Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic by Rafael Concepcion
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Ever since Adobe went to a subscription model, they have provided changes to the Lightroom Classic photography software throughout the subscription period. (Classic is designed to be used on a computer; there is a separate app for mobile phones.) Every year, Adobe Press comes out with an updated instructional manual. Every year I write a new review of the updated manual. Most of the Lightroom functions are unchanged, and most sections of this book are unchanged. It gets harder and harder to say something new about the book, even though I highly recommend it. I suppose I could just cut and paste my old review.
When you get this book (assuming you’ve all ready gotten your subscription to Lightroom Classic) you download images from the publisher’s web site, and load them into Lightroom The lessons then walk you through each of the modules, like Library or Develop, and have the reader do practical exercises manipulating the buttons and sliders, with the downloaded images. At the end of the process you have a good familiarity with Lightroom. Then it’s like Carnegie Hall: practice, practice, practice. The lesson for the publishing module is located on line. The book is sprinkled with portfolios of good and great photographers for inspiration.
To me the best part of the deal is the access you get to the on-line copy of the book. It has everything that’s in the book, plus demonstration videos of the exercises you will perform and easy interactive quizzes. What I particularly like is being able to go from the on-line book to the Classic Program on my computer without juggling a book. (You might ask why get a book at all? I find it just a bit easier to refresh my memory about a single point by examining the dead trees product then going on line for a quick look.)
I’ve looked at lots of Lightroom Classic books and I find that this is the easiest way to learn. (It’s still not easy. You will have to spend hours becoming competent.) Except by way of example, the book will teach you little about how to make better (more artful?) pictures with the software.
For existing users, it may be sufficient to just look at the demonstration videos pertaining to the recently added subjects. Going back over the entire book, may be overkill. Before I started looking at the entire volume, I went to the section on the new selection and masking techniques. (If you don’t know what that means, you will after you use the book.) Concepcion thought me how to use the new techniques in just a few minutes.
I have a pet peeve about the online version that I will paste into the next paragraph. Skilled programmers have told me this is not a difficult problem to solve.
My aged eyes made me maximize the videos to full screen. When I minimized the first video I was returned to the top of the page. However, when there were more videos lower on the page, and I had maximized one of these, I was returned to the top of the page again when I minimized the later video. I had to scroll down to return to the point from which I had maximized.
That’s it. I recommend this book highly, and I got through the review of another edition.