New Adobe Lightroom and Camera Raw release candidates fix bugs, add camera support

Adobe points out that the release candidates have been tested, but are not yet ready to be pushed out automatically to all customers. The company is requesting additional community testing before wide distribution.

The release candidate for Adobe's Lightroom 5.3 photo import, management and tweaking tool addresses reported issues with the previous version, while expanding support for a host of new cameras.

Issues fixed in Lightroom 5.3:

• Issues when upgrading catalog from previous versions of Lightroom.
• Incorrect photos are displayed after switching away from a Publish Collection.
• Catalog optimization did not finish, and was not optimizing the catalog
• Feather of clone spots is set to 0 after upgrading catalog to Lightroom 5.
• Auto White Balance settings are not saved to Snapshots.
• Sony 18-55mm lens is detected as the Hasselblad 18-55mm lens for lens correction.
• Increased Update Spot Removal history steps when in Before and After view.
• Slideshows start playing automatically even when the Manual Slideshow option is enabled.
• Video playback stops when dragging on the scrubber.
• Errors when publishing photos to Flickr through the Publish Service.
• Option + drag on Edit Pin behavior is functioning incorrectly.
• Black border appears around the exported slideshow video.
• Catalog containing images processed with PV2003 were adding a post-crop vignette when catalog upgraded to Lightroom 5.
• Pressing the "Reset" button while holding down the Shift key caused Lightroom to exit abruptly.
• Output Sharpening and Noise Reduction were not applied to exported images that were resized to less than 1/3 of the original image size.
• The Esc key did not exit the slideshow after right clicking screen with mouse during slideshow playing.
• Import dialog remained blank for folders that contain PNG files with XMP sidecars.
• Metadata panel displayed incorrect information after modifying published photo.

Lightroom 5.3 also comes with additional support for newly released digital cameras, which are also part of the Camera Raw 8.3 update.

The following cameras are now supported (preliminary support denoted with asterisk):

• Canon PowerShot S120
• Fujifilm XQ1
• Fujifilm X-E2
• Nikon 1 AW1
• Nikon Coolpix P7800
• Nikon D610
• Nikon D5300 (*)
• Olympus OM-D E-M1
• Olympus STYLUS 1 (*)
• Panasonic DMC-GM1
• Phase One IQ260
• Phase One IQ280
• Sony A7 (ILCE-7)
• Sony A7R (ILCE-7R)
• Sony DSC-RX10 (*)

Users are urged to provide feedback on both release candidates via Adobe's Feedback Portal.

Lightroom 5.3 is available as a free download for Lightroom 5 users, while new customers can purchase the software for $149, or $79 for upgraders.

The Camera Raw 8.3 plug-in update is free, with versions for both Photoshop CC and Photoshop CS6.