A few other Lightroom links… Product manager Tom Hogarty writes about what’s really a plug-in and how so-called plug-ins (Aperture’s and others) are really external editors. Tom and marketing manager Frederick Johnson are interviewed about LR2 in this new O’Reilly podcast, and Adobe Camera Raw engineer Eric Chan writes about the Adobe profiles. The whole lot’s worth reading:

We have a new set of camera profiles called the Adobe Standard profiles. Our goal in designing these profiles is to give photographers a better default color: that is, a better starting point for making image adjustments. With the new profiles, the main improvement is in the warm colors: reds, oranges, and yellows. Deep saturated reds should indeed appear red, without messing up skin tones. Saturation is better maintained in warm highlights, and warm colors are easier to distinguish. There are also improvements in other colors, but the changes in warm colors are the most noticeable.

I’ve never felt strongly about Adobe Camera Raw colour, though generally prefer it to the look from Nikon Capture or other converters. But as shown here in Lightroom 2’s calibration panel, these new roll-your-own profiles should keep the pixel peepers and colour charters happy.