I started using Luminar 2018 a while back, and though it was impressive with its huge array of filters and presets and AI-powered tools, one thing it sorely lacked was libraries.
But now that Luminar 3 is out, that's all changed.
Now, Luminar users can browse, organize, rate, and group photos in a clean, intuitive library panel.
What's more, you can add existing images in folders from multiple locations, import images from a memory card or hard drive, automatically group images by month, year, and day, and much more.
In the video above, Omar Gonzalez takes a deep dive into these and other features of the Luminar 3 library.
Follow along as he offers his hands-on test of libraries and some of Luminar's other handy features.
Below, I've outlined some of the top features of Luminar 3 library for easy reference.
The Luminar 3 Library Has a Beautiful UI
To be fair, Luminar 3 as a whole has a beautiful UI...
As Omar points out in the video, the grid view is particularly nice because it shows nice, clean thumbnails of your images without all the extra space and image information that clutters up the Lightroom library.
What's more, you can choose between various sizes of thumbnail previews to customize how you interact with your library of images.
When you select an image to view, the beautiful UI continues.
As you can see in the screenshot above, not only are the editing controls neatly organized on the right side of the screen, but a handy filmstrip view of your other library images is tucked onto the left side of the screen. Yet despite having a wealth of tools and information at your disposal, the screen doesn't feel cluttered at all.
Quick Tip: You can toggle between the editing view shown above and the grid view in the library by pressing the spacebar or pressing G.
Learn More:
How to Add Images to Luminar 3 With Libraries
As noted earlier, you can add images into your library from memory cards or hard drives, and then once they're in the library, you can move them, group them, rate them, and so forth. You can even make your own virtual albums.
To add images, simply click File > Import Images and navigate to the location of the images on your memory card or hard drive. Then click "Import to Folder."
Better yet, when you add a folder to Luminar, you can work within that folder and any changes you make either in Luminar or on the desktop will be synced. That means keeping your images organized is much more straightforward.
Another handy feature in the Luminar 3 library is that you can quickly copy edits from one image and paste them onto another.
For example, when in the grid view, as shown above, you can select an image, press CMD/CTRL+C and then select another image and CMD/CTRL+V to paste those edits.
Additionally, you can Shift and click to select multiple images to apply edits to a series of photos at once. You can also press Shift+CMD/CTRL+S to select multiple images to apply edits.
This feature is available in the filmstrip view as well. That means that as you make edits to an image, you can copy and paste them onto other images in the folder without even leaving the editing window.
Not only does this feature work very well, but it's also a huge time-saver - if you have a number of photos that require the same type of editing, you can apply the same edits to all the images you select in a matter of seconds.
Quick Tip: You can also copy and paste things like cropping - crop one image and use the keystrokes above to paste the same crop dimensions onto other photos.
Learn More:
- Easy Workflow for Amazing Landscape Photography
- Post-Processing Tip: How to Create Realistic Sun Rays in Your Photos
Luminar 3 Provides Simple Image Organization
Not only does Luminar automatically sync images, but there's also a variety of ways to keep those images organized.
You can assign star-ratings to images and sort based on those ratings from 1-5.
You can also use colors to rate the images (i.e., green is a rating of 8) to further sort your images or sort them by date as well.
In other words, Luminar 3 offers total image organization with tools that allow you to rate and sort photos in a matter of seconds. Combined with its vast suite of innovative editing tools, it offers photographers a complete editing and organizing experience.