This entry was written by Patrick Dean, editor of the photography news and review website, Neutralday.com

Adobe has released a free public beta edition of their digital darkroom and workflow application, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3. A number of improvements have been made both externally and internally to improve performance and functionality in Lightroom. Some of the highlights include:

• All new performance architecture
• Greatly improved noise reduction for high ISO photography
• Ability to add grain, for film emulation effects
• All new import handling (worth the download itself)
• Drag-and-drop publishing to Flickr and other websites
• Watermarking tool
• Background colors available for prints, and yes any color!
• Collections now also found in the Develop module! (finally)
• and many more...

Adobe is making frequent mention of the fact that this is a free public beta, and as such, the application is far from finished. That means there may be some bugs and that you can and should expect more features to be added or perfected for the finalized version of Lightroom 3. However given that you can run the Lightroom 3 beta along with your regular Lightroom edition, it's well worth it to give it a try.

Additional Resources

• Download the free public beta of  Lightroom 3 from Adobe's website.
• Lightroom guru Scott Kelby discusses and raves over the improvements found in the new beta.
• Terry White shows off some of the new features in the new beta.