Today’s Question: I use Lightroom Classic, but sometimes edit photos in Photoshop. Why do I sometimes see Camera Raw when I open a raw image in Photoshop, but other times I don’t see Camera Raw and the image just opens in Photoshop?
Tim’s Quick Answer: If you’re using Lightroom Classic to manage your photos, you should never see the Camera Raw dialog in Photoshop unless you’ve used the Camera Raw filter. The Camera Raw dialog appears when you open a raw image directly in Photoshop rather than sending the image from Lightroom Classic.
More Detail: When you send a raw capture to Photoshop from Lightroom Classic, the source raw image is rendered based on the adjustment settings from the Develop module, opening in Photoshop without the Camera Raw dialog coming up. When you save that image, it will automatically be saved with the file type and settings established on the External Editing tab of the Preferences dialog in Lightroom Classic.
If you’re seeing the Camera Raw dialog in Photoshop when a raw image is opened, it means you opened the raw image directly in Photoshop rather than sending it from Lightroom Classic. That is something that should be avoided because, for example, it will cause a metadata mismatch with Camera Raw updating settings for the image that are not reflected in Lightroom Classic.
When using Lightroom Classic to manage images, the only time you should see the Camera Raw dialog in Photoshop is if you chose to use the Camera Raw filter, which can be accessed by choosing Filter > Camera Raw Filter from the menu in Photoshop. This enables you to have the same adjustment options as Camera Raw (or the Develop module in Lightroom Classic) while working on an image layer in Photoshop.
