Lightroom 'plug-in' like functionality for CeroNoice

As I discussed in my recent post, I believe the CeroNoice workflow creates a serious alternative to other 32-bit TIFF routes, such as ‘Merge to 32-bit HDR’ or Photoshop. I believe the results are first class, for instance the image of Winchester Cathedral at the bottom of this post. 

Also in the last post I provided a small .bat script to partially automate the creation of the 32-bit images from within Lightroom. The only limitation is that this was for a Windows environment.

In this post I introduce ‘CeroNoice Bracketing.exe’, which can be used as an external editor in Lightroom.

To set up the new workflow, simply put the required files in a processing folder, as detailed before, ie CeroNoice.exe etc, together with my .exe, called CeroNoice Bracketing.exe (email me for a copy).

Set up an external editor preset in Lightroom, with the following attributes:

• Export original (can be .cr2 or .dng); 
• No file naming; 
• Post processing = open in other application (ie point to CeroNoice Bracketing)

Finally, set up a ‘watched folder’ in LR (under File, Auto Import), where the 32-bit processed .tif will be returned. The returned file will have the image name of the lightest original, with _32-bit appended.

Once set up, all you do is select, from darkest to lightest, the input images, export via the CeroNoice Bracketing preset and carry on working! 

In a few seconds the output file will appear in the LR watch folder (which I call 32-bit Processing, for easy identification).

All working files, ie LR exports are deleted. You can move the 32-bit TIFF or simply leave in the 32-bit Processing folder.

I have found LR handles the CeroNoice created TIFFs well, eg able to fully use the +/- 10 Ev range in the floating point TIFF.

Bottom line: with the help of my little .exe, Windows’ users can access CeroNoice from within LR in a fully automatic manner, from either .cr2s or .dngs.