Last week, Adobe released Lightroom CC Version 4.1.1 for iOS. While such "dot releases" are usually used as maintenance updates with bug fixes, performance improvements, and updated raw libraries, Lightroom CC Version 4.1.1 adds welcomed support for Apple Shortcuts.
It's OK if you haven't done anything with Shortcuts, or if you haven't even heard about it at all. While you can use Shortcuts for myriad purposes, it shines when you want to automate mundane tasks, especially when it involves several applications. One such case happens to involve Adobe Lightroom in a mobile environment. Prior to this update, you could copy any photos already added, or imported, to the Camera Roll into the Lightroom app relatively easily.
However, once you did so, you'd also have to remember to delete those photos from the camera roll, lest you end up with duplicate files not only taking up precious local storage space, but also cloud storage space (if you have iCloud Photo Stream syncing active), and bandwidth usage to get said photos synced up to the cloud. If you use multiple photo backup solutions concurrently, like Google Photos and iCloud Photos, your space and bandwidth usage would increase by an order of magnitude more. However, you really get kicked in the pants when you import all those big 'n juicy raw files from your camera over Wi-Fi or with an SD card adapter. Fortunately, things just got a bit easier.
For convenience, I've made this Shortcut available for you to import onto your iOS device. NOTE: You must first install the Shortcuts app from the iOS App Store before you can import and use this Shortcut.
Now that Lightroom for iOS supports Shortcuts, you can automate the following process after you import a new batch of photos.
- Execute the Lightroom Shortcut
- Aggregate those photos from the previous import
- Copy those photos to the Lightroom app
- Optional: You can also choose to apply a preset upon import
- Delete all the photos from that last import from the Camera Roll
Because this Shortcut will delete the last batch of imported photos that had just been copied to Lightroom from the Camera Roll, you can avoid storing duplicate files and unnecessarily taking up cloud storage space.
Download Adobe Lightroom CC from the iOS App Store: iPhone | iPad
Updates, okay I'll set my calendar to update one year from this date. The only thing they are successful at is raising their monthly prices while scamming people with buggy software while calling them pro editions. I really considering dropping to just Photoshop and Lightroom and giving up Premiere, etc. Tired of updating only to have to downgrade for a stable build and they do not care.
[Insert eye roll here]
When will adobe lightroom fix their bugs with andriods? Every time I would use the damn thing it would glitch and drop out so much I gave up using it.
creative cloud is the only reason i'm still hung up on Adobe and haven't migrated to Capture One. i'm invested in the Apple ecosystem, using an iMac for major work and an iPad Pro for OTG, fast edits or highly precise masks using the pencil. i prefer to not sit or stand at my desk as much as possible, so a growing abundance of work is done on my iPad Pro using CC mobile.
sure, i could dump some of my hardware for Microsoft, trading in the iPad Pro for a Wacom Cintiq Pro, just to obtain all of the versatility i enjoy now but on Capture One, but that's a huge investment in both time and money, something that's still just a hobby.
what would help is if Adobe would stop dragging their feet on the buildout of their mobile software like Lightroom CC Mobile. the lack of full history that carries over from Classic to Mobile, snapshot support and the ability to create luminosity masks this far into Lightroom Mobile's lifetime is frustrating, to say the least.
Preach