If you’ve ever got home after a long day’s photo shoot or wedding, you’ll know that familiar sinking feeling when you remember how many hours you’ll spend editing and retouching the photos. In today’s fast-paced world, clients often expect near-instant results, and editing can feel like a never-ending task.
However, these days there are clever AI tools to help speed up this process. Neurapix is one of these and is an AI-powered plugin for Adobe Lightroom Classic. It’s so fast that it can edit 1000 images per minute and promises to cut your editing time by 90%. Neurapix is designed specifically for wedding and event photographers and uses artificial intelligence to learn your unique editing style and apply it to large batches of images quickly, consistently, and efficiently. But does it live up to the hype? Let’s take a look.
What is Neurapix?
Neurapix is a German start-up founded in 2021. It’s essentially an AI-driven plugin for Adobe Lightroom Classic that learns your unique editing style and applies it to your photos. Unlike traditional presets, which apply fixed slider values to every image in a copy/paste manner, Neurapix’s SmartPresets analyze each photo individually, ensuring consistent, high-quality edits tailored to each individual image’s lighting and composition.
The plugin is designed to help photographers save time, maintain consistency, and focus on what they love most: shooting, growing their business, or spending more time with family and friends. Whether you’re editing a wedding gallery with thousands of images or a smaller event, Neurapix claims to handle it all in minutes, not hours.
How Neurapix Works
Seamless Integration with Lightroom Classic
Neurapix is fully integrated into Adobe Lightroom Classic, meaning you don’t need to export images to another app or juggle multiple programs. Everything happens within Lightroom, making it a convenient addition to your existing workflow.
Not Just Another Preset
Traditional presets tend to apply the same slider values to every image, which can lead to very inconsistent results, especially in varied lighting conditions. Most wedding days feature different venues and vastly different lighting situations.
However, Neurapix’s SmartPresets are different. The AI analyzes each image individually, adjusting exposure, colour, contrast, and more to match your unique style. This ensures that every photo looks consistent, even in tough lighting situations.
Easy Setup with Minimal Training
Once you’ve downloaded the software and installed it, simply open up Lightroom Classic. Now you have to let the AI train on your image editing style. You’ll see a prompt which tells you to choose either 500 edited images, or you can choose the Kickstart option and edit just 20 RAW images that best represent your editing style.
The AI analyzes these images to learn your preferences for exposure, colour grading, and cropping. It’s worth noting that the initial setup might take a few minutes (depending on your internet speed). Once the AI has learned your style, you’re ready to edit thousands of images very quickly.
Flexible Editing Options
You can choose between local editing (using your computer’s processing power) or server editing (using Neurapix’s servers). Local editing is ideal if you want to keep everything on your machine, while server editing is faster and better suited for heavy workloads. Neurapix’s servers are based in Germany and have strict security protocols so that you don’t have to worry about privacy or safety issues.
Advanced Features
There are also some impressive advanced options. Neurapix features the option of applying AI cropping and straightening to your images based on your previous samples. This is something I haven’t seen before in AI editing tools, and it’s pretty impressive. The AI doesn’t just do a centre-weighted crop, it analyses your images and makes the best decision on where to crop based on composition, similar to how you might do it yourself. Except that you can’t make those decisions nearly as quickly.
There’s also the option to make black-and-white presets and use AI masks to brighten eyes or whiten teeth. Again, doing this manually takes an inordinate amount of time.
Preset Tweaking
Of course, if you don’t like the job that the Preset has done, you can soon tweak the overall preset, delete it completely and start over, or just create a new one from a different set of images. You can also make adjustments to any of the images after you’ve applied the preset to any batch.
Key Features of Neurapix at a Glance
- AI-Powered SmartPresets: Tailored edits for each image, ensuring consistency across your gallery.
- Real-Time Editing: Edit up to 1,000 images per minute.
- Flexible Editing Options: Choose between local (flat rate) and server (pay-per-picture) editing.
- AI Cropping and Straightening: The AI learns your cropping style and applies it automatically.
- AI Masks: Optional enhancements like brighter eyes or whiter teeth at no extra cost.
- Black & White SmartPresets: Create custom B/W presets for free.
- Data Security: All images are processed on Neurapix-owned servers in Germany.
Pricing
Neurapix offers two pricing options: a flat rate and a pay-per-image option. The flat rate costs $49.95 if you sign up for a year’s subscription. This could be a great choice for extremely busy wedding and event photographers who shoot large numbers of images every week. If you choose the flat rate option, you can do the processing locally on your own computer or use Neurapix’s servers.
For everyone else, the price-per-image option might be a better fit. This works out at just 4 cents per image. If you choose this option, the processing is all done on Neurapix’s servers (which, incidentally, are totally secure and based in Germany).
There is also a trial available which lets you try editing up to 1000 images completely free of charge on Neurapix’s servers. This way, you can check out whether it might work for you and your business without having to commit first.
Preset Store
If you’re in a hurry or just really like someone else’s presets, you can check out the Preset Store and purchase ready-made presets made by other professional photographers. You can even try them out ahead of buying to see how they might work with your own images. You get a few free ones included anyway when you sign up for Neurapix. However, some of these in the store might be a better fit for your style. The pre-made presets vary in price, with the average costing around the $280 zone.
First Impressions and Why Neurapix Could Be a Game-Changer
When I first tried out Neurapix, I have to admit that I was bracing myself for a bit of a learning curve. I’ve been using the combination of Lightroom and Photoshop with the odd extra editing plugin for years, and I’m very happy with my workflow for portrait editing. Granted, I’m not a wedding photographer (I actively try to avoid those!), but I do shoot events and concerts from time to time.
I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the set-up was extremely easy and rapid. Once I’d downloaded the software and installed it on my laptop, the next step was simply to open up Lightroom Classic. Immediately a prompt appeared telling me I could make my own preset.
Obviously, I chose the Kickstart option, which only needed 20 images for the initial sample. I uploaded RAW images from an outdoor family shoot with the plans to compare them with more outdoor images taken with a different subject on a different day.
It was very fast to analyse the batch of images (I actually chose more than 20 for the sample), and I quickly received an email telling me it was up and running. Now I could try out the first batch of images to edit.
Again, it was very easy and intuitive to edit the new batch. I selected the images I wanted to edit and then chose ‘edit’ from the dropdown menu. It took maybe a minute maximum to apply those edits to around 300 images.
I was honestly a little sceptical as to how well the edits would turn out, but again, I was pleasantly surprised. This software really did what it promised! The majority of the edits were spot on with how I would have edited them one by one. Even the shots taken in extremely bright direct sunlight or using a gold reflector had come out well. Some of the images were shot in open shade, while others were taken in direct sunlight. However, this didn’t seem to have been an issue for Neurapix. I was convinced!
Take a look at the images below and how they compare with my rough first edit versus Neurapix’s version:
Pros and Cons of Neurapix
Let’s start with the good things about Neurapix, and there are several. Firstly, Neurapix really does do what it ‘says on the tin’. It is extremely fast, it’s incredibly simple to set up and start using, and it’s effective. If you’re shooting consistently in the same sort of locations and lighting, then this really could be a game-changer in how you batch edit your images. The quality of output seemed consistent and really high.
Secondly, I like the fact that it’s integrated seamlessly into Lightroom Classic. Most of us are familiar with Lightroom so that won’t be a turn-off for most photographers. It’s software we already know how to use, so there’s very little learning curve involved with Neurapix.
Obviously, the potential time savings is a big deal. The ability to edit thousands of images in minutes is a huge advantage for wedding and event photographers. The additional cropping and masking features are something that I haven’t really seen before on other AI editing tools. These features do set Neurapix apart, and could be good for busy studio photographers who shoot a lot of portraits as well.
The flexibility to choose between editing locally or on Neurapix’s servers is also a nice touch. It can free up space on your own desktop or give you more control over where your images are being edited.
Unfortunately, nothing is ever 100 per cent perfect. There are a few drawbacks to Neurapix. If you’re like me, you might prefer to use the Creative Cloud version of Lightroom. I have to admit that I don’t love the Lightroom Classic interface. It’s a pity that Neurapix only works with Lightroom Classic. However, many wedding photographers are familiar and happy with Lightroom Classic, so this may not be a deal breaker.
Secondly, Neurapix only works with RAW files. If you shoot Jpegs (and admittedly, some event photographers do for quicker delivery), then this simply won’t work for you. However, again, I don’t actually know many professional wedding photographers who wouldn’t be shooting RAW images in any case so this detail maybe isn’t so important.
One other thing to take into account is that Neurapix only works with a steady internet connection. Whether you’re working on their servers or locally on your own computer, you still need an internet connection. This is definitely something to take on board, especially if you shoot in remote locations or are a destination wedding photographer.
Finally, the last hurdle for many photographers will simply with the price. For some, the time savings mean that the flat rate will be totally worth the investment. However, if you’re a part-time photographer or someone who doesn’t shoot a high volume of weddings and events, then you might consider the pay-per-image option as a more cost-effective solution. Similarly, I thought the price of the ready-made presets was high compared with other presets (although I am told that the photographers themselves set their own prices and receive the full payment upon download).
Who Would Benefit from Using Neurapix?
Neurapix is perfect for wedding and event photographers who need to edit large batches quickly. If you’re a high-volume shooter, this could be a lifesaver. It’s cheaper than outsourcing your retouching, and it’s consistent in quality, meaning that you can trust it to edit your images intelligently in the same way that you would. However, if you’re a hobbyist or already have a consistent editing style, traditional presets might be good enough.
Final Thoughts
Neurapix is a powerful tool that delivers on its promises. It’s not perfect; there’s room for improvement, such as support for regular Lightroom and a better preview feature. However, for the right photographer, it’s a game-changer. By automating the tedious parts of editing, Neurapix allows you to focus on what you love most: capturing and creating stunning images, working on your business instead of in your business, and even spending more quality time with loved ones.
In today’s instant gratification culture, where clients expect faster turnarounds than ever, tools like Neurapix are becoming essential. If you’re a wedding or event photographer looking to save time, maintain consistency, and meet client expectations, Neurapix is definitely worth a try. Try Neurapix now with 2,000 free edits.
