PSE 9 with Lightroom

[MVW22]

If you use Lightroom and have the Perfect Layers plug-in, does PSE 9 offer much else?
If you can't tell, I'm new to the PP world....
Thanks

[jiro]

If you use Lightroom and have the Perfect Layers plug-in, does PSE 9 offer much else?
If you can't tell, I'm new to the PP world....
Thanks

I wish I have PSE 9 and test-drive it so I can give you a good feedback, unfortunately I don't. However, if PSE 9 has layering capabilities then it is now in the hands of the user to fully utilize its features to help him edit his images better. An interesting thought would be - "why would adobe market totally distinct products if their features are overlapping?" My simple answer is... specific market niche. Photoshop for the advanced users, Lightroom for the professional photographers on the go, and PSE for the enthusiasts who want to start learning more about editing. Basically, that's how I see it or perhaps I am totally wrong about this.

[MVW22]

Thanks for the response, Willie. I tend to agree with your niche categories too... the more I read about who uses what programs and when. Not knowing much about PP I bought LR3 mainly because of the reviews and price (more than PSE, but much less than PS) - I thought it would be just right in the middle somewhere as far as processing power and abilities... Later, I found out that the real power of LR is its ability to manage photos (for the pro or someone with thousands and thousands of photos) and started to wonder if I was missing out on a lot post processing options that are maybe found in PSE - I pretty much ruled out Photoshop b/c of the price for me... I think for now I'll hold off on any other PP programs and continue to figure out lightroom. I probably still have 75% worth of that program to discover....

[jiro]

Thanks for the response, Willie. I tend to agree with your niche categories too... the more I read about who uses what programs and when. Not knowing much about PP I bought LR3 mainly because of the reviews and price (more than PSE, but much less than PS) - I thought it would be just right in the middle somewhere as far as processing power and abilities... Later, I found out that the real power of LR is its ability to manage photos (for the pro or someone with thousands and thousands of photos) and started to wonder if I was missing out on a lot post processing options that are maybe found in PSE - I pretty much ruled out Photoshop b/c of the price for me... I think for now I'll hold off on any other PP programs and continue to figure out lightroom. I probably still have 75% worth of that program to discover....

Thanks, Mark. If you will study the adjustment brush and the gradient tool of LR 3, those are pretty powerful add-ons to basic editing on LR. I really personally use LR from the start as soon as I import the files from the CF cards it goes directly to LR. Its intuitiveness is something that I have not seen before and I really like it.