Adobe Lightroom 2: Workflow for Busy Photographers
A few years back, I’d authored a quick PDF to distribute to friends as they pondered getting into Lightroom. It was 2006/2007 and software like Lightroom was new and the hegemony of Bridge/ACR/Photoshop hadn’t yet been broken.
It has been extremely popular ever since, despite not making it all that public, and I’ve sent thousands of copies to photographers over the past few years.
Upon opening it the other day, I discovered it was a bit long in the tooth, so I dusted it off (metaphorically speaking) and reworked it in InDesign to include some new info, omit some of the less important stuff and generally updated it for Lightroom 2. It’s not a huge thing, only 13 pages long, but it can help you get started with Lightroom.
So without much more fanfare, may I present V2 of my Adobe Lightroom 2: Workflow for Busy Photographers PDF for your perusal?
It’s technically a beta
release, and I’m sure it needs some more refining,
but I’ll get to that over the next while. I’m sure
some will find it as useful as version 1 was way back
when.
If you have edits, additions or commentary, please
feel free to comment below and I’ll gladly respond.
Slickrock by Night
Here is my favorite pict from the shoot...
We had a ball, got some
interesting pictures, and even learned a few things.
Then on the ride back I lost my Wescott collapsible
umbrella out there. Somewhere. Just fell off the back
of my pack. Go figure.
Can’t wait to get back and try some new things...
Lightroom Tuesday
Welcome to Lightroom
Tuesday.
This weekly post is aptly named, as each Tuesday I
gather together the best presets, tips, tricks,
tutorials from the Lightroom-o-sphere and post them
for you, my dear readers.
- How to change crop orientation from Lightroomers.
- Using Lightroom 2’s Target Collections from Lightroomers (they’re on a roll). I remember when this was brought up during the 2 development cycle. At first I thought it was a uber-geeky addition, but it turns out I use this *all* the time.
- Noise Ninja has a “Sidekick” mode (thank you Marketing!) that lets you batch process from Lightroom.
- Matt K has a nice rundown of Q&A items this week on Lightroom Killer Tips.
- More from the big K - picking colors from anywhere.
- LightroomNews.com covers the shortcuts you should know to speed up your develop Module wanderings. I’ve been preaching G/D/N/W/R and the like for years. Go speed racer!
- Mastering the White Balance Controls.
- How many images in a catalog? I keep mine below 40K for performance reasons. Here is a Forum discussion on the matter...
- Image Info Tooltips are cool. You can be likewise if you just press the I key.
- Here are 30 (I kid you not, 30) tutorials listed at the EducationOnlineForComputers.com (I kid you not). Have not gone thru all of them, but there are some gems here.
- Stacking Bracketed Photos in Lightroom. Ah yes, I remember bracketing...
- X-Equals released their Image Kit - a zip file with all past Lightroom presets in one easy to grab file. Nice.
- An Evening with Terry White - My LIghtroom 2 Workflow. I didn’t know Terry while @ Adobe, but I do follow his blog and he has some great things to say. Apparently he is doing an online discussion via AcrobatPro Connect TONIGHT - April 28th. Learn more here...
- Anita Dennis (holla Anita!) from Adobe emailed me and asked that I highlight all the Adobe-created learning resources on the web. They’re working really hard to put together a community that benefits Lightroom users, so here are some great links. Lightroom Community Help - Help others, help yourself. Its cool. Everyone is doing it. Lightroom Help & Support Page - There are tons of great tutorials/tips here ( Getting Started with Lightroom, Watermarking your photos, Creating a Panorama)
Not Lightroom related, but kinda cool:
- The Lazy Rule of Thirds - a short treatise on rules and breaking them.
- Using a dummy to explore lighting effects.
- HDR photography is getting a bit long in the tool IMHO, but here is an interesting article on it.
Inspiration Monday: Martin Fuchs
I stumbled across this 2007 series documenting Co-Op City, a cooperative middle income development in the Bronx, and loved the casual portraiture of people in situ.
A few pictures from the series. Its well worth a perusal.
images © Martin Fuchs
images © Martin Fuchs
images © Martin Fuchs
Have a great Monday.
That's What I'm Talkin Bout
More Photos from Uranium Bicycles Shoot
A special thanks to the gang at Uranium - Dave, Linus, Angela, Marshall and Christie - for tolerating the repeated stopping, posing and re-dos when all we really wanted to to was barrel down that mountain at breakneck speed.
Biking and photography are hard to mix for that very reason, but the results can be spectacular.
I’m really pushing my
poor Macbook Air with these. I can’t wait to get home
on the big monitor and my beefy Mac Pro to finalize
these images.
Uranium Shoot
Still working thru them in Lightroom, but here are a few early selects...
Lots more to come, but its time to go ride again...
Young Ballerinas
Here is a glimpse of these talented girls...
Have a great Wednesday.
Lightroom Tuesday!
Welcome to Lightroom
Tuesday, aptly named as each Tuesday I gather
together presets, tips, tricks, tutorials and the
like from the Lightroom-o-sphere and post them for
you, my dear readers.
Sorry for the late post today. Busy with work and I’m
traveling (in Moab again).
- Split Toning is cool. Here is a tip from Lightroomers.com on how one can be likewise hip.
- Spotlight Preset
- More from Lightroomers - Show in Collection.
- Tips for improving Lightroom Performance.
- I bet you wondered how you ever got along before the Traveling Gnome Preset. Yeah, me too.
- Nerd Alert - more geo-tagging goodness.
- Noobie Alert - Getting Started in Lightroom 2
- Using Nik Silver Efex Pro with Lightroom. Personally, Im pretty happy withe b&w conversions I already get, but hey...
- DPS covers some “dont’s” in Lightroom.
- Speaking of Black & White, Matt K has some more b&w presets for your perusal.
- Dual Monitors can be cool. I was pretty excited when we worked on them in the 2.0 time frame, but truth be told, I hardly ever use it - mostly I think because my second 30” monitor is the communications monitor. Mail, IM, IRC, Twitter.
- Wonder what the Preview Options in the Import dialog do? Wonder no more...
- Other Lightroom peeps with tweets.
Inspiration Monday: Thomas Allen
Mondays ‘round here are for inspiration, so I like to highlight someone else’s work that catches my eye.
This week I’m giddy with anticipation. I ran into these mind-bendingly beautiful photographs by Thomas Allen in a tweet late last week. Based on cover art for pulp fiction paperbacks from the 40’s and 50’s, M. Allen constructs an interesting twist on the books and their contents. Talk about an interesting concept put together flawlessly. Huzzah for originality. Just spectacutlaré.
Peruse, friend...
image © Thomas Allen
image © Thomas Allen
image © Thomas Allen
More highlighted here...
An exhibit awhile back...
No website yet for him as far as I can find. If you
do know of one, comment it SVP.
A Night Out With a Young Dancer
And the best part was: it
was a complete surprise.
She had Flamenco class Friday afternoon, so I hid our
finery in the trunk and drove her to class, smiling
the whole way. After class, I handed her a package
with her dress and told her to get ready to go to the
Ballet.
She was ecstatic. Big grins. Ear to ear. Love it.
It was sunny an warm. We at a lovely meal before hand
and walked to McCaw Hall. We were in our seats with
plenty of time and over the next three hours we were
mesmerized. PNB really shines, and no better ballet
than Swan Lake to prove it. Chloe’s favorite part was
the Little Swans. It was easy to see why. Intricate,
powerful, and demanding.
Here are a few pictures. She gets inspired by dance,
as you’ll see.
And best off, today I got
an email from her:
daddy,
Thanks for taking me to swan lake, I had a great
time. I love the poster! your the best dad ever.
the e-card from american girl is from me!
Chloe your 10 year old daughter!
Happy Birthday Chloe. Keep Dancing.
PS. Wore the kilt. Thats what I’m talking ‘bout.
Random Goodness
The Painted Desert
I’m a happy denizen of the Pacific Northwest, but there is a side of me that craves the baking sun, the parched landscape and the beautiful red rock of the Colorado plateau. Especially in May when its still raining in Seattle.
Here are a few pictures from last week’s trip...
Sidecar!
The kids are all fired up
about it too. Even Chloe (probably because its
Russian).
The boys envision some form of armament up front
though, but I think the wife will probably nix at
least that part of our little dream. I can haz
browning M1919?
What will we do with it? Probably not this. But certainly tour around
on it.
And no, I’m not kidding.
Recommended Read: +10% Photoshop
I generally find a few nuggets worth reading, and today I found a real gem that deserves a highlight because it calls out something I’ve been pushing for years to anyone who would listen.
The article by Michael Gray as it sums up the way I’ve felt since I first imported images into a small skunkworks application in the dark halls at Adobe.
First read the article:
Now to some quick history. I was at Adobe for almost
10 years and worked on a variety of photo-related
tools for them. But it was painfully obvious for
several years that we were not doing the right thing
with Bridge/ACR/Photoshop and that standard hegemony
baloney. No naming names here, but resistance and
status quo were the norm.
So when Shadowlands (what became Lightroom) came
along, it was an epiphany for those of us who were
not overly interested in protecting an aging behemoth
at the expense of efficiency and elegance. It took
forever for Adobe to realize that (lots of tell-all
here that I’ll skip) but the suits finally figured it
out and did the right thing. Lightroom shipped and
redefined the space. Aperture, of course, primed the
pump and was like a frying pan upside the heads of
those that deserved it.
I quickly joined the LIghtroom team and was happy as
a clam. While not perfect, Lightroom is the best
photographic tool we have for the majority of camera
slingers today. Supported by Photoshop or other
plugin tools (Nik etc), you have a great beginnings
of a workflow that actually makes sense for today’s
marketplace. Instead of bouncing around in a
balkanized (and pixel-destruction) space, we have
something better. Huzzah.
And, while I left Adobe last year, there are some
good people working on Lightroom that will continue
to help it evolve in the right place. We knew it
would take some time to take over the entrenched
priesthood that ran the photo world, but its well on
its way.
Go Team!
Lightroom Tuesday!
Welcome to Lightroom
Tuesday, aptly named as each Tuesday I gather
together presets, tips, tricks, tutorials and the
like from the Lightroom-o-sphere and post them for
you, my dear readers. After a week hiatus, I’m back
with some great things from the past 2 weeks...
- Matt K has some great tips in his Q&A feature.
- I’ve shot street photography for years. I love shooting on the streets, although its taken a backseat to dance in the last few years. Here is an article on Profiphotos.com that talks about mimicking that street photo aesthetic. You could do it like its always been done: a Leica, a 35 or 50 MM Summicron/Summilux and some Tri-X pushed a bit. That gives you some contrast and speed so you can just hyperfocal it and be there...
- David Ziser talks about the latest Nik software package to hit LIghtroom... Here is a short look at how they work in Lightroom.
- TOP (you know what that is, n’est-ce pas?) outlines what he thinks is the best on-the-cheap workstation for photography...
- Getting red-eye? Hack. Ok, I’m kinda kidding. I can’t even remember the last time I had to use the red-eye tool because, well it happens because you don’t know what you’re doing most of the time. On-camera flash or a cheapy point/shoot. Doh! But here is a short tutorial if you’re still spreading your lighting wings...
- Lightroomers! has an interesting tip on Exporting photos from Lightroom and want to stack it next to the original.
- LIghtroom’s local adjustment brush lets you create masks, kinda. We designed it to be less in-your-face than Photoshop’s myriad of ways to add effects. Learn more here.
- Of all the questions I get about Lightroom, the big one is about how to keep yourself organized in Lightroom’s Library module. And on the hard drive. Most times, people dump and go and create an unholy mess. For those that know me, I’m not the most organized person in the world, but one should really take organization seriously when using lightroom. Here is an interesting look at how David DuChemin does it. Some sage advice.
- LRG Complete 4.1 updated. This is a web gallery engine for Lightroom.
- Sean McCormack’s new Lightroom 2 Made Easy book was released recently.
- Martin Evening has posted another video tutorial for Lightroom - this one is on creating an invert tone curve. You know, to convert a negative to a positive...
- A set of interesting Black & White presets from PresetHeaven.
- Matt K posted a video tutorial on using the Adjustment Brush and an interesting screed on the “truth” behind LIghtroom Backups. This is a known issue on the team - we talked alot about fixing the broken backup features, but it just didn’t fit in the 2.0 development timeframe. Personally I backup once a week using LIghtroom’s catalog backup feature because it has saved me once already and it isn’t a big deal.
- Adobe is doing some free eSeminars for Professional Photogs. More here.
- SlideshowPro for Lightroom was updated recently.
- A few weeks old, here is a tutorial by Martin Evening on controlling Vibrance & Saturation in Lightroom.
- Lightroom Newbie Tip - pressing the V key will quickly do a grayscale conversion. This isn’t a end-all-be-all black and white conversion, but just a way to quickly see if the picture works in monochrome...
- Here is a quick video tutorial on the Clarity slider’s effects in Lightroom.
- Another new Lightroom book: Adobe Photoshop (ugh) Lightroom 2: Streamlining your digital photography process” talks workflow.
- The Graduated Filter was a late-comer to the local adjustment toolset (we were much more focused on the brush tool) but it made it in and can be used for some interesting effects. Here is a basic look at its most common use-case.
- Why keyword? Because you can filter on them later.
- Split Toning is cool. Here is a tutorial on how to use the Split Toning panel.
Have a great Tuesday!
Back Home!
Last week my son and I spent 5 days exploring some little-known canyons near Ticaboo, Utah. The canyons, abutting Lake Powell at several parts, were quite remote and I was amazed to see nobody else in the 5 days we were there.
Not one person. I kid you not. Awesome.
I don’t think I’ve ever gone backpacking without seeing at least one other person. I came close one time - but on the second to last day we saw some geologists helicopter in to check out some thing or other nearby.
Here is a topo map of the area we were in.
Click to see a detailed look at the area, with GPS
data and everything. You can even look at it in
Google Earth if you want. Its
cool, but its not the same - trust me.
We camped, played cards, read books, explored, swam
in Lake Powell and just goofed off. As usual, it was
a blast. Then we headed to Moab for a few days for
bikes, food and fun.
A great trip.
Here are a few photos...
I love the ghosts of the
canyon photo...
More to come. Lightroom is still having its way with
the previews...
Gone for a week...
Every year I spend at least a week in wilderness with my son. Just the two of us. At 12, he’s quite a young man; tough, smart and focused. We’ve been doing this since he was old enough to put weight on his shoulders, and every year he becomes more capable. We’ve wandered our way down to Havasu Falls, spend a week at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, explored the land of canyons, and squeezed thru the Crack in the Wall near Escalante.
While his peers become increasingly entertainment-minded, with weak constitutions and minds resembling runny custard, I’m proud to see that achievement and learning have become more important to him than a stultifying X-box or gross-out movie.
This year we’ll be exploring some pretty remote areas near Lake Powell and enjoying the rugged (hopefully sunny) colorado plateau. With the extended drought, we’re hoping to get to explore some of the canyon lost when that Damn Dam was built.
Here is a picture from last years trip to Canyonlands National Park. This was taken in the Chestler Park area...
I’ll have lots to post
when we hit civilization again. So stay tuned. Also,
a fitting quote from Monsieur Abbey:
“One final
paragraph of advice: do not burn yourselves out.
Be as I am — a reluctant enthusiast... a part-time
crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half
of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and
adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it
is even more important to enjoy it. While you can.
While it’s still here. So get out there and hunt and
fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out
yonder and explore the forests, climb the mountains,
bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that
yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and
contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely,
mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep
your brain in your head and your head firmly attached
to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise
you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory
over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women
with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their
eyes hypnotized by desk calculators.
I promise you this; You will outlive the
bastards.”
Amen to that.
Young Dancer
I really love shooting the dimly-lit areas of the
backstage area during a performance - everyone is
quiet, focused and ready to dance and often makes for
great pictures if you can manage the light.
This young EBT dancer was watching the older girls on
stage and, if she’s anything like my daughter, was
memorizing every step in case she might be called to
“step in” and save the performance.
Well, or at least so she’d be ready in a few
years...
Studio 202
This was a two part shoot, first focusing mainly on taking some product pictures to enhance their forthcoming website. I had some fun with a few speedlights and some wonderful natural light streaming in the front window.
I’m going to get in this week and shoot some portraits of the women who work there as well. Should be fun...