Adobe's Lightroom 2 is a fantastic tool. I love it. My photography has jumped up a level in terms of quality and style. The learning curve is a little more difficult than I expected, but once I was around the application for a few weeks I found the interface paradigm easy to use. Lightroom breaks down the workflow into separate modules: Library, Develop, Slideshow, Print and Web. The only two I ever use are Library and Develop. The Web module looks a little pointless as it generates web galleries of photos, something that most only photo site do already. They are pretty nice looking though, but why embed all of your content in a Flash movie when you can grab the photos from an externally located server.
For me, Lightroom 2 gets rid of three applications I was previously using: Adobe Bridge, Adobe DNG Convertor and Adobe Camera Raw. It combines the metadata templating functions of Bridge, the conversion of camera RAW images to DNG and non-destructively color corrects the DNG image. The Develop module is worth the price of admission. It is simply the best application for processing photos. Everyone can see how much better their photos will look with a minimal of color tweaking. The presets are also spectacular. While looking through flickr photos I always wondered how the great photographers got such strong color. Now I know, they use the presets in Lightroom!
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