Lightroom: Support Common Image Formats (EPS, GIF, PDF, BMP etc.)

With today's software updates and new releases of the apps, you can now export your photos as PNGs in both Lightroom Classic and in Adobe Camera Raw (ACR):

https://theblog.adobe.com/august-photography-releases/

"With this release, we have added a new file format for your export needs. You can now export images in the PNG file format. Importing PNG files have been supported in previous Lightroom versions."

It is a small babystep (more like a crawl, really) in the right direction. But I think the broad topic here is about imports, not exports.

Exports are way easier. Anyone can export to any lossless format and use some batch process to turn them into PNG. Importing file formats is where LR needs to add support, because preprocessing them makes duplicate files to keep track of, and cannot ever work for animated files.

Also:

http://feedback.photoshop.com/photosh...

At the top of this thread at the bottom of the original post, click the "+1" button to the right of "4 people like this idea".

Though a slight extra step, Lee, it seems like it would be fine to have users manually specify which file formats they want Lightroom to support. Some graphics applications let you check and uncheck desired file formats during the installation process (usually with the ability to later update those settings).

Additionally though, Lightroom should be able to display the imported images to some degree. If not, how would you know the images are cataloged or available?

Beyond that, if it is too difficult to support editing and exporting from within Lightroom, I think it would be fine to hand the editing off to another application. This could be done similar to the ability to edit Lightroom images in Photoshop.

Depending on the file type, if someone tries to edit an unsupported image format in Lightroom, the application could even display an "Edit in Photoshop?" or "Edit in Illustrator?" dialog box.

Thank you for your suggestion. ...pt

"Additionally though, Lightroom should be able to display the imported images to some degree. If not, how would you know the images are cataloged or available? "

You'd have an icon, with the filename in it, like you have in an OS for a file type the OS doesn't recognize.

"Beyond that, if it is too difficult to support editing and exporting from within Lightroom, I think it would be fine to hand the editing off to another application. This could be done similar to the ability to edit Lightroom images in Photoshop."

That's actually quite complicated. How about a "just open the file like what would happen if you double click it in the OS"?

No, Lee. Lightroom needs the ability to actually *display* these other common image types, just as Bridge can do.

I noticed that Bridge provides Open and/or Open With context menu choices to open files. For consistency, that approach would probably be best for Lightroom.

Thank you for your ideas towards a solution. ...pt

It is actually worse than this - Lightroom gives certain file types (e.g., jpeg and png) the same namespace. Thus, if you have two files of the same name with these different extensions, only one can be shown in Lightroom. 

In general, LR allows you to have many files in a folder all with the same basename but different extensions, e.g. a.arw, a.dng, a.jpg, a.mov, a.nef, a.png, a.psd, a.tif:



There's a special case of JPEGs getting paired with raw files, but you can disable that behavior with the option Preferences > General > Treat JPEG Files Next To Raw Files As Separate Photos.

Have you observed otherwise?

Thanks, John, for this reply. I'll look into this. Assume your suggestion worked unless you hear otherwise.

Saying Bridge has broader format support because it has the other Creative Suite applications available to send files to is a fallacy. Bridge has no problem cataloging my MS Office/LibreOffice/iWork files, and the last time I checked those aren't part of the Creative Suite. Doesn't seem to have a problem cataloging ZIP files and other archive formats. Doesn't even seem to have a problem cataloging my Aperture, iPhoto, and Photobooth libraries. Know what happens when I double click on my Aperture library from within Bridge? It opens Aperture. No error saying it doesn't know what to do with it, no dialog confirmation or question about what I intended to do, just passes the handling of it off to the proper application. Even when those applications are not part of the Creative Suite. I could, right now, completely remove Photoshop, Illustrator, and the rest of the Creative Suite from my computer. All but Bridge. And then I could direct Bridge to send PDFs to Preview, PSDs/PNGs/DNGs/etc to Pixelmator/GIMP/Acorn/etc. Know what would happen? It'd pass those files on to the proper applications without complaint.

Lightroom is essentially Bridge+ACR with much more limited file format support. Giving Lightroom broader file support isn't requesting that it be able to edit these files, we just want to be able to catalog them, to make Lightroom a proper DAM so we don't HAVE to use multiple programs to keep track of our day to day work.

Thank you, Jay, for your vote for adding to Lightroom "broader file support."

Bridge is essentially a folder browser tool that happens to be able to broker requests from other apps. So, in that respect it is completely unlike Lightroom.

and a good reason why it crashes and it has been useless for large files and network image storage

You might want to get some help with that -- since other people are using Bridge just fine without so many crashes and problems.

It might help. I think it has issues with large files, and the way it exoprts resize is amateur and clunky at best....Although I have only used it when CS5 was on its second update. I also read that it has issues with 64bit Win7 . Who doesn't use more mem than 4Gb these days when working with the average camera producing 14mpixels and more. In my case 22 to 40. and @ 16bits with a few layers within minutes you have a GB size file. If Bridge can't handle it..hand off to LR.

I have gone and removed all the files it makes the 2 cache files in each folder and left it at that. ACDSee is much better at this, as it the Batch Resize tool alone , other than Batch Export is leaps ahead.

I think the bigger issue is that Lightroom is single-user only.  If somehow (I'm not holding my breath) Lightroom became multi-user, then a full-on DAM would make more sense as part of a workgroup or enterprise solution. 

As i said, i'm not holding my breath.  The rest of what used to be Creative Suite is multi-user, with enterprise pricing.  Why not Lightroom? 

there is a "techical reason," which is that the SQLite database used by Lightroom is inherently single-user.  But that's just an excuse.  Adobe could easily replace that database.

Well, apparently the team thinks there is. There was even an argument as to whether .psds should be included since they aren't produced by cameras. .psds got in, but only with maximize on which means they are rendered and LR displays only the rendered image and ignores the rest.

Many people think the most important new file format for LR to support is .psb.

You didn't comment on my proposed solution above. I'm interested to know if you'd find that adequate or not.

It seems like the Lightroom "team" should start listening to users, Lee, and not just to the echo chamber of other team members.

Customers who buy and use the product have a different perspective than software engineers and product managers.

Many users agree that support for additional file formats would be helpful.

The devil is in the details. What does "support for additional file formats" mean to you? Because it won't necessarily mean the same for someone else.

>>The devil is in the details. What does "support for additional file formats" mean to you? Because it won't necessarily mean the same for someone else.

Hi, John. At its most basic, support for additional image formats means that Lightroom would be able to display and catalog more formats. So when browsing, say, a client's photo shoot images, I could also see their logo and Web banner files too. Juggling Lightroom and Bridge to do this today is a real time waster.

While it would also be nice if Lightroom could edit more image formats, I can live without that if editing is too big of an engineering challenge. In that case, just open the image for editing in its native application. But let's at least be able to see and organize these other files from within Lightroom.

If that makes sense to you, please vote for this feature request.

Thanks. ...pt

AMMMMMMMMEEEENNNN!!!!!! For the love of imagery! Somebody listen to this man! (PT). I've been saying this myself and now found the right place!

Do not let it edit other foramts, No...just so we can see they exist! Hand off to the correct app to edit.
It should act as the MOTHER of Bridge and image files, as Bridge is crippled when it comes to networks, large files...it has no clue what to do and crashes. Lets leave bridge out of this.

We image makers need a MANAGER for ALL our image files, and since LR is being such a good Librarian, Give it some support to at least SEE! You have bottled up LR as if its some Fine Art ONLY tool that I'm gonna make some award winning archival print of Yosemite...Come on..We make images that get published in magazines, and websites and different color spaces...GEEZ why cant I know if the file is RGB or CMYK??16Bit or 8Bit..its in the Meta...Why cant I see that info??

People please ..if you think you should at least see previews of images...VOTE for this!

Only other option is to have another DAManager to license the preview of RAW developers from ACR/LR, and Capture One.

If LR does support other images, it would surely pull far ahead and gain large market share from C1 users.

Wholly in agreement with what Raffi and Phil have to say!

No, it wasn't. Bridge and Lightroom are completely different programs.

Thanks for the correction John, it was just what I was told at the time (that Bridge suffered from trying to support so many formats)

One could just as well point to many other image cataloguing apps of the same era - iView, Extensis ACDeeSee etc - that performed well while supporting many different file types. It's just an obvious line in the sand, and perhaps those who draw it are the same as those who were once against video features?

Not agin Video features here;)
I'm definitely not against any features in LR, just saying , hope it doesn't screw anything up;)

Hi, Simon. Of course, none of us want to add features that will make Lightroom run sluggishly.

But as John replied, other applications handle numerous file formats without undue problems. With proper engineering, Lightroom would seem capable of supporting some additional file formats, too.

My point really was the Bridge simply did not work in one version, (on my system - and on quite a few other people's) it was as frustrating as blazes. I would just hate to have that happen in LR. Thanks for the reassurances:)

Bridge in CS5 doesn't work either. It is really waste of time.

I think of course it would be smart to approach LR like other DAM viewers...Enable the format you want it to support..Like ACDSee is rather good at this...but has other issues as it tries to be a RAW dev, and stretching itself as Video as well...so. (Besides its lack of support within its other amanger apps with Metadata ..a mess really).
LR has a very logical approach with organization. Metadata, libraries...lots of "safety warnings" before an execution, etc and makes it easy to use and manage. I think the LEAST LR can do is support its on family of product file tiypes..CS!!?? ..that is the you getting used to just marketing corporate mumbo jumbo...You the heck are you making this stuff for?!! Internal use only??

OK- I voted;)

Thank you, Simon, for voting to add support for more of the common file types we use all the time.