from a Wacom tablet (Windows)
• Develop adjustments are lost after Edit In while auto-write XMP is turned on
• Entering name with trailing space while face tagging changes case of keyword
• Keyword hierarchies are not displayed when naming face regions
• Keywords get erroneously renamed when using hierarchical keywords in face tagging
• Keyboard shortcuts for Merge don’t work in German or French
• Improved quality of display color management on some widegamut displays when Use Graphics Processor is enabled 
• Card reader not automatically found (Windows Autoplay registry issue)
• Crash when Android device is mounted (Windows)
• Closing the crop tool or cycling Full Screen modes with Lights Out mode makes entire screen go black
• Cannot enter negative values in Develop in some languages
• Mouse wheel changes brush size and scrolls image
• Import from Photoshop Elements now allows you to include People keywords.
• Reduced “color blur” artifacts when processing Fujifilm XTrans raw images – In collaboration with Fujifilm, we are still investigating methods to improve fine detail rendering and overall edge definition
• If a Person keyword was NOT marked as “Include on Export”, it is still nevertheless included on export unless “Remove Person Info” is selected. Please note that this only occurred for People keywords.
• The “Remove Chromatic Aberration” checkbox is now enabled by default for all Fujifilm cameras.
• HDR and Pano Merge: Cleared in-camera crop before merging rather than destructively applying it prior to merging.
• Pano Merge: Fixed a Pano blending issue specific to Leica M9.
• Fixed a bug with Panasonic LX100 – extended ISO 100 was too bright and Magenta Highlights have been fixed.
• Fixed a bug with Nikon Coolpix P7800 NRW raw files that showed only Matrix as camera profile.
• Fixed crash when reading some JPEG images
• When enabling “Before/After” preview in the Develop module, the screen flickered before showing the Before preview. This only occurred when GPU was enabled
• Lightroom starts slowly, any attempt to do something results in the blue spinning-wheel and “Not Responding” when connect to LAN without LAN/internet connection
• If a catalog is too large, the zipped backup can’t be unzipped
• Export creates erroneous Invalid Constraint Size Error

Lightroom 6/CC now available!

We've been waiting for it for quite some time now, but here it finally is: a new version of Lightroom.

The new version is available both as a stand-alone/upgrade version (called Lightroom 6, $149 full version / $79 upgrade) or as part of the Creative Cloud subscription model (where it's called Lightroom CC, available from $9.99/month as part of the Creative Cloud and Photography programs). The features are the same for both versions of the program.

Key highlights of the new Lightroom 6/CC

• HDR Merge – yes, directly from within Lightroom 6/CC, no extra (external) software required!
• Panorama Merge – this is a boon to Lightroom Pano shooters; Lightroom 6/CC is now able to stitch together (raw) photos to form a panorama, which you can then edit with all the familiar Lightroom develop tools.
• Face recognition and tagging – Lightroom is now able to recognise faces and can automatically tag your photos.
• Filter brushes – The power of filter brushes finally comes to Lightroom too. Adobe Camera Raw has had this ability to manually paint in or out the masks generated by e.g., the radial or graduated gradients.
• Speed – The new Lightroom should be faster than its predecessor as it now makes use of the Graphical Processing Unit to off-load some of its tasks.

Adobe releases Lightroom 5.7, Camera Raw 8.7, and DNG Converter 8.7

Adobe has released new versions Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw with bug fixes, new features, and support for additional cameras (a.o. the new Nikon D750 & Canon EOS 7D Mark II) & lenses.

You can update each using their respective update mechanisms, for Lightroom and the DNG converter a direct download is (also) available:

• Lightroom 5.7: Mac / Win
• DNG Converter 8.7: Mac / Win

Note: updates to Camera Raw 8 for Photoshop CS6 only include new camera support, lens profile support, and bug fixes. The new features listed in the release notes are only available in Photoshop CC.

See below for a full list of changes.

Lightroom 5.6 and Camera Raw 8.6 released today

Adobe today released a new version of its Lightroom and Camera Raw. A while back, we could already play with the release candidate of Camera Raw, but now Lightroom users can also benefit from the added features. Compared to the release candidate, the final version contains support for a number of additional (Sony) lenses as well as additional bug fixes.
Downloads available from Adobe:

• Adobe Camera Raw 8.6: Use the update mechanism of application (or: manual)
• Lightroom 5.6: Download Mac / Windows
• DNG Converter 8.6: Download Mac / Windows

Changes in Lightroom 5.6 and Camera Raw 8.6

• Improve performance when batch processing images (via the Save button in Camera Raw) and when converting images to DNG (via DNG Converter). This performance improvement is only available on 64-bit systems. (Camera Raw for Photoshop CC and CC 2014-only)

New Camera Support

• Nikon D810
• Panasonic LUMIX AG-GH4
• Panasonic LUMIX DMC-FZ1000

Added Camera Matching colour profiles

• Sony DSC-RX100 III
• Sony A7S (ILCE-7S)
• Sony Alpha SLT-A77 II (ILCA-77M2)

New Lens Profile Support

Lens Name	Lens Mount
Canon	Canon EF-S 10-18mm f/4.5-5.6 IS STM
Canon	Canon EF 16-35mm f/4L IS USM
Canon	Tamron 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di VC PZD A010E
Canon	Tamron 18-200 f/3.5-6.3 DiIII VC B011EM
Nikon	Nikon 1 NIKKOR VR 70-300mm f/4.5 – 5.6
Nikon	Tamon 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di VC PZD A010N
Pentax	Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 DC HSM A013
Phase One A/S	Schneider Kreuznach LS 40-80mm f/4.0-5.6
Sony Alpha	Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 DC HSM A013
Sony Alpha	Sony 28mm f/2.8
Sony Alpha	Sony 16mm f/2.8 Fisheye
Sony Alpha	Sony 100mm f/2.8 MACRO
Sony Alpha	Sony DT 16-105mm f/3.5-5.6
Sony Alpha	Sony DT 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3
Sony Alpha	Sony DT 18-250mm f/3.5-6.3
Sony Alpha	Sony 70-200mm f/2.8G
Sony Alpha	Sony 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 G SSM
Sony Alpha	Sony 70-400mm f/4-5.6 G SSM
Sony Alpha	Sony 70-400mm f/4-5.6 G SSM II
Sony Alpha	Sony 135mm f/2.8 [T4.5] STF
Sony Alpha	Sony 300mm f/2.8 G SSM II
Sony E	Zeiss Touit 2.8/50M

Please note – the profile for the newly added Canon EF 16-35mm f/4L IS USM lens is not automatically located when applying lens profile corrections. This is a bug and we will fix it in a future release. The workaround is to: Manually select the profile and choose “Save New Lens Profile Defaults” in the Setup menu on the Profile tab. From then on, the lens should automatically select when the profile is enabled.

Bugs fixed in Lightroom 5.6

• Collections with a custom sort order would sometimes not properly sync with Lightroom mobile.
• Updated the “Adobe Standard” color profile for the Nikon D810.  Please note that this only impacts customers who used Camera Raw 8.6 or DNG Converter 8.6 to convert NEF raw files from the D810 to DNG
• Star ratings set in Lightroom mobile did not properly sync to Lightroom desktop.  Please note that this only occurred on images that were added to Lightroom mobile from the camera roll
• Resolved the issues causing the persistent “Syncing … images” state that some of our customers have reported.”
• Star ratings would sometimes not sync from Lightroom desktop to Lightroom mobile.  Please note that this only occurred when attempting to sync a Collection that contained more than 100 photos that already contained star ratings.
• Added information to the “System Info” dialogue to help designate if the customer installed Lightroom from the Creative Cloud.
• Unable to open sRaw files from the Nikon D810.  Please note that this only impacted customers that converted D810 sRaw files to DNG in either Camera Raw 8.6 RC or DNG Converter 8.6 RC.
• Images with invalid GPS coordinates would not properly sync with Lightroom mobile
• Lightroom occasionally crashed when changing image selection on Windows. Please note that this only occurred on the Windows platform.
• JPEG files exported from Lightroom would not open or be available to edit within Canon Digital Photo Professional application software.
• Lightroom would run in reduced functionality mode when it should not.

Bugs fixed in Camera Raw 8.6

• Fixed crash on launch in some cases on Hi DPI (Retina) systems.
• Fixed crash when opening some Sigma SD9 raw files.
• Fixed issue with JPEG images saved by Camera Raw not readable in some external applications.
• Fixed automatic lens profile selection for Leica M (Typ 240) when using most recent firmware version.
• Fixed issue with some Hasselblad H5D-50c and H5D-60 3FR raw images appearing slightly too dark. Unfortunately, this fix may affect the appearance of existing images captured with this combination of settings. It is recommended that you (1) purge the Camera Raw cache via the Camera Raw Preferences dialog, and (2) review previously captured images for unexpected brightness changes.
• Fixed bug with converting Nikon D810 and Nikon D4S sRaw files to DNG.
• Tweaked and updated the Adobe Standard color profile for the Nikon D810.  Please note that this only impacts customers that used Camera Raw 8.6 RC with the Nikon D810.

Adobe releases Lightroom 5.5, Camera Raw 8.5, and DNG Converter 8.5

In my previous post on the new (Photoshop) CC 2014 I already briefly mentioned Camera Raw 8.5, but there is more: Adobe also released Lightroom 5.5 and the DNG Converter 8.5.

Additional cameras supported by these releases

• Canon PowerShot G1 X Mark II
• Fujifilm FinePix S1
• Nikon 1 J4
• Nikon 1 S2
• Nikon 1 V3
• Olympus OM-D E-M10
• Panasonic DMC-GH4
• Pentax 645Z
• Samsung NX3000
• Sony DSC-RX100 III
• Sony A7S (ILCE-7S)
• Sony Alpha SLT-A77 II (ILCA-77M2)

Additional lens profiles in these releases

Mount	Name
Canon	Sigma 50m F1.4 DG HSM A014
Canon	Sigma 18-200mm F3.5-6.3 DC MACRO OS HSM C014
Canon	Tamron 16-300mm F3.5-6.3 Dill VC PZD MACRO B0163
Fujifilm	Fujifilm Tele Conversion Lens TCL-X100
Nikon	Nikon 1 NIKKOR VR 10-30mm f3.5-5.6 PD-ZOOM
Nikon	Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED VR
Nikon	Sigma 50mm F1.4 DG HSM A014
Nikon	Sigma 18-200 F3.5-6.3 DC MACRO OS HSM C014
Nikon	Tamron 16-300mm F3.5-6.3 Dill VC PZD MACRO B016N
Nikon	Tamron SP 150-600mm F5-6.3 Di VC USD A011N
Pentax	Sigma 30mm F.14 DC HSM A013
Sigma	Sigma 50mm F1.4 DG HSM A014
Sigma	Sigma 18-200mm F3.5-6.3 DC MACRO OS HSM C014
Sony Alpha	Sigma 30mm F1.4 DC HSM A013
Sony Alpha	Sony Alpha 28-75mm F2.8 SAM

Additional functionality in Adobe Camera Raw 8.5

Note: though Lightroom 5.5 uses ACR as its base, it is the policy of Adobe not to introduce new functionality into “dot releases”. For Photoshop CS6, which can also be updated to use ACR 8,5. none of the new functionality was ever made available so below functionality is only available in Photoshop CC or CC 2014!

• Modify Graduated and Radial Filter masks with a brush:
  After adding or selecting a Graduated or Radial Filter instance, click the new ‘Brush’ mode (next to existing ‘New’ and ‘Edit’ mode buttons) to reveal brush controls that allow you to modify the selected mask.
  Use the ‘Brush +’ and ‘Brush -’ icon buttons in the brush controls pane to add to or erase from the selected mask.
  Press the ‘Clear’ button to remove all brush modifications from the currently selected mask.
  When a Graduated or Radial Filter instance is selected, Shift-K can be used to enter and leave brush modification mode.
  Mask visualization is now available for the Graduated and Radial Filters. Use the Mask checkbox at the bottom of the Local Corrections pane or press ‘Y’ to toggle the mask overlay.
• Added Per-Panel Preview default toggle button
  If the current panel’s settings are not the ACR defaults, clicking the new Per-panel Toggle Button will reset the panel to the ACR defaults.
  Clicking the button again will restore the previous settings.
  This is a standalone feature, separate from the new Preview controls.
  The changes are applied to the main view; if you have both the Before and After panes visible, changes will appear in the After panel.

Bug fixes in Adobe Camera Raw 8.5 & Lightroom 5.5

Adobe updates Lightroom, Camera Raw (Photoshop CS6 and CC) and DNG Converter

Adobe has released version 5.4 of Lightroom and version 8.4 of Adobe Camera Raw (for Photoshop CS6 and CC) and the DNG Converter applications.

The new version of Camera Raw fixes a number of issues and adds support for additional cameras and lenses. With version 5.4 of Lightroom there is now also an iPad version available. This new Lightroom Mobile synchronises your images with the desktop version and offers some (albeit limited) editing capabilities. Great for showcasing your work on the road and to perform some quick edits. The files used by Lightroom Mobile are actually the new smart previews that were introduced with LR5, meaning that your edits actually do get propagated to your (raw) images on your desktop computer as well, even on raw files!

Please note that if you're still on Windows XP or Vista or Mac OS X 10.6, you're out of luck; the new versions of the software do not supported on those platforms any longer.
Also note that not all functionality of the new ACR is available in Photoshop CS6, for full functionality you'll need Photoshop CC. A subscription to the CC program is required for Lightoom Mobile.

Use the update mechanism as provided in Photoshop to update to the latest version of ACR.
DNG converter 8.4 can be downloaded from the Adobe website: Mac / Windows.
Lightroom 5.4 can be downloaded from the Adobe website as well: Mac / Windows.

Adobe releases Lightroom 5.3 and Camera Raw 8.3 (for Photoshop CS6 and CC)

Adobe has just released and update to their raw processing engine. Bringing some new functionality to both Lightroom and Photoshop (note that for Photoshop CS6, the enhancements are limited to new camera support, lens profile support, and bug fixes, you'll need Photoshop CC for the full range of enhancements). If you have an older version of Photoshop, you can make use of the DNG Converter which has been updated to 8.3 as well.

Notice that this will be the last release of ACR compatible with Windows XP, Windows Vista or Mac OSX 10.6. For continued support, you will need to upgrade your OS.

Adobe releases Lightroom 5.2

Together with the Camera Raw update, Adobe also updated Lightroom.

Lightroom 5.2 contains the following enhancements and bug fixes.

New Features in Lightroom 5.2

• A Smoothness adjustment slider has been added to the Detail Panel under Color Noise Reduction. This helps to reduce low-frequency color mottling artifacts
• Refinements to the Spot Healing Tool:
  • New Feather control
  • Auto find source method now works better for images with textured areas like rocks, bark, and foliage
  • Auto find source method now prefers source areas within the crop rectangle
• Auto Exposure has been improved to be more consistent across images and across different image sizes.
• Smart Preview size has been updated to 2560 pixels on the long edge.
• Refinements to the Local Adjustment Brush:
  • Right Click (PC) / Control-click (Mac) on a brush adjustment pin to bring up a context menu to duplicate or delete
  • Control+Alt+Drag (PC) / Command+Option+Drag (Mac) on a brush adjustment pin to clone (duplicate) that adjustment

Newly added support for Tethered Capture in Lightroom 5.2

• Canon EOS 6D
• Canon EOS Rebel T5i / EOS 700D / EOS Kiss X7i
• Canon EOS Rebel SL1 / EOS 100D / EOS Kiss X7
• Nikon D7100

New Camera Support in Lightroom 5.2

• Canon EOS 70D
• Canon PowerShot G16
• Canon PowerShot S120*
• Casio Exilim EX-ZR800
• Fujifilm FinePix HS22EXR
• Fujifilm FinePix HS35EXR
• Fujifilm FinePix S205EXR
• Fujifilm X-A1
• Fujifilm X-M1
• Leica C (Typ 112)
• Olympus OM-D E-M1*
• Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX7
• Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ70
• Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ72
• Pentax Q7
• Pentax K-50
• Pentax K-500
• Sony DSC-RX100 II
• Sony A3000 (ILCE-3000)
• Sony NEX-5T

* denotes preliminary support

New Lens Profile Support in Lightroom 5.2

Mount	Name
Sony	Sony E 35mm F1.8 OSS
Hasselblad	Hasselblad LF16mm F2.8
Hasselblad	Hasselblad LF18-55mm F3.5-5.6 OSS
Hasselblad	Hasselblad LF18-200mm F3.5-6.3 OSS
GoPro	GoPro Hero 3 Black Edition
GoPro	GoPro Hero 3 Silver Edition
GoPro	GoPro Hero 3 White Edition
Leica	Leica TRI-ELMAR-M 16-18-21 mm f/4 ASPH.
Canon	SIGMA 18-35mm F1.8 DC HSM A013
Canon, Nikon, Sigma	SIGMA 120-300mm F2.8 DG OS HSM S013
Nikon	SIGMA 30mm F1.4 DC HSM A013
Olympus, Sony	SIGMA 60mm F2.8 DN A013
Pentax, Sony	SIGMA 17-70mm F2.8-4 DC MACRO OS HSM C013
Pentax, Sony	SIGMA 35mm F1.4 DG HSM A012
Nikon	Nikon 1 NIKKOR 32mm f/1.2
Sony	Sony DSC-RX1R

Bugs Corrected in Lightroom 5.2

• Output Sharpening and Noise Reduction were not applied to exported images that were resized to less than 1/3 of the original image size.
• Slideshow Exporting process fails for time-lapse sequences.
• Unable to export a Book.  This only occurred after a customer deleted a background photo.
• Catalog containing images processed with PV2003 were adding a post-crop vignette when catalog upgraded to Lightroom 5.
• JPEG decoding produced a red colorcast.
• Unable to scroll through photos when in Full screen mode. This only occurs when more than 1 photo is selected.
• “Store presets with this catalog” preference is not preserved when upgrading catalog from previous versions of Lightroom.
• Crash when scrubbing Size slider with existing spot selected.
• Landscape crop not maintained on portrait oriented photos
• Pressing the Reset button while holding the Shift key results in an internal error.
• Crash when attempting to move brush spots.
• Gray area is shown when zooming in/out after cropping image.
• A row of vertical artifacts appears along bottom edge of photo when applying Grain.
• Defringe Color Sampler is inaccurate on photos that have Upright applied.
• All of the images on a Compact Flash card did not appear in the Import Dialogue.
• Metadata panel displayed incorrect information after modifying published photo. Please note that this only occurred when metadata was changed after the photo was published.
• Soundtrack does not fade at the end of a slideshow.
• The Esc key did not exit the slideshow after right clicking screen with mouse during slideshow playing.
• Import dialog remained blank for folders that contain PNG files with XMP sidecars.

Installation

Either use Lightroom's own update mechanism or download directly from Adobe: Windows | Mac.

Software developers can download the Lightroom 5.2 SDK from Adobe as well: SDK

Lightroom 5 released

After a period of public beta testing, Adobe has released Lightroom 5.

The most notable new features are:

• Advanced Healing Brush – much improved over the previous version
• Upright – Automatically straightens your photos
• Radial Gradient – Create multiple off-center vignette effects
• Smart Previews – Allows working on a reduced size version of your library, ideal for working in the field
• Video slide shows – Show off your work as a video slide show
• Improved photo book creation – Even better than before photo books

 Lightroom is available as upgrade from $79.00/€72.57, full versions for $149.00/€129.15

For more information, see the Adobe website

Lightroom 5 Public Beta available

Just getting used to Lightroom 4? Well, the folks of Adobe aren't letting you rest; they have been working on its successor already…

Lots of cool new features for the upcoming version of Lightroom (and most probably Adobe Camera Raw as well). To see for yourself what this new version of Lightroom has to offer, download the free beta from the Adobe labs website.

Some of the new Features in Lightroom 5 Beta

• Advanced Healing Brush – Easily remove objects and fix defects—even those with irregular shapes such as threads or lint—with a single brush stroke. Take precise control over what's being removed as you make unwanted objects just disappear.
• Upright – Straighten tilted images with a single click. Upright analyzes images and detects skewed horizontal or vertical lines. You choose one of four correction methods, and Upright can even straighten images where the horizon is hidden.
• Radial Gradient – Lead your viewer's eye through your images with more flexibility and control. The radial gradient tool lets you create off-center vignette effects, or multiple vignette areas within a single image.
• Offline editing with Smart Previews – Easily work with images without bringing your entire library with you. Just generate smaller stand-in files called Smart Previews. Make adjustments or metadata additions to Smart Previews and your changes will be automatically applied to the full-size originals later.
• Video slideshow sharing – Easily share your work in elegant video slideshows. Combine still images, video clips, and music in creative HD videos that can be viewed on almost any computer or device.
• Improved photo book creation – Create beautiful photo books from your images. Lightroom includes a variety of easy-to-use book templates, and now you can edit them to create a customized look. Upload your book for printing with just a few clicks.

There is already a plethora of videos and other information on the new Lightroom available on the internet, e.g., at the PhotoshopCAFE Lightroom 5 training site.

Adobe releases Lightroom 4.4, Camera Raw 7.4, and DNG converter 7.4 updates

Adobe has just released an update to its raw converters. The update provides support for additional cameras and lens profiles as well as fixes to bugs present in previous versions of the converter.

If you're not using the latest version of the software (i.e., Lightroom 4, Photoshop CS6, Photoshop Elements 11), you can make use of the DNG Converter 7.4 application to get raw file support for the newly added cameras.

To update:

• Lightroom 4.4 – Please use the update mechanism of the software
• Photoshop CS6 – Please use the update mechanism of the software
• Photoshop Elements 11 – Please use the update mechanism of the software
• DNG converter 7.4: Download Mac / Windows

Below is the complete list of changes (from Adobe).

Complete Nik software collection now only $149

Good news for everyone performing their own post processing: the complete Nik Software collection is now only $149!

The collection consists of all 6 highly rewarded plugins for Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Photoshop Elements, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, and Apple Aperture. Available for both Windows and Mac. View the complete collection at the Nik Software website.

Nik Software Collection

• Color Efex Pro 4 – Awesome set of filters for colour correction, retouching, and other creative effects.
• Silver Efex Pro 2 – If you're serious about B&W, this is the filter set to consider.
• HDR Efex Pro 2 – One of the best, if not the best, HDR tools available, I really love it!
• Sharpener Pro 3 – Covers every step in the image sharpening workflow; from Capture Sharpening to Creative Sharpening to Output Sharpening.
• Dfine 2 – Powerful noise reduction.
• Viveza 2 – Creating selections and masks the easy way.

Compatibility

The Nik Software collection is compatible with the following systems:
Mac

• Mac® OS 10.6.8 through 10.8
• Intel processor
• 2GB of RAM (4 GB or more recommended)
• Adobe Photoshop CS4 (CS5 for HDR Efex Pro 2) through CS6
• Adobe Photoshop Elements 9 through 11
  (apart from HDR Efex Pro 2, which is not compatible with Photoshop Elements)
• Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 through 4
• Apple® Aperture® 3.1 or later
• 32-bit and 64-bit Compatible (HDR Efex Pro 2 is only compatible with 64-bit systems)
• For GPU acceleration, an Open GL 3.0 compatible graphics card such as the cards listed below. If no compatible card is available, GPU acceleration will be disabled and the CPU will be used.

Windows

• Windows Vista®, Windows 7, Windows 8
• AMD® or Intel® processor
• 2GB of RAM (4 GB or more recommended)
• Adobe Photoshop CS4 through CS6
• Adobe Photoshop Elements 9 through 11
  (apart from HDR Efex Pro 2, which is not compatible with Photoshop Elements)
• Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 through 4
• 32-bit and 64-bit Compatible
• For GPU acceleration, an Open GL 3.0 compatible graphics card such as the cards listed below. If no compatible card is available, GPU acceleration will be disabled and the CPU will be used.

GPU Compatibility

• NVIDIA GeForce 8 Series, GeForce 9 Series, GeForce 100 Series, GeForce 200 Series, GeForce 300 Series, GeForce 400 Series, GeForce 500 Series,
• ATI Radeon HD2000 Series, Radeon HD3000 Series, Radeon HD4000 Series, Radeon HD5000 Series, Radeon HD6000 Series,
• Intel HD Graphics 3000

Photoshop CS6 13.0.2/13.1, Lightroom 4.3, and Camera Raw 7.3 updates

Adobe has just released updates to their major photo editing software.

Lightroom 4.3/Camera Raw 7.3

The Lightroom 4.3 and Camera Raw 7.3 updates add support 20 for new cameras, including the Canon 6D and Nikon D5200.

Lightroom 4.3 also includes HiDPI (Mac Retina display) support for the Library and Develop Modules. It is a real pity that Camera Raw does not yet include this support though (hopefully the next update will cover this).

Here's the full list of new cameras supported in LR4.3/ACR7.3:

• Canon EOS 6D
• Canon PowerShot S110
• Canon PowerShot G15
• Canon PowerShot SX50 HS
• Casio Exilim EX-ZR1000
• Casio Exilim EX-FC300S
• Leica M-E
• Nikon 1 V2
• Nikon D5200
• Nikon D600
• Olympus PEN E-PL5
• Olympus PEN E-PM2
• Olympus STYLUS XZ-2 iHS
• Panasonic DMC-GH3
• Pentax K-5 II
• Pentax K-5 IIs
• Pentax Q10
• Sony DSC-RX1
• Sony NEX-VG30
• Sony NEX-VG900

Photoshop CS6 13.0.2 (Mac only)

Like Lightroom 4.3, this new 13.0.2 version of Adobe Photoshop enables support for new HiDPI displays on the Macintosh platform for “a dramatic improvement in image fidelity and resolution.”

Photoshop CS6 13.1.0 (Creative Cloud subscription only)

If you bought Photoshop CS6 through the Creative Cloud subscription (from $19.99/€24.59 per month) you get some new features added to this, showing the advantage of this subscription based service (though, personally I still find it quiet expensive).

The first Creative Cloud-only update of Photoshop offers a host of new and improved features:

• The Blur Gallery and Liquify are now usable on smart objects, greatly enhancing your “non-destructive editing” capabilities.
• Web design enhancements:
• CSS export from text and layer styles for faster and easier web design.
• Import of colour swatches from you HTML, CSS, or SVG files.
• Conditional actions – People making use of actions a lot will love the fact that you can now have conditional actions.
• Improvements to the crop tool, naming of merged layers, and the ability to see up to 100 of your recently opened files.

Note to Windows XP users: these features are not supported on Windows XP any longer (the same already holds true for some of the GPU-enabled features by the way).

Adobe updates Lightroom, Camera Raw, and DNG converter

Adobe has just released updates for Lightroom 4, Camera Raw, and DNG Converter. The updates include support for many new camera models and lenses.

You can download the new versions using these links:

• Lightroom 4.2: Windows, Mac
• DNG Converter 7.2: Windows, Mac
• Camera Raw 7.2: Use the update mechanism of Photoshop CS6

Below is the full list of fixes and added camera/lens support.

Adobe releases Lightroom 4.1 and Camera Raw/DNG Converter 7.1 updates

Adobe today released updates for Lightroom, Adobe Camera Raw, and the DNG Converter.

The new features in Lightroom 4.1 and Camera Raw 7.1 include the ability to process HDR TIFF files and new de-fringing controls. The new software versions also support raw files from the Nikon D800 and D800E, and the Canon EOS 5D Mark III (as well as many other new cameras).

The updates can be downloaded directly from the Adobe web site, or by using the update feature in Lightroom 4 and Photoshop CS6.

• Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4.1
• Adobe Camera Raw 7.1 and DNG Converter 7.1

Adobe releases Lightroom 4

After a two-month period in which you could freely beta test the application, Adobe has now released Photoshop Lightroom 4, the all-in-one raw converter, image editor, and photo management application.

Some of the top new features include simplified and improved control, enhanced highlight and shadow recovery, more local editing controls, extended support for video files, etc.

People will welcome Adobe's step to halve the price as well. You can now get Lightroom 4 for only $149/€129. As always, students/teacher get an even better price.

Lightroom 4 adds support for the following new cameras:

• Canon EOS-1D X
• Canon PowerShot G1 X
• Canon PowerShot S100V
• Fuji FinePix F505EXR
• Fuji FinePix F605EXR
• Fuji FinePix HS30EXR
• Fuji FinePix HS33EXR
• Fuji FinePix X-S1
• Nikon D4
• Nikon D800
• Nikon D800E