Lightroom has become the industry standard for editing images quickly but when it comes to viewing and culling images, it's still incredibly slow. On1 has recently launched Perfect Browse 9.5 as the fastest way to burn through hundreds or thousands of raw files and then import your favorites into Lightroom for editing. Oh, and did I mention, it's totally free for Fstoppers readers right now.
As a wedding photographer, I tend to shoot thousands of images at a time. Before I can edit anything, I need to go through each image one by one, delete the bad ones, and figure out which images are actually worth editing/delivering. Lightroom is notoriously slow at loading raw files and therefore, culling thousands of images can take hours. Even if each image takes just 1 second to load, that extra time could add an hour to your workflow. In some cases with slower computers and larger files, each image can take longer than 5 seconds to load which in turn can add hours to your editing process.
I recently downloaded On1's Perfect Browse 9.5 and installed it on my computer. I moved 233 D810 raw files (around 70MB each and 16.2GB total) into a folder on my SSD C: drive and then opened the software. The software itself took about 3 seconds to load. I then imported the photos and the software seemed to hang for about 5 seconds and then BOOM, every raw file thumbnail instantly appeared. I double clicked on an image and it became full screen without any hesitation. I tapped the right arrow key on the keyboard and the next image appeared instantly. I then held the right arrow key down and I saw hundreds of raw files flying across my screen without any sort of lag. Zooming in 100% on any image (something that I almost never do while culling) is the only thing that took any time at all at around 4-6 seconds. I opened up my task manager (yes I use Windows) and I kept an eye on the Ram usage of Perfect Browse and it appeared to be using right around 3GB of RAM to keep all 233 images ready at a moments notice.
In case you were wondering, the star rating system in Perfect Browse carries over to Lightroom making complex categorizing extremely quick as well. Obviously we all wish that Lightroom was capable of shuttling through raw files at these kinds of speeds but until that day comes, Perfect Browse 9.5 is the fastest and most simple way to view and cull large amounts of raw files that I've ever used.
Luckily you don't have to take my word for it. We've teamed up with On1 to allow every Fstoppers reader to have this $60 software for free. This offer will not be around forever so if you are interested, jump on this now. Download it here for free, give it a try, and let us know how you like it in the comments below.
Thank you! Can't wait to use it! Fstoppers rocks!
Let us know how it works for you.
In the first 5 minutes I can already tell you Photo Mechanic is being replaced! Really great tool. You guys and your partnerships are invaluable to the photographic community at large! We are all in this together, there's plenty of work to go around!
Glad to hear you like it. Enjoy!
I'm kind of seeing the opposite, it seems to be a little slower than PM. Still excited to give it a try, though. I'm going to use it instead of PM for my next shoot!
Hey Mike, thats not a response we hear about Perfect Browse, so we would be happy to help you out and make sure everything is in place for you. Please contact support@on1.com for free technical service.
CONS:
There is no multitasking when importing photos. Also copying is at same "speed" as LR.
I dont know howto set Album location.
I didnt find an easy way to create folder and import all photos from camera to it, I use select all and copy & paste, I hope I missed something.
There is some rainbow on previews (few px at bottom of almost all photos).
It is very simple, one would say ugly, but hey, it is for free and it is working on Mac.
There are some strange shortcuts like for removing stars.
PROS:
I own LR5 and LR CC, but I wont use them from today on (I use them for culling only).
There is some magic behind, I have no idea how they do previews that fast.
The price is perfect.
I also upgraded to version 10. Sweet as can be. Has finally support for showing images from subfolders without diving in. They had great discounts during X-Mas.
I am way beyond frustrated- this version won't even open. It just crashes and give up an error report. Tech support has been unable to isolate the issue and I finally went to Paypal for a refund.
First, the download link from the web page caused Microsoft security tool "EMET" to terminate Firefox.
Second, when I downloaded from the email, the file was tagged as unsafe by Norton Internet Security and removed. This unsafe rating is based on there being little to no usage of the software within the Norton community and not based on any specific threats. So perhaps this software is a special version for Fstoppers?
Haha MS security and Norton. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Yeah no.
Huh?
Tam is apparently one of those who thinks you should only use apple to edit photos. At least that's what I imagine "hahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha" means. I don't see anything in the paragraph above that isn't already done with photo mechanic. I'd like to hear you do a side by side comparison if possible, otherwise PM is just as fast. I can cull a full wedding in no time with PM.
Photo Mechanic is also my go-to tool. But you can't argue that "free" is appealing!
Joke's on you. I actually own a PC. Diehard Microsoft fan. That said, I think their security software is shit. And so is Norton's.
Hahaha you made my day!! xD
Norton is probably one of the worst antiviruses out there. It's usually very poorly ranked in various tests.
I think PhotoMechanic is faster than this :-)
After trying it for a few mintues, I agree.
Looked promising but after installing it just shuts down every time I open it.
Give your computer specs and settings here and maybe they will be able to help you.
I seemed to get it working. Just had to shut down Chrome. But here they are anyway:
Windows 7 Home Service pack 1
Intel Core2 Quad CPU Q9650 @ 3.00GHz
8 GB memory
64-bit operating system
Hey Anthony Solis, email support@on1.com for free technical support and trouble shooting. Your computer specs would be very helpful as well!
Thank you for this. I quickly skimmed through the software and I like what I see so far.
Playing with it, it seems great, just not any different from Photo Mechanic, BUT it's hard to beat free!
Thank you Fstoppers! It is indeed fast. Do you or does anyone know if there is there a way to persuade Perfect Browse to treat raw+jpeg or dng+jpeg as the same file, as in LR?
It does not currently ignore the jpeg like Lightroom, but an on1 rep replied to another user in these comments and said they would add it to the list for the next dev.
As a user of Photo Mechanic (I love it!) this is actually pretty exciting. It's hard to argue with "free." It seems like there are bugs at the moment (of course, it's new) but I'm pretty intrigued to see how this fits in the marketplace, considering PM's foothold.
Works great and for speed would be pretty much on par with Photo Mechanic, yet has the same quirks PM has ... random freezes for seconds when sorting or rating photo's. I understand that might take time but can't that be done in the background? Cba if sorting takes time but rating/flagging... I just want to move on when I smash that P or 5 button!
Big Thanks Lee and all to all Fstoppers, i really wished for something like this, since lightroom archive the photos in many folders which im not a big fan of.
Norton AntiVirus scanned and removed the download and flagged it as a virus.
http://www.on1.com/support/1179/
Threat identified by Norton as WS.Reputation.1
Like many other software packages, they recommend the first step to installing is to turn off or temporarily disable your antivirus software. It is pretty normal for antivirus to find false positives in new software packages (especially Norton), and this download is very new. On1 submits all their installers to all the major AV brands so it should clear up within a couple days. When you are downloading from a big company like this you can safely ignore alerts like you are getting. If you are downloading from a site you aren't sure of, you should be more wary.
Note that the WS.Reputation.1 is Norton's worst classification and even they don't really listen to it... http://community.norton.com/en/forums/clarification-wsreputation1-detection
Get rid of Norton. :) Norton is terrible. I work in IT and I see more customers with Norton get viruses than people without any virus protection at all.
I downloaded and installed it before finishing the first paragraph of this post (lol). Thanks Lee!
Lightroom CAN be used with no lag for culling, just follow this:
- Import and apply presets
- Go to library grid mode (key "G")
- Select all photos and go to menu Library - Previews - Build Standard Sized Previews
Although it takes some minutes to complete, now moving from photo to photo in Library mode is instant. Not in develop mode though.
The only problem with this process is that it can take a long time to build the 1:1 previews, especially on a 1500 RAW file wedding.
If you don't usually zoom to 100%, you don't need 1:1. standard sized will do, and it's faster to build. It have to be larger than your window size though, set it on Catalog Settings > File Handling > Standard Preview Size
With the On1 App, you just view the files and instantly have 1:1 access. It will save hours off the Adobe preview-building workflow on a large shoot.
Okay, here's a quirk (in comparison with Photo Mechanic) if you shoot RAW + JPG: As you arrow through the pictures, it displays both the RAW and JPG file, so you see the photo twice. Any way to have it just display one or the other?
We'll add it to the list for the next rev, Mike.
Rick LePage
on1
.
That's awesome Dustin! Was the preview quick for you?
Just tried it out myself. Seems to be working pretty well, especially with accepting ratings made in-camera.
thanks! Fstoppers rock!
This one goes to the Fs Team!
I wish software like this or photo mechanic could be used as a plug-in for Lightroom. Great offer none-the-less!
Justin, once you've made your selections (or winnowed out the rejects), you can select those images headed to LR, right-click, and use the "Send to Lightroom" item. All of you photos will then transfer to LR's Import dialog box, with ratings and keywords intact.
that's pretty handy, thanks!