Lightroom Workflow and Nik Software

[jlg759]

Hello,

I have a question about using Lightroom and the NIK collection. When using the NIK software it creates a copy of the raw file and then when you save you have two of the same file one is the original raw and the second is the processed tiff file. What you end up with is two of the same file. I know your not supposed to delete the raw file so what do you do? I thought about saving all my raws to an external hard drive and keeping just the processed files in my Lightroom. Any suggestions as to what others are doing.

Thanks

Joe

 

[clee01l]

You do not have "two of the same file". One is the original RAW photo site data, unadjusted. The other is a processed RGB pixel data file saved in a Lossless TIFF format (as opposed to a lossy 8 bit JPEG). The original is the starting point, the TIFF sent to Nik represents the intermediate file having both LR and NIK adjustments. If your final derivative is a JPEF made from the Nik TIFF then the only way to recreate the Nik adjustments is to sent the LR processed RAW file to the Nik external editor. So if you want to export the Nik processing to a JPEG more than one time, you need the intermediate TIFF to export from. This is a good reason to keep it. If you want to improve the processing when newer processing technology is available, you will need the original RAW file and an external editor of your choice that has the improved technology. It may be well worth noting that the Nik Software will soon be non functioning and not run on some future release of Windows or MacOS. It is already obsolete and hasn't been supported in several years.

 

[JimHess43]

In my opinion, it is always a good idea to keep the original raw file (or DNG file if you prefer to go that way) available in Lightroom. It's the file that has the most data and provides you the greatest flexibility in postprocessing. It is the file from which you can most freely generate different versions using different effects. I would never want to be without my original raw files being available in Lightroom. The Nik collection of Plug-ins used to be quite valuable and a major part of my workflow. But Lightroom has improved tremendously and I no longer use Nik nearly as much. I occasionally turn to it for a little noise reduction when I have used high ISO settings, But other than that I use it very little anymore. In any event, keep the raw files!