Toast And Lightroom

[jmbreit]

Hello, this is my first post here. I currently have Toast 8 Titanium and am thinking of upgrading to the newest version. I have looked at the tutorials and still need to be sure about something. I use Adobe Lightroom 3 to manage my huge collection of photos. I take all my pictures in RAW and a resolution of 4288 by 4228 and import this from my camera into Lightroom. And depending on what I what to do with my edited pictures I select file type and resolution in Lightroom when I export. My primary purpose would be to burn my pictures onto CD's or DVD's to show on my HDTV. I see in the tutorial that you can input directly from Adobe Lightroom. Can anyone tell me if I first have to export my pictures in a specific file type and resolution from Lightroom before importing into Toast? I do not want Toast to automatically select file type and crop my pictures. I want to make that choice.

Thanks, John

[tsantee]

Long answer, unfortunately. I can't tell from your description whether you plan to play the CD or DVD with a Blu-ray player (and want to burn the photos as an HD Blu-ray disc) or with a standard DVD player. Also, either kind of player can play a slide show of photos burned as a data disc as well as a so-called DVD Slide Show so I don't know if that is what you are planning or not. I presume you are aware that you can burn CDs and DVDs from within Lightroom 3 itself. I haven't done that so don't know if those can be read by either a DVD player or a Blu-ray player.

 

Toast 11 can see the collections and the source folders from your Lightroom Catalog. It makes most sense to put the photos you want Toast to use in a collection. Lightroom has to be closed when you open Toast in order for Toast to access the Lightroom catalog. From what I can tell Toast will see RAW files (mine are converted to DNG) as well as other formats. However, Toast doesn't see any adjustments you made in Lightroom unless you apply those to a virtual copy and import the virtual copy in Toast. At least I think it can see the adjustments in the virtual copy because I know Toast see virtual copies as well as the original file. If that's important I can look further into that.

 

If you are making a Data disc to play on your TV then the photos need to be in a format and size that meet the specs of the player. I expect you'd need to convert your photos to JPEG via Lightroom before adding to Toast. If you're having Toast make a DVD slide show in SD or HD then Toast can use the source RAW file (presuming Toast reads that file) and converts it to MPEG 2 or h.264 for that format's slide show.

 

If you have a Blu-ray player many of them provide for streaming photos, videos and music from your Mac. In that case you don't need to burn them to disc unless you want to take the photos elsewhere to play them.

 

Lastly, Roxio has a 30-day refund policy for purchases of its software from its online store. So you can give it a try yourself and decide if its worth keeping.

[jmbreit]

Long answer, unfortunately. I can't tell from your description whether you plan to play the CD or DVD with a Blu-ray player (and want to burn the photos as an HD Blu-ray disc) or with a standard DVD player. Also, either kind of player can play a slide show of photos burned as a data disc as well as a so-called DVD Slide Show so I don't know if that is what you are planning or not. I presume you are aware that you can burn CDs and DVDs from within Lightroom 3 itself. I haven't done that so don't know if those can be read by either a DVD player or a Blu-ray player.

 

Toast 11 can see the collections and the source folders from your Lightroom Catalog. It makes most sense to put the photos you want Toast to use in a collection. Lightroom has to be closed when you open Toast in order for Toast to access the Lightroom catalog. From what I can tell Toast will see RAW files (mine are converted to DNG) as well as other formats. However, Toast doesn't see any adjustments you made in Lightroom unless you apply those to a virtual copy and import the virtual copy in Toast. At least I think it can see the adjustments in the virtual copy because I know Toast see virtual copies as well as the original file. If that's important I can look further into that.

 

If you are making a Data disc to play on your TV then the photos need to be in a format and size that meet the specs of the player. I expect you'd need to convert your photos to JPEG via Lightroom before adding to Toast. If you're having Toast make a DVD slide show in SD or HD then Toast can use the source RAW file (presuming Toast reads that file) and converts it to MPEG 2 or h.264 for that format's slide show.

 

If you have a Blu-ray player many of them provide for streaming photos, videos and music from your Mac. In that case you don't need to burn them to disc unless you want to take the photos elsewhere to play them.

 

Lastly, Roxio has a 30-day refund policy for purchases of its software from its online store. So you can give it a try yourself and decide if its worth keeping.

 

Thank you for the detailed reply. I do not have a Blu-Ray player at the present time. I think it would be best for me to export out of Lightroom to a folder for Toast to use. I have edited plenty of my photos and would want the edited pictures burnt to CD or DVD. Your reply answered that part of my question. If Toast could somehow see the edited pictures ( virtual copy) in Lightroom that would save all that extra work. As per your reply if you could look into the "virtual copy" item that would be helpful.

I totally forgot about being able to burn from Lightroom. I will have to try that and see how it goes.

I will be in the market for a Blu-Ray palyer soon. I do have a Macintosh computer. Could you provide me a short list of Blu-Ray players that support streaming of photos from my Mac? My digital tuner HDTV is a Sony WEGA Trinitron picture tube unit. It has component video jacks that I use for my old standard DVD player. The TV also has HDMI inputs also but this old player does not have HDMI jacks. The picture on this TV is just great and I would not even think of replacing it until it gives up the ghost.

John

[tsantee]

Thank you for the detailed reply. I do not have a Blu-Ray player at the present time. I think it would be best for me to export out of Lightroom to a folder for Toast to use. I have edited plenty of my photos and would want the edited pictures burnt to CD or DVD. Your reply answered that part of my question. If Toast could somehow see the edited pictures ( virtual copy) in Lightroom that would save all that extra work. As per your reply if you could look into the "virtual copy" item that would be helpful.

I totally forgot about being able to burn from Lightroom. I will have to try that and see how it goes.

I will be in the market for a Blu-Ray palyer soon. I do have a Macintosh computer. Could you provide me a short list of Blu-Ray players that support streaming of photos from my Mac? My digital tuner HDTV is a Sony WEGA Trinitron picture tube unit. It has component video jacks that I use for my old standard DVD player. The TV also has HDMI inputs also but this old player does not have HDMI jacks. The picture on this TV is just great and I would not even think of replacing it until it gives up the ghost.

John

More long answer. I just replaced my WEGA XBR TV with a flat screen two weeks ago, so I know about that TV. Mine didn't have a HDMI input however. If you connect a Blu-ray player using the component inputs the player will only show 480i video from commercial Blu-ray discs (something the motion picture industry required). So unless you can connect via HDMI a Blu-ray player will only play HD from discs you burn or from media you stream through it.

 

There are different ways to show photos using a standard video DVD player. You can do any of these with Toast 8. One is called a DVD Slide Show which is the best for convenience and reasonable quality. Drag folders of pictures into the Toast Video window with DVD Video selected as the format. Toast can put up to 99 (or maybe 98) photos in each of up to 99 (or 98) titles. Each photo plays as a chapter on the disc so you can use the player's chapter skip function on the remote control to advance or go back. The photos advance automatically in 5-second increments and can be paused. There is no option for audio. Apple's iDVD can put an audio track behind a DVD slide show if that is something you care about.

 

Another option is to make a movie of your photos using iMovie or one of several apps that create the Ken Burns pan and zoom option (such as Fotomagico). This produces a lower-quality image and takes a lot of encoding time, but can be very entertaining. You also can use iPhoto and Aperture to make these kinds of movie slide shows.

 

A third option is to burn an ISO9660 data CD of your photos that the DVD player reads and displays on the TV. This might produce the highest quality and lets you zoom into portions of the photo using the player's remote control. However, it is very slow because the player has to down-rez the photos to the size for the video display. It is good to reduce the resolution of your photos before burning them to CD so the player doesn't have to work so much to reduce their size. Of course, that in turn compromises how much you can zoom into the image when it is displayed. It's a tradeoff.

 

My Blu-ray player is the Soy BDP-S580 that has built-in wi-fi. It can stream from my Mac and play from USB devices (including a camera) connected directly to the player. It also can play from data discs. Photos must be JPEG. After getting this I no longer need my WDTV Live box that I used for this kind of streaming in the past. If you don't see yourself getting a Blu-ray player soon then you can get a AppleTV or WDTV Live Plus or similar device for streaming.

 

I haven't checked if the Toast Media Browser can access Lightroom images with corrections applied. I doubt it unless you saved the corrected version as a file.

[jmbreit]

More long answer. I just replaced my WEGA XBR TV with a flat screen two weeks ago, so I know about that TV. Mine didn't have a HDMI input however. If you connect a Blu-ray player using the component inputs the player will only show 480i video from commercial Blu-ray discs (something the motion picture industry required). So unless you can connect via HDMI a Blu-ray player will only play HD from discs you burn or from media you stream through it.

 

There are different ways to show photos using a standard video DVD player. You can do any of these with Toast 8. One is called a DVD Slide Show which is the best for convenience and reasonable quality. Drag folders of pictures into the Toast Video window with DVD Video selected as the format. Toast can put up to 99 (or maybe 98) photos in each of up to 99 (or 98) titles. Each photo plays as a chapter on the disc so you can use the player's chapter skip function on the remote control to advance or go back. The photos advance automatically in 5-second increments and can be paused. There is no option for audio. Apple's iDVD can put an audio track behind a DVD slide show if that is something you care about.

 

Another option is to make a movie of your photos using iMovie or one of several apps that create the Ken Burns pan and zoom option (such as Fotomagico). This produces a lower-quality image and takes a lot of encoding time, but can be very entertaining. You also can use iPhoto and Aperture to make these kinds of movie slide shows.

 

A third option is to burn an ISO9660 data CD of your photos that the DVD player reads and displays on the TV. This might produce the highest quality and lets you zoom into portions of the photo using the player's remote control. However, it is very slow because the player has to down-rez the photos to the size for the video display. It is good to reduce the resolution of your photos before burning them to CD so the player doesn't have to work so much to reduce their size. Of course, that in turn compromises how much you can zoom into the image when it is displayed. It's a tradeoff.

 

My Blu-ray player is the Soy BDP-S580 that has built-in wi-fi. It can stream from my Mac and play from USB devices (including a camera) connected directly to the player. It also can play from data discs. Photos must be JPEG. After getting this I no longer need my WDTV Live box that I used for this kind of streaming in the past. If you don't see yourself getting a Blu-ray player soon then you can get a AppleTV or WDTV Live Plus or similar device for streaming.

 

I haven't checked if the Toast Media Browser can access Lightroom images with corrections applied. I doubt it unless you saved the corrected version as a file.

 

Again I thank you for more detailed info. I am familiar with the choices you mentioned in Toast 8. You could also do the DVD slide show in iDVD as you mentioned but Apple seems to be letting that fade away. I did look at the manual for the old Panasonic DVD player I have and it gives no info on what size pictures should be when burnt to a CD or DVD. Just file type ( JPEG). Older versions of iDVD would tell you no more than 640 by 480 pixels.

I did burn some images to a CD via Lightroom. JPEG and in max resolution . The pictures filled the screen on my TV but the picture was a jagged and rough. I may have to guess on some different resolution sizes and I may luck out that way. I think Toast is the better avenue. Lightroom does not have the choices toast does. I am going to look for a Blu-Ray player. Then I can utilize the HDMI feature on my TV.

Regards, John