Adobe released Lightroom 5.2 today, with important bug fixes, new camera, lens and tethered capture support. As has become their practice in the first “dot” release (“.2” in this case — there was no “.1”), Adobe has also thrown in a few small but welcome new features.
Watch my “What’s New in Lightroom 5.2” video below, and then read on in this article for more information on new camera support, bug fixes, etc.
New Features in Lightroom 5.2
1. Color Noise Smoothness Slider
- The color noise slider previously present has been great at removing pixel-level color noise. This new smoothness slider now also removes larger color blobs that you may find when you brighten very-much underexposed areas of a photograph:
CLICK TO SEE LARGER
2. Refinements to the Spot Healing Tool:
- New Feather Slider
This is a “small” addition that for me increases the power of this tool greatly. As I explain in my video on how to use the spot removal tool/ advanced healing brush in Lightroom 5, I usually work in Heal mode. However, when working up against a high contrast edge, Heal can cause bleeding along the edge of my fix. In these cases I turn to clone mode. However, up until now the edge of the clone fix was often too harsh. Now we can use the feather slider to adjust this edge. (It works on both clone and heal.)
- Auto find source method now works better for images with textured areas like rocks, bark, and foliage
- Auto find source method now prefers source areas within the crop rectangle
3. Auto Exposure has been improved to be more consistent across images and across different image sizes.
4. Smart Preview size has been updated to 2560 pixels (from 2540) on the long edge.
5. Refinements to the Local Adjustment Brush:
- Right Click (PC) / Control
- click (Mac) on a brush adjustment pin to bring up a context menu to duplicate or delete
- Control+Alt+Drag (PC) / Command+Option+Drag (Mac) on a brush adjustment pin to clone (duplicate) that adjustment
Newly added support for Tethered Capture in Lightroom 5.2
Canon EOS 6D
Canon EOS Rebel T5i / EOS 700D / EOS Kiss X7i
Canon EOS Rebel SL1 / EOS 100D / EOS Kiss X7
Nikon D7100
New Camera Support in Lightroom 5.2
Canon EOS 70D, Canon PowerShot G16, Canon PowerShot S120*, Casio Exilim EX-ZR800, Fujifilm FinePix HS22EXR, Fujifilm FinePix HS35EXR, Fujifilm FinePix S205EXR, Fujifilm X-A1, Fujifilm X-M1, Leica C (Typ 112), Olympus OM-DE-M1, Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX7, Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ70, Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ72, Pentax Q7, Pentax K-50, Pentax K-500, Sony DSC-RX100 II, Sony A3000 (ILCE-3000), Sony NEX-5T
* denotes preliminary support
New Lens Profile Support in Lightroom 5.2
Sony E 35mm F1.8 OSS, Hasselblad LF16mm F2.8, Hasselblad LF18-55mm F3.5-5.6 OSS, Hasselblad LF18-200mm F3.5-6.3 OSS, GoPro Hero 3 Black Edition, GoPro Hero 3 Silver Edition, GoPro Hero 3 White Edition, Leica TRI-ELMAR-M16-18-21 mm f/4 ASPH, Canon SIGMA 18-35mm F1.8 DC HSM A013; Canon, Nikon Sigma 120-300mm F2.8 DG OS HSM S013, Nikon SIGMA 30mm F1.4 DC HSM A013; Olympus, SonySIGMA 60mm F2.8 DN A013; Pentax, Sony SIGMA 17-70mm F2.8-4 DC MACRO OS HSMC013; Pentax, Sony SIGMA 35mm F1.4 DG HSM A012; Nikon 1 NIIKKOR 32mm f/1.2; Sony DSC-RX1R
Bugs Corrected in Lightroom 5.2
- Output Sharpening and Noise Reduction were not applied to exported images that were resized to less than 1/3 of the original image size.
- Slideshow Exporting process fails for time-lapse sequences.
- Unable to export a Book. This only occurred after a customer deleted a background photo.
- Catalog containing images processed with PV2003 were adding a post-crop vignette when catalog upgraded to Lightroom 5.
- JPEG decoding produced a red colorcast.
- Unable to scroll through photos when in Full screen mode. This only occurs when more than 1 photo is selected.
- “Store presets with this catalog” preference is not preserved when upgrading catalog from previous versions of Lightroom.
- Crash when scrubbing Size slider with existing spot selected.
- Landscape crop not maintained on portrait oriented photos
- Pressing the Reset button while holding the Shift key results in an internal error.
- Crash when attempting to move brush spots
- Gray area is shown when zooming in/out after cropping image.
- A row of vertical artifacts appears along bottom edge of photo when applying Grain.
- Defringe Color Sampler is inaccurate on photos that have Upright applied
- All of the images on a Compact Flash card did not appear in the Import Dialogue.
- Metadata panel displayed incorrect information after modifying published photo. Please note that this only occurred when metadata was changed after the photo was published.
- Soundtrack does not fade at the end of a slideshow
- The Esc key did not exit the slideshow after right clicking screen with mouse during slideshow playing.
- Import dialog remained blank for folders that contain PNG files with XMP sidecars.
Download Links for Lightroom 5.2:
[sc:signup]
Thanks for the link to 5.2
This appears to be for the full package rather than an update. For existing Lightroom 5 users is it a simple case of installing 5.2 over the top of 5.0 and does it retain any customizations over the default 5.0 installation ?
Just to say that NO it wipes all customizations and plugins out. Not ahppy about that part.
Just read my comment “2.”
Don’t download 5.2 if you already have 5.0.
It should, Alastair.
Adobe kind of is dropping the ball on LR’s inclusion in CC. The CC interface, for Mac at least, doesn’t register that there is an update. It says 5.0 is still up to date. Adobe’s LR FB page (https://www.facebook.com/lightroom) says to go to open the Lightroom app and click on Help and “Check for updates”
That gets you here:
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=5647
That’s where you want to go if you don’t want to download the entire program.
Hello Laura – When I lauched my LR 5.0 this morning I was notified of the upgrade, but I had no time to upgrade since I had to rush out. I have just used your link and upgraded to 5.2 EASILY AND SUCCESSFULLY – the same can’t be said of one or two other well-known softwares; which I have given up.
Thanks for your What’s New notes. As usual, they are clear and well laid out.
P.S. – I am still watching your video tutorials over and over again. Ah, the blunders I would have made without your explantions!
Regards
Tiberman – Mauritius
You’re welcome, Tiberman!
Thank you for the explanation of the updates and showing how to use them. I wonder about the clone tool and why it usually picks an area that is absolutely not like the area I did my initial selection on? It’s frustrating because when I use that tool I am usually at 100% viewing, then I have to zoom out, move the cropped area closer to where I really want it because at 100% viewing LR has chosen a section out of the viewing area, then zoom back in and continue. And also, if Adobe is listening, I’d like to be able to rotate the cloned/healed selection. I often work with wide angle lenses for my spherical panos and sometimes, ceramic tiles for example, don’t line up properly when I cloned from one place to another. But if I could rotate the selection then it would be just about spot on. Of course then I’d want a Free Transform tool, and then I’d want…just need to process it in PS I suppose.
I agree that the fact that it doesn’t seem to prioritize sources inside the viewing area is frustrating Rod, and I have let Adobe know this. In the meantime, hold down the space bar, and then drag in the photo to pan over to the area where the source circle is.
Thank you again Laura,
for your great explanations, I look forward to
5.3,5.4 5.5 and whats to come, just so as I can get more
of your wonderful updates.
Regards and thanks, Vincent
Hi Vincent, I’m glad you have enjoyed my video for 5.2. Fortunately for my workload though, Adobe doesn’t add new features to any release after the first update.
Laura, I hope I’m not too far off topic, but I started with Lightroom 5 and did the LR 5.2 update. Is there a quick way to toggle between before and after changes in the Basic panel in the Develop module. I know that the other panels have an “Turn off…” switch in the header (left), but I realize that is for more discrete changes, and not the large number of adjustments the Basic panel has.
I know that I can click on a previous state in the History section, but I don’t always have that panel open, and it would be more convenient to not have to move the pointer over to the left side every time I want to compare a change. I’m aware of the before & after windows, but then the image gets quite a bit smaller. To make it bigger (sometimes not big enough), I have to collapse the left and right panels. I guess it’s time for a bigger monitor. :-)
When I do Ctrl-Z in Lightroom it undoes the last change, and by holding down the Ctrl and the Shift key and pressing Z I can redo the change, but that is awkward. I think I’m just missing something that an experienced LR user such as yourself knows about. I guess I’m looking for something in the Basic editing panel that I can click on to turn on and off the last change I made.
Thank you for the LR 5.2 update video, Dean
Hi Dean,
You can press the \ key to view before and after (on my PC).
Thank you very much Chuck. This will be very useful in my image editing in LR.
Will Lightroom 5 support Canon 5ti?
Yes it does, Cindy.