Month: September 2022

Today’s Question: My son-in-law has been using the Cloud version of Lightroom. He’s just come back from a safari with many images and he’s wondering whether he should consider going over to Lightroom Classic. Would this be a good time for him to make the switch, or should he continue as he is? I know that he is interested in printing and may not have done a lot of that before. Is that a factor?

Tim’s Quick Answer: In my view most photographers would benefit from using Lightroom Classic rather than the cloud-based version of Lightroom. That is especially true for photographers who want to print their images, since the cloud version of Lightroom does not support printing.

More Detail: The primary difference between the cloud-based Lightroom and Lightroom Classic is where photos are stored. With Lightroom Classic you manage the storage of your photos locally, while with the cloud-based version the photos are stored primarily in the cloud (Adobe’s servers) and are downloaded to your computer or device as they are needed.

In addition, the cloud-based Lightroom doesn’t include all of the sharing features of Lightroom Classic, including printing. All things considered, I think Lightroom Classic is the better choice for most photographers. The only reason a photographer may prefer using the cloud-based version of Lightroom is if they want to have all their photos synchronized to the cloud. However, in my view this is not a significant benefit for photographers, especially considering that you can synchronize selected collections of photos to the cloud with Lightroom Classic.

It will take some work to transition from cloud-based storage to local folders, since the cloud-based version of Lightroom doesn’t allow you to create folders. However, I do feel that work is worth doing in order to gain the benefits of Lightroom Classic.

Today’s Question: When I send an image from Lightroom Classic to Photoshop, the canvas is not centered. When I use the Move tool, I can move the image, but the canvas does not move.

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can adjust a few settings in Photoshop to ensure that the image is displayed within the interface, without extending beyond the main Photoshop image area unless you have zoomed in on the image enough that only part of the image is visible.

More Detail: The first thing to check is the “Overscroll” setting in Preferences. From the menu choose Edit on Windows or Photoshop on Macintosh, then select Preferences > Tools. Turn off the “Overscroll” checkbox, which will prevent the image canvas from being moved beyond the main Photoshop window, such as when using the Hand tool.

Next, be sure that the image is in a tab rather than a floating window. You can do this by choosing Window > Arrange > Consolidate All to Tabs. This will cause all images to be in tabs rather than a floating window that could be dragged beyond the main window area.

Floating panels can also obscure the image, so if you have any floating panels, you can either close them or dock them. You can, for example, drag a set of floating panels to the right edge of the Photoshop window. When you see a blue highlight indicating the docking position you can release the mouse button and the panels will be docked rather than floating.

If you want to see the entire image, keep in mind that you can fit it to the available area with the “Fit on Screen” command. You can choose View > Fit on Screen from the menu or hold the Ctrl key on Windows or Command key on Macintosh while pressing 0 (zero) on the keyboard.

Today’s Question: I’ve recently started getting an error indicating that Lightroom Classic does not have access to some “standard folders”. The Learn More link explains what to do, but is there any reason not to enable this security setting for Lightroom Classic?

Tim’s Quick Answer: The issue in question only applies to Macintosh users, and I do recommend enabling Lightroom Classic to access to the folders to avoid potential confusion or problems in your workflow.

More Detail: The message in question relates to security settings in the Macintosh operating system, related to permission for applications to access the “standard” folders in the operating system, which includes folders such as Desktop, Documents, and Downloads, among others.

It appears to me that this issue has arisen anew with the update to MacOS Monterey (12.5.1), although the overall security settings have been in place since the release of MacOS Mojave. Thus, users who have upgraded their operating system recently, including myself, may be seeing the alert message about folder permissions.

I do recommend providing Lightroom Classic with access to the standard folders, especially if you will be storing photos within any of those folders. The setting can be updated in the Security & Privacy section of System Preferences.

To get started click on the Apple logo at the far left of the menu bar and choose System Preferences. Go to Security & Privacy and navigate to the Privacy tab. Click the lock icon at the bottom-left corner of the System Preferences dialog and enter your system password to enable changes. Then turn on the checkboxes under Adobe Lightroom Classic on the list to the right of the “Files and Folders” selection. I recommend turning on all the checkboxes for Lightroom Classic, though you could obviously leave some off if you have a reason to prevent Lightroom Classic from accessing specific storage locations.

With this option enabled you should no longer see the message about this permission issue unless it arises again with a future update to the operating system or to Lightroom Classic.

Today’s Question: In your answer about film scanners, you made reference to “pixels per inch” resolution. The scanner manufacturers list the resolution in “dots per inch”. Are these two terms interchangeable?

Tim’s Quick Answer: In my view the term “pixels per inch” (ppi) is more correct in the context of digitizing film images because the scanner is creating pixels based on the original, and the ppi resolution indicates the density of information being gathered from the original.

More Detail: In some respects I think it would be fair to say that the terms “pixels per inch” (ppi) and “dots per inch” (dpi) are interchangeable. Of course, some purists on the subject would say I am absolutely wrong about that!

In general, ppi resolution is used to refer to a digital image in the context of output size. This resolution is really only applicable when printing a photo, because when an image is shared digitally all that really matters is how many pixels there are. For example, if a monitor has a horizontal resolution of 1,920 pixels, you would need an image to be 1,920 pixels wide to fit the full width of the display. It doesn’t matter what the ppi resolution is set to for the image, because each pixel in the image would simply be represented by one pixel on the monitor display.

When printing the ppi resolution becomes important, because it impacts the quality of the print. In actual fact it is still the number of pixels that is important, but the ppi resolution provides an indication of whether you have enough pixels. For example, a typical photo inkjet printer requires at least 360 ppi resolution for optimal quality, which means an image that is to be printed ten inches wide would need to have at least 3,600 pixels in width.

The “dots” in the dpi resolution refers to dots on the paper when printing. That effectively translates to pixels in the context of the print, but the term “dots” is generally used instead. This is despite the fact that with many printing processes a single “dot” in the image is not produced by a single ink droplet. For example, many photo inkjet printers that render image data at 360 ppi typically place up to 1,440 or 2,880 (or more) ink droplets per inch.

So, in a very general sense dpi resolution relates to physical mediums, which is why I suspect the term came into common use for scanners. The ppi resolution is generally used when referring to a digital image. However, in my view the terms can be very reasonably considered interchangeable in most cases.