Tomas Mowlam takes a look at some of the excellent new features in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Version 3, including lens correction devices, tethered shooting and support for raw camera photo and video files.

This one’s for all you photographers out there – pros, beginners or otherwise. The new Adobe Lightroom is out and looking very good.

The first beta of version 3.0 was launched in October 2009, a second followed on 23 March 2010. This one has arrived soon after the last, so what’s different?

What is it?

Lightroom is more than a file browser, like Adobe Bridge, although it does help you to manage a lot of images. Although it mixes seamlessly with Photoshop, it’s not a full blown image editor. Its purpose is actually to combine the two; viewing, editing and managing.

It uses “nondestructive editing features” such as filters, exposure adjustments and colour controls to alter single photos or entire sets; all the time it offers a full variety of options for displaying or sharing your images.

What’s new?

Lightroom now supports raw files from over 290 models of camera giving you complete image integrity. Adobe has also extended the range of DSLR video formats that it will accept, so you can work on video and photo files side by side.

A lens correction feature, Lens Profiles and Manual Correction, lets you tweak images to remove all those small blemishes and annoyances. Adobe has also added new sliders that will let you alter your images for that ‘film’ look.

You can now watermark your pictures and put them into slideshows in order to show to clients or distribute across the web, while all the time protecting your work from copyright infringement.

There’s also a brand new tethered shooting feature that lets you to instantaneously see shots on a laptop – very useful on any busy photography shoot.

Adobe has made a nod towards social media in Lightroom 3 with full Flickr incorporation so you can post straight to your chosen online galleries.

Lightroom 3 looks to be a really good update on an already solid piece of software. It is an excellent tool for anyone looking to take their photography to that next level.

Specs

Windows

• Intel® Pentium® 4 processor or equivalent
• Microsoft® Windows® XP with Service Pack 3
• Windows Vista® Home (32 bit and 64 bit)
• Windows 7 (32 bit and 64 bit)
• 2GB of RAM
• 1GB of available hard-disk space
• 1024×768 display
• CD-ROM drive

Mac OS

• Intel processor
• Mac OS X v10.5 or 10.6
• 2GB of RAM
• 1GB of available hard-disk space
• 1024×768 display
• CD-ROM drive

If you want to find out more then you can visit either Adobe US, or Adobe Canada, directly.