October 2021 Update of Adobe Lightroom
Gary Detonnancourt
Latest updates in Adobe Lightroom
Let’s have a look at the major enhancements and new features of Lightroom Classic’s latest version below:
Enhanced editing with masking:
Masking is the headline addition in the latest lightroom version. Arguably, it is a complete game-changer.
Masking Icon
Masking Options
The local adjustment tools have merged into a solo masking icon. The icon is available in the tool strip. Clicking it will let you have a popped-up selection tools list, that includes the prior local adjustment tools that are known as Radial Gradient, Linear Gradient, and brush tools. This list also includes the Color Range mask, Depth Range Mask, and Luminance Range Mask.
Two new options in the list Select Subject and Select Sky:
These two new options are based on Artificial Intelligence to select an animal, sky, person, animal, or any other object that’s a clear part of your selected image. This one-click solution really performs well.
Select Subject
Inverting this mask selects the background.
Improved workflow for metadata
The customize button allows you to select what fields are in your metatdata.
Even though this feature isn't as exciting as masking, the metadata panel has gotten a redesign. Now it will allow you to control which field you want to customize completely. You can open and customize the metadata panel by clicking the customize button.
Batch edit improvements
Adobe Lightroom’s recent release has also brought performance improvements because you can now apply editing to a batch of images easily. This way, you can quickly update previews in Survey, Secondary Grid, and Grid mode.
When you will apply batch editing on a larger number of images, you can put the metadata panel in Edit-Only mode to speed up performance.
Auto-Save in XMP
The recent release also offers several enhancements when you select write changes into XMP automatically. The XMP file will be automatically saved when there is any change in any image’s metadata. You can also pause this auto-save feature in the Catalog Settings.
Additional Features:
New Premium Presets sets are also available in Lightroom Classic to let you achieve your creative vision effectively. Premium Presets are now available with 8 new categories, Black & White, Food, Landscape, Urban Architecture, Lifestyle, Retro, Travel II, and Cinematic II. Adobe Lightroom has also come up with camera matching color profiles for Canon Picture Styles.
You can now filter your content by a specific date as well.
File storage has also been optimized. You can now find the “.lrcat-data” file in the same folder of the catalog file. This file will have essential information about your images.
All of these amazing enhancements are now available to use after the October 2021 release of Adobe Lightroom.
