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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
Photo Mechanic vs Adobe Bridge
Joseph V. Labolito, Photographer
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Philadelphia | PA | USA | Posted: 3:45 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> Which one do you use to ingest, caption and edit.
Why? |
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Max Simbron, Photographer, Assistant
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Phoenix | AZ | USA | Posted: 4:01 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> Code replacements in Photo Mechanic are just amazing. Then there's the fact that you can crop, and upload straight from Photo Mechanic to wherever you need to file, or even to your Photoshelter site.
But honestly, the biggest thing for me is the code replacements. |
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Jonathan Castner, Photographer
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Longmont | CO | USA | Posted: 4:09 PM on 09.25.07 |
| ->> Photo Mechanic kicks Bridge's butt like Chuck Norris on PeeWee Herman. Nuff said. |
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Garrett Hubbard, Photographer
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Washington | DC | USA | Posted: 5:49 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> There is no comparison in speed. none.
folder of 1000 raw files in PM comes up almost immediately. bridge will sit there and think for at least 5 times as long. and that is being conservative.
with that said I use both for different purposes.
PM for ingest, sorting, ranking.
bridge for batch processing instructions to raw files.
then image processor in PS via bridge to convert files to JPG.
lightroom folks might be able to contribute to your decision with their thoughts on their workflow. |
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Ian L. Sitren, Photographer
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Palm Springs | CA | USA | Posted: 6:05 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> Nothing is faster than PM for "ingest, caption and edit". Nothing.
However if you have the time and want to do some image adjustments too, I like Aperture. |
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Dennis Wierzbicki, Photographer
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Plainfield | IL | USA | Posted: 6:11 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> PM to ingest, caption and sometimes crop. PS to do any heavy editing, toning, resizing, etc..
Bridge is just way too slow.
As Max said, Photo Mechanic's code replacement is simply astounding once you learn to use it. Everyone I have shown this to is awe struck, as in "I can't believe I've been using PM all this time and never knew about this feature. Wow! This is gonna save me a ton of time" |
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Justin Deeley, Photographer
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Noble Park | VIC | Australia | Posted: 7:26 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> It's pretty one sided comparison - I avoid Bridge like the plague!
Lightroom on the other hand - that's a completely different story and a bit more of a fair comparison to PM.
Great for ingest, caption, crop and MOST colour correction and links well into PS for extended editing. |
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Mark Sutton, Photographer
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Herndon | VA | USA | Posted: 7:40 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> I use a combination of both PM and Adobe Lightroom. I can go through a 1000 RAW images in no time in PM. Select and save in a folder, bring that folder up in Lightroom and do any adjusting, cropping, noise (yes the noise slider is better in the latest version 1.2).
I haven’t touched Photoshop in a long time and mainly because Adobe Bridge just dies when you have a bunch of RAW images in a folder you need to edit. The Presets are awesome in Lightroom as well. This has cut down on my work flow considerably. Stay very - very far from Adobe Bridge. It’s like the red button Daffy Duck tells you to avoid. “Not da Wed One”….. |
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Mike McKinney, Photographer
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Albuquerque | NM | USA | Posted: 9:31 PM on 09.25.07 |
| ->> Photo Mechanic rocks!! I continue to be amazed each time I delve deeper into it's features. |
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Ron Erdrich, Photographer
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Abilene | TX | USA | Posted: 9:48 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> I find Bridge to be handy when I'm editing a story and I want to move around pictures while planning their sequence. You can also export it immediately to Photoshop's web gallery generator.
But that's really all I use it for, Photomechanic is far and away better for general editing, captioning, copying, etc.
-Ron- |
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Darren Whitley, Photographer
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Maryville | MO | USA | Posted: 10:00 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> If you know PM, using Bridge can be a frustration particularly when trying to view ranked images.
What Bridge offers though is the ability to do ACR without tying up Photoshop. Also, you can send your photos off to an InDesign contact sheet, which can be created using some master pages and templates. There's no other way to launch these two featrue that I know of in either PS or ID.
Also note that Bridge reads XMP files so it gives you thumbs that actually look like your conversions. The new CS3 Bridge is faster than CS2 Bridge so I can't complain too much.
I use PM 99% of the time. I use Bridge when I have a specific Bridge-related task. I also prefer ACR over Lightroom. |
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William Luther, Photographer
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San Antonio | TX | USA | Posted: 10:17 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> Ron,
FYI
Using PM's Arrangement function (which is one of the ways of sorting a contact sheet) you can move photos around on the contact sheet to get them into the order you would like, then rename them so they stay in that order when you move them elsewhere.
William |
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Ron Erdrich, Photographer
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Abilene | TX | USA | Posted: 10:38 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> Hmm, didn't find that on my version of PM, it's 4.4.3.3, is that something on the latest update or is it Mac specific (I'm using a PC at work). Sounds cool, though.
-R- |
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William Luther, Photographer
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San Antonio | TX | USA | Posted: 10:43 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> I'm on 4.5.2
Maybe it was an addition in 4.5...I don't know.
William |
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Ron Erdrich, Photographer
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Abilene | TX | USA | Posted: 10:52 PM on 09.25.07 |
| ->> Time to rattle the cage over at IT... |
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Armando Solares, Photographer
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Englewood | FL | USA | Posted: 11:17 PM on 09.25.07 |
| ->> What is code replacement? What does it do? How do you use it? Or why should you use it? |
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Ramsay de Give, Student/Intern, Photographer
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Santa Fe | NM | USA | Posted: 11:52 PM on 09.25.07 |
->> ditto Armando... anyone care to *learn me good* ;)
thanks |
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David Meyer, Photographer
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Armando Solares, Photographer
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Englewood | FL | USA | Posted: 1:48 AM on 09.26.07 |
| ->> thanks david. |
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Joseph V. Labolito, Photographer
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Philadelphia | PA | USA | Posted: 9:14 AM on 09.26.07 |
->> gentlemen thanks for your in put
and
i also have some learning to do on the "code" subject
joe |
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Steve Russell, Photographer
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Toronto | ON | Canada | Posted: 9:26 AM on 09.26.07 |
->> Wow, that is almost a silly question!!!
I find PM the best by far.
They have forums to help with any of the products.
In fact any ideas you give them they might use!!
http://forums.camerabits.com/
But once you have a grasp on code replacement,
make a visit to who should SportShooter Member of the Year, Mike Stone's website to download codes for NBA, NFL, MLB, NHL and NCAA Football!
http://stopactionsports.com/extract.php?
Incredible!!! Mike Stone = ss.com MVP! |
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Richard Denham, Photographer
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Toronto/Buffalo/Niagara | On | Canada | Posted: 10:40 AM on 09.26.07 |
| ->> PM code replacement is phenomenal. Not only can you get codes from Mike Stones website (cheers for that) but making your own codes is not all the difficult or time consuming. If you can get a hold of a digital roster from a team, it should take maybe 10 min's maximum to go through the steps to make it code. As for Adobe Bridge, the only thing I use that for is if I am batch editing using my actions in CS2 |
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Curtis Clegg, Photographer
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Belvidere | IL | USA | Posted: 11:08 AM on 09.26.07 |
->> As long as there are so many people willing to answer questions about PhotoMechanice I'll toss my question out there...
Does PhotoMechanic allow you to leave the file's original four-digit file name intact during the ingest/rename process? All references I have seen to renaming demonstrate a sequencing process, but I don't usually want to sequence the files... I want to keep the unique four-digit identifier intact so I can refer back to my notes when I need to. So _MG_1234.CR2 could become football_9-26-08_1234.CR2 |
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Joe Andras, Photographer
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Orange County | CA | USA | Posted: 12:10 PM on 09.26.07 |
->> Curtis asked,
>>Does PhotoMechanic allow you to leave the file's original
>>four-digit file name intact during the ingest/rename
>>process?
Yes, you can use variables to create the new filename. In your case, just click on the "Variables" button and double-click on "Filename, file" to include the original filename variable as part of the new name:
football_9-26-08_{filename} |
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Joe Andras, Photographer
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Orange County | CA | USA | Posted: 12:12 PM on 09.26.07 |
| ->> I just realized that you only want to use part of the original file name, i.e. only the 4-digit ID. I'm not sure on that one. Anybody? |
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Curtis Clegg, Photographer
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Belvidere | IL | USA | Posted: 1:21 PM on 09.26.07 |
->> Thanks Joe, but yes I do want to keep part of the original file name.
How does everyone else handle this situation? In my notebook I jot down the original file name's four-digit identifier, and then details that pertain to that photo. I sometimes find a photo and then want to go back and look at my notes for that event, or I go back and read details in my notebook and want to find files associated with that event.
In this 2006 thread on the PM support site Kirk says he will add find/replace functionality for the filename field soon:
http://forums.camerabits.com/index.php?topic=790.0
but I don't know if that has happened yet.
In another thread Kirk tells how to put the original filename in an alternate IPTC field:
http://forums.camerabits.com/index.php?topic=2135.0
which would be somewhat useful, but not as easily searchable.
It seems like a find/replace function during the ingest process would make a lot of sense. |
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Delane B. Rouse, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Washington | DC | US | Posted: 2:10 PM on 09.26.07 |
->> Sure u can keep just the 4 digit portion of the filename...
the VARIABLE is frame, fnum or frame4, fnm4
dbr |
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Hassel Weems, Photographer
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Locust Grove (Atlanta) | GA | USA | Posted: 4:43 PM on 09.26.07 |
| ->> Photo Mechanic actually works, which is something I can't get Bridge CS3 to do reliably. |
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