Bought Lightroom 3 and have PS CS4. Upgrade to CS5?

[mrcultureshock]

Hello,

I'm using Photoshop CS4 Extended at the moment and I recently bought Lightroom 3. I plan to open RAW files in LR then move to PS if necessary. Do you guys think if this combination works well? Do I even have to consider upgrading to CS5?

BTW I'm not a pro; photography is just a hobby.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Steve]

Probably not.
I went from CS3 to CS5 and there are a few nice changes in that upgrade.
Lightroom 3 is going to give you the Raw support you need for new cameras for a while, so that's not an issue.

I don't know if ACR is the same in both programs though, LR3 and CS5.
In CS5 there's a lens correction module which I like, a great noise reduction module and HDR Pro.
HDR Pro is good, not great, but it's better than what I had in CS3 which was nothing.

The real big deal in CS5 is Content Aware fill, but it's not living up to all the hype.
Under the right conditions it works great, but a lot of times Clone Stamp works better.

You should download it and try it for yourself and see what you think.

 

[Dezigns Unlimited]

I do agree with Steve to a certain degree but there are more Big Deals in CS5, Content Aware is good and works in the right situation. There is also the new Redefine Tool which is a major upgrade to Ps CS5, also the new Puppet Tool has came in handy many times!!

I can usually get by with Camera RAW, don't really see the need for Light Room... of course that's just my opinion...

 

[Steve]

I haven't used puppet much but "Refine Edge" is a major improvement over CS3, not sure about CS4.

 

[mrcultureshock]

Thanks for the replies guys!

 

[sPECtre]

It all depends if your camera is supported by Camera Raw 5.X, included in CS4.
Also, I don't think that you could import raw files that had lens corrections done as smart objects.
You should be able to import them as TIFF or PSD files, though.