# How to stop lightroom making adjustments



## 391615 (Apr 30, 2008)

Whenever I import files from my camera, I open the Raw file, and it comes up loads, looks like an unedited file, then it says loading, and the image is saturated, and edited slightly. I've looked everywhere and I can't stop it from happening. Then when I try to export the files to Tiff, they are edited, I want to edit the files manually. How can I do this.


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## jcolman (Apr 30, 2008)

391615 said:


> Whenever I import files from my camera, I open the Raw file, and it comes up loads, looks like an unedited file, then it says loading, and the image is saturated, and edited slightly. I've looked everywhere and I can't stop it from happening. Then when I try to export the files to Tiff, they are edited, I want to edit the files manually. How can I do this.



Do you have a preset defined in LR when you load?


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## Garbz (May 1, 2008)

You don't. When you import the files from camera the first thing you see is the JPEG preview embedded in the raw by the camera. This is done at camera settings.

Lightroom then processes the RAW using the adobe camera raw engine and applies it's default settings. If you can find a setting that gets it to look good then you can set that as the default. But other than that and playing slightly with the ACR settings there's nothing you can do.

RAW is not a standard and this is exactly why threads like this start. If you want to get results like you do from the camera then use the camera manufacturer's raw processor (Such as Nikon Capture NX). Personally I like the lightroom settings more than what comes off the camera which is one of the reasons I use it in the first place.


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## 391615 (May 4, 2008)

Thanks for the responses. I think that helps garbz, I understand now as I remember when I took Raw and Jpeg that the Jpeg looked different. I just don't like how the setup in lightroom seems to oversaturate shots, and sometimes brings out a lot of noise.


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## Garbz (May 4, 2008)

Lightroom also renders it's own little preview file which is very soft. This could be the source of your noise problem. When you zoom in or export the file out of the library all of a sudden lightroom will render properly (and rather slowly to my distaste) and all of the noise suddenly becomes visible.

The way noise normally is added to the image is if you bump up the brightness, mainly in the mids to shadow region. If you find your images appear brighter when you import them compared to the initial preview you briefly see then yes lightroom is adding noise.

Before you abandon lightroom I suggest you try taking a photo in JPEG+RAW on your camera. Open the both, and have a play in lightroom to see if you can make the RAW look more like the JPEG if that is the look you are aiming for.

If it means bumping up the noise reduction, linearising the contrast curve, dropping the saturation slightly then so be it. There are loads of options in lightroom so I would imagine with a bit of tinkering you can get the equivalent original photo back. Finally on the preset menu on the left when in develop mode, overwrite the default user preset, which should make the current settings the default to apply.


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