Adobe Releases Lightroom Updates with New Profiles Feature and More

As it continues to improve its core photography products, Adobe released a new version of its Lightroom products with a concentration on new color profiles, user-interface adjustments, and bug fixes.

Update: We've also added some videos that highlight these features below. While Camera Profiles were something few often changed more than once (if at all) while editing, Adobe realized both the opportunity and the need to make this a more important, robust, and useful feature in Lightroom. The new feature, now called, "Profiles," will move to the top of the Basic panel in order to make it more usable. Given Lightroom's updates to the feature, this move makes sense and will be the first place you start when editing a photo.

The new profiles are now split into three categories of Adobe Raw profiles, Camera Matching profiles, and Creative profiles. Six new Adobe Raw profiles still allow you to apply different methods of rendering to your raw images with Adobe's presets (the default for which was perviously Adobe Standard), but with improved color science. Adobe's Camera Matching Profiles do the same thing, but with the goal of closely emulating each brand's in-camera profiles. And over 40 new Creative profiles allow one-click creative edits that are finally editable with an Amount slider to make them useful for more than pleasing filter-loving Instabrides.

While Adobe Standard is still remaining as an option, the new default raw profile, Adobe Color, brings changes that many have requested in order to help warm tones and gradients between various tones look more natural and smooth. Other profiles include the remaining five Adobe Raw profiles (Adobe Monochrome, Adobe Portrait, Adobe Landscape, Adobe Neutral, and Adobe Vivid), all of the same Camera Matching profiles (which are now also available in Lightroom CC for the first time), and the 40 new Creative profiles split into four groups: Artistic, Black & White, Modern, and Vintage.

Just as with Adobe Standard, these profiles are intended to bring every photograph — regardless of camera brand or model — to a similar starting point so you can more easily process images from different cameras side-by-side with the same edits for a unified approach to color. Those who upgrade cameras over the years or who deal with ingesting photographs from multiple photographers with their own systems shouldn't have to worry about throwing out old presets or creating custom ones for each situation if using the Adobe Raw profiles.

With these new features reworked for utility, it makes sense to house them in the new location at the top of your workflow, as it's now much more likely we may actually begin individual edits with a switch to the profile that best matches the subject matter.

Along with the new Profiles update, Lightroom Classic CC will have the Dehaze feature moved to its Basic Panel while it will also feature an expanded tone curve panel for more precise control and a more accurate face-recognition algorithm.

Adobe's Lightroom CC for desktop is also gaining support for network-attached storage (NAS) devices while Lightroom CC for iOS welcomes some new features such as the Geometry tab as a premium feature for adjusting perspective, the Grain adjustment, left-handed mode for iPad, layout optimizations for the iPhone X, updated Camera Raw support, and improved control over Lightroom CC Web shares to enable downloading, viewing metadata, and viewing location data. In addition to the same improvements, where they make sense, the Details tab with Noise Reduction and Sharpening will also come to Lightroom CC Android.

These updates are available now through Adobe Creative Cloud.

UPDATE: All of the new releases naturally include bug fixes, and a new Photoshop CC update is also available with the updated camera support in Camera Raw. If you do not see the update immediately available within the Creative Cloud Apps tab, clicking on the menu and manually checking for updates may show the downloads available to you.

An overview of Profiles in Lightroom Classic CC is featured above, but below is a similar video for Lightroom CC:

UPDATE 2: I have personally had several crashes, but usually after not using Lightroom for some time, coming back to it, and switching to a different image. If I continue using it without a break, it seems okay so far. But there are also reports of crashes in other small scenarios. As always, it's recommended to wait until the first spree of bug fixes come out if you rely on your software for critical work every day to avoid unnecessary downtime.

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Adam works mostly across California on all things photography and art. He can be found at the best local coffee shops, at home scanning film in for hours, or out and about shooting his next assignment. Want to talk about gear? Want to work on a project together? Have an idea for Fstoppers? Get in touch! And, check out FilmObjektiv.org film rentals!

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34 Comments

Im not at home to try this yet, but if i have profiles like RNI or VSCO, will they show a preview frame just like the new Adobe ones?

You can now roll over presets with your mouse and you get a real preview which is nice.
In terms of old presets that had camera specific profiles...I don't think they carry over in the new Camera Profiles section. For example, RNI just released a new Profiles pack in coordination with this update...so I am assuming that their previous profiles aren't built according to the new methodology.

I was just referring to camera profiles provided by the preset makers not the presets themselves. I just updated and checked it. Old camera profiles are updated and added to the new profiles grid. It gives you preiviews of each one just like the new Adobe developed ones.

The new RNI profiles pack was meant fro the CC lightroom, not the classic version.

I had some own build camera calibration profiles and they are gone! Also my Nikon ones are not seen. LR classic looks like a smartphone app now. I guess the next step is to get rid of it as it is like LR CC more and more.

If you're in Classic LR, they're still there, under Legacy.

My question is why can’t they be adjusted like in Lightroom classic where I can adjust the hue and saturation of the different color channels to taste? And while this feature may be nice I would still rather have the ability to import custom presets like VSCO or Mastin labs

I don't think that feature will go away

You can still have your presets. Profiles ≠ Presets ;-) One changes the way Adobe renders the raw file, and the other are changes made on top of the file after the render, although you can apparently still apply profiles to non-raw images for added flexibility in creating various looks, etc., if you want.

Yes, but VSCO /also/ uses profiles, IIRC. That's how they achieve such subtle color tweaks; by actually manipulating RGB curves or something, in the DNG Camera Profile Editor that you can download separately. But I think you have to do it for literally every single camera you want to support, or you at least have to have one raw file for every single camera, so you can load that profile as a recipe on the raw file, then save it as a new profile. But I'm getting off track.

The real question is, how will VSCO etc. integrate these new options into their own presets. Or, as I think some here are asking, ...could these new profiles actually render (some of) the "looks" redundant, that were only previously possible by a preset that involved a custom profile?

They could render some of those redundant, but I think they'll still long be their own customized presets. The new setup does enable/allow for third-party profiles; and some companies/photographers (such as DVLOP, etc.) have already started working with Adobe on this and I believe have some out...

Support for NAS is very interesting

I was assuming that meant catalog could be stored on a NAS device. That is something that has not been available.

Isn't this only for Lightroom CC, Not for Classic?

Correct. You could previously store originals on a NAS device in Classic, but I don't believe you could with CC before now. But catalogs still have to stay on the local drive, etc.

Super unhappy about that and they screwed up the order of my own presets.

too little too late. Capture one all the way.

I've only had a few minutes to play with it...but so far I really love the updated profiles section. The creative profiles are much more useful, in my opinion, than presets and having an opacity slider is really great.

LR Classic. Click a profile and then command Z to undo causes it to crash every single time.

Don't you mean, crashing = classic Lightroom? :-P :-(

Can we now call it color grading like the cool kids using Capture One? lol

So first question would be HOW DO I REMOVE THIS CRAP from my presets? I don't need a bunch of one and done presets that I can't move or delete! And thanks for making all my presets out of order with no way to reorder. Or am I just overreacting and Adobe isn't trying to screw me up with this shite?

I wouldn't worry so much. These are not presets, and your presets will stay the same. These are just profiles. Some people may never even use them. But the new default will be the improved Adobe Color for a better starting point. And now you basically just have the option to switch that to something else, like a Camera Matching profile or a different Adobe one, etc., right at the top before you begin editing without going all the way down to the Camera Calibration module, which is what you'd have to do before.

But for now, it stays nicely collapsed in its own small area unless you expand it.

I don't have a problem with that part, just the reordering of my presets. And they should've added their crap to the bottom or at least giving the option to reorder. I wonder if I can delete them from the folder.

Adam Ottke Think you're missing the point, Adam: the new profiles on the right in Develop are ok; but on the left there's a massive list of numbered presets they've added to the User Presets and the existing user presets have been reordered. Mine were alphabetical, now they're not.

So I decided to uninstall the 7.3 update...

I'm trying to see it, but I think something must have just gotten a bit messed up on your end. Yeah, I see a few new presets, but nothing massive or too major. And mine are still alphabetical. Maybe try again eventually? Of course, always recommended to wait a week or two at least anyway while any potential new bugs get sorted out. Good luck!

Sorry but when she says SLIDERS, I can't not think of that old show, lol...

"What if you found a portal to a parallel universe?"

Some cautions for upgraders: 1) an entirely new catalog file will be created. Make sure you know where to find it. 2) two new desktop shortcuts will be created in addition to the shortcut already on your desktop. One for Classic (which I have) One for CC (which I do not). Confusing? Yes. 3) Your old catalog file is not compatible with your new lightroom update. If you open lightroom with your old desktop shortcut it will not be able to open the new catalog file. See #1. And as your trying to sort through all this, you won't be syncing. It's messy and a ClusterF. Take screen snippets of any messages you get from lightroom as you go through this process. You will need them. That is all!

I didn't face any of this on my update on a Windows 10 machine yesterday. The update to yesterdays new Classic CC v7.3 (April 2018) and had luckily no issues at all (knock on wood)

However I had a new catalogue file created with the last major update (I think the one that had also the "new" Lightroom CC, also worked perfectly on 3 or 4 catalogues). The shortcuts may coincide with the new file path (Adobe Lightroom Classic CC) of the newer version.

Has anyone tried sharpening Fujifilm RAW files yet?

This latest release is just rubbish.

I never installed a software with so many bugs. I thought it was me but just logged to the Adobe Lr Classic forum and Adobe are now advising to roll back to 7.2. Some of those that did that are complaining that the bugs persist.

Adobe 101. I just wish this company is wiped off the face of the Earth.