I had taken some photos over the weekend, and I was processing them in Lightroom when I noticed that the software was acting unusually. When I applied a preset, the preview worked perfectly, but it took a few seconds to actually apply. At first I thought that maybe this was an issue with the new version of Lightroom, so I quit and restarted. It was then that I noticed another weird issue: the software was still trying to write the metadata to disk. So I thought that maybe my disk was running out of space. I checked, and there was still lots of room. Curiouser and curiouser I thought. While it turned out not to be a disk space issue, I was actually close to the source of the problem, thinking it was disk-related.

Adobe has released the latest round of Lightroom and Camera RAW updates, and in this article we’re going to concentrate on Lightroom Classic. Aside from the usual under-the-hood tweaks and bug fixes, Lightroom Classic 15.5 adds three new key features, one of which I’ve been asking for for a long time!

On a recent trip to London, I took quite a few photos and some video at the top of the Shard, one of London’s most famous buildings. I have already posted a few of these, and there are a lot more to come. However, in this post, I wanted to talk about the challenges I faced editing a subset of the images I took and how I addressed them. I ended up using both Lightroom and DaVinci Resolve’s new photo editing mode for these. The latter is something I particularly want to talk about, as it has some interesting abilities, as well as some quirks that those not familiar with the software should be aware of.

I know it’s kind of a cliché, but I really do love the whole fake tilt-shift miniature thing. It’s even better with a time-lapse, but it works great on stills too. However, to get the best out of the trick, you really need photos taken from the right angle and elevation. In other words, from a tall building (or plane or drone). Luckily, I was recently in such a position, thanks to an impromptu trip up the Shard in London. I was just processing these normally, and then I thought to make a few as miniatures too.

I wrote a while ago about the issues I was having with my Canon RF24-105mm F4L. I noted that for some bizarre reason, the lens got softer at 24mm as you stopped down from f4. This is the opposite of what normally happens with a lens. I went through significant testing to make sure I wasn’t doing something stupid and to try to identify the problem. I also contacted Canon, and they said this was not normal behaviour and that I should send it in for service, as it was still under warranty. So I did that, and last week, after it took a month, I got the lens back. The results, unfortunately, were disappointing.

We were recently heading to Belfast for a meeting, and because the road from Dublin to Belfast can be a bit boring and monotonous (it’s just one long motorway), my wife and I decided to take the coastal route instead. So, we turned off at Newry and first stopped at Warrenpoint for Lunch, before heading on to Newcastle. I had never taken this route before, and I was quite impressed by the scenery. But it was coming into Newcastle that really blew me away.

With Adobe recently adding lots of new features to Camera RAW that so far aren’t in Lightroom, users of Lightroom may be wondering how to get access to some of those new tools. Well, it’s actually very straightforward, and you can use Camera RAW from Lightroom entirely non-destructively. You just need to follow the simple workflow below.

The news that Adobe has agreed to acquire Topaz Labs has hit the creative community with a collective “what the f….”. For anyone who relies on tools like Gigapixel, Photo AI, and Video AI, I’m sure this news is a bit of a worrying development, especially if you’re one of those creators who had exited the Adobe ecosystem (”you fool … there is no escape!”).

After a rather bleak and dull start to the year, it’s always nice when the grey world of winter springs to life. And while Spring has its own charms, things really explode into vividness once summer hits. I have always been fascinated by flowers and plants, not necessarily from a “nature” point of view, but by the wonderful colours and textures of the natural world. I guess the designer and artist in me just won’t quit.

With the last few Photoshop releases, Adobe has kept adding new features to Camera RAW. Usually, these would be added to Lightroom either at the same time or with the following release, but so recently, this hasn’t been the case. And these haven’t been minor features either, we’re talking some big, long-sought-after tools, including the colour corrector in masks, and the ability to adjust the edges and feathering of AI masks. Are we seeing a different strategy emerging from Adobe regarding its photography applications?

I’ve finally upgraded the site to Squarespace 7.1 and used the opportunity to redesign the layout and try out a few new features. It’s not perfect yet, but it already feels cleaner and more modern, with changes like removing the old sidebar and adding a new “Featured Posts” section on the home page. There are still some quirks to fix, like featured images no longer appearing automatically, plus a few spacing and menu tweaks still on the list. Read on for more details.

DXO is running a special Father’s Day promotion, and my readers can get 20% off with the code THOMAS_FD26. That’s pretty much it, really! The offer runs until June 28th, and it’s only valid for new customers, I’m afraid.

A set of June updates to Adobe’s Photography applications will be released later this week. This will include Lightroom Classic, Lightroom, Photoshop and so on. For the most part, these will be bug fixes and new camera support, but there are a couple of things worth noting.

The start of this year has been a bit weird for me, photographically speaking. I haven’t taken a large number of photographs for various reasons. The terrible weather being one of them. However, over the first six months, I have taken a few street photos, and while there aren’t many, I thought I would share them here.