Archive for the ‘Lightroom 3’ Category
Some images only require a few adjustments and you’re done. Yes. You’re that good!
Other images just ask to be taken down different paths. As artists we often try to find the best expression of the moment we captured. But we don’t always know the steps from capture to masterpiece. We try different settings. Apply a preset or two. Dive into the adjustment brush. and so on. And, even though Lightroom preserves an endless stream of history on an image we don’t always remember at which step we saw one of those “looks” we liked. So what do we do?
Before Lightroom we might have saved multiple copies of an image. One for each different look. Now I know that storage is cheaper these days but how many times do you want to multiply a 25Mb file? Enter the snapshot!
Snapshots are one of the ways Lightroom lets us experiment and keep versions along the way. Even better, snapshots are virtual copies of an image that take up no room (or very very little) on the drive. These are literally snapshots of the settings at the time you take them. Great, huh?
Don’t confuse snapshots with Virtual Copies. We’ll talk about those in Part 2. So let’s see how to make these snapshots.
Read the rest of this story »
The Library module is a powerhouse of organization tools. You can view many images, a few, or one. Zoom in for fine details. Add star ratings. Add color labels. Change landscape to portrait and back again! The list goes on and on.
There is one small problem, however. Many new Lightroom users can be confused by Lightroom’s reaction to some of their actions. Some seasoned users even get confused on occasion. Here’s a typical question I get asked; “I select several images and press 4 to add a 4 star rating. Why does this sometimes add the rating to all the images selected and other times only to my active image?”
The answer lies in the difference between how the Grid view and the Loupe view treat these actions. Although they are both part of the Library module they serve very different purposes. You can think of the grid view like a lawn sprinkler, it gets everything wet. Loupe view is more like a water gun, you aim it at something and only it gets wet. (It’s a weak analogy, I know. But hang in there.)
Read the rest of this story »
If you have been using Lightroom and involved with the Lightroom community for any length of time then one of the names that is sure to be familiar to you is George Jardine. George was involved with Lightroom from its beginning and was a Lightroom Evangelist at Adobe until he left in 2008 to explore new creative ventures.
George Jardine started as a professional photographer. His work has appeared in Sports Illustrated, Better Homes and Gardens, Interior Design magazine, and many other national publications. George first joined Adobe Systems in 1993, and in 2003, he began work on the Lightroom project. George currently teaches workshops, consults for digital photographers, and is a freelance video producer.
If you are looking for a great set of tutorials to get you up and running in Lightroom look no further than George’s new Lightroom 3 tutorials. These 15 tutorials focus on catalog management and workflow.
Read the rest of this story »
In the previous article, Creating iPad Albums With Lightroom, I talked about using Matt Kloskowski’s export presets to create albums for your iPad. This method is accessible by both Lightroom 2 and Lightroom 3 users.
However, if you have moved on to Lightroom 3 you can take advantage of one of its great new features—Publish Services. (Thanks to John Beardsworth whose comment on the previous article motivated me to get this article out of draft sooner rather than later!)
A lot of the attention Publish Services has gotten revolves around the link between Lightroom and online services such as Flickr, Zenfolio, SmugMug, etc.. But the other side of this feature is the ability to create links between Lightroom and your drives. And it is this aspect we will exploit here.
Read the rest of this story »
The iPad is an excellent tool for showing off your work. Chances are, though, if you are a Lightroom user you don’t want to fiddle with iPhoto just to get your images ready for your iPad and sorted into albums. And if you are a Windows based Lightroom user then iPhoto isn’t an option for you.
Before we look at how to export your images and create iPad albums I suggest you go read Matt Kloskowski’s recent post Presets—Lightroom iPad Export Settings. Matt describes how to prepare your images and offers two very useful export presets. Download these and then return here. Don’t worry. I’ll wait.
Welcome back! Now that you have Matt’s presets installed we can proceed. This is a fairly straight forward workflow that will make organizing your images on your iPad easy (and iPhoto free).
Read the rest of this story »
Looking for new Lightroom presets? Do you have some great presets you developed and want to share? Well, Presetpond is the place to go!
Presetpond is a new online community for photographers enabling them to share preset-files for and Lightroom. There are also presets available for Aperture.
By registering at the site photographers can upload preset-files to the site along with a set of preview images showing the preset in action. These files can then be downloaded and rated/commented on by the public.
Read the rest of this story »
Lightroom 3 has been out in the wild now for just about a month now. If you have questions or need a little training assistance here are a few places to look.
A.J. Wood at Media Cats is posting some great video tutorials for Lightroom 3 at http://media-cats.com/learning/. Worth a look!
The National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) has an excellent Lightroom 3 learning center available at http://www.photoshopuser.com/lightroom3 and you don’t need to be a member to access it (although I heartily recommend you join!).
Adobe has quite a few resources available as well:
And don’t forget to check out the resources in the Interesting Sites over in the sidebar of this site!
I had the pleasure of writing an article for Photoshop User magazine’s July/August 2010 issue. The topic is the new noise reduction technology in Lightroom 3. If you aren’t familiar with Photoshop User magazine, it is published by the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) and is sent to all members. The magazine is also available at major book stores. Click here for a PDF of the article and enjoy!
If you haven’t yet investigated the benefits of becoming a NAPP member you should! At only $99 a year it’s a real bargain. Besides the subscription to the magazine you have access to hundreds of video tutorials, tips, tricks, and other things to enhance your Photoshop and Lightroom skills. NAPP also offers an extensive array of discounts. I haven’t really paid for my membership in years. I wind up save more than the annual dues using these discounts! Take a look at NAPP and join today!
Lightroom 3 is finally here! It’s been a long ride full of adventure and discovery from Lightroom 3 Beta through Lightroom 3 Beta 2 to Lightroom 3. Along the way we all made suggestions and requests. Adobe listened. If one of your suggestions didn’t make it into this version don’t worry. This won’t be the last version of Lightroom. I am confident that we have a lot of new and exciting things in the future. For now, let’s get comfortable with Lightroom 3!
As with any version of Lightroom it all begins with Import. And this time around we have an entirely new and improved import feature. While this has been the source of some consternation and controversy, once you dig in and look at what’s new here I think you’ll be on board.
Read the rest of this story »
