Lightroom 4 Public Beta Is Here!

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Jan 092012
 

Lightroom 4 Beta

Happy Birthday Lightroom! How nice of you to give us a gift on your special day!

That’s right, Lightroom 4 Beta is ready for you to play with. You can download your copy at http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/lightroom4/. As you discover new things and want to get involved in the conversation then head over to http://forums.adobe.com/community/labs/lightroom4/. The Lightroom team is eager to hear what you have to say, good or bad, so don’t be shy!

As a reminder THIS IS BETA SOFTWARE!!!!! So please do not use this against any of your original images. Make separate copies of some images you want to experiment with so that your originals are protected. I can’t stress this enough. Whenever a new Beta is released I hear from a handful of readers who didn’t heed this warning. It’s not always a happy ending. So, one more time, THIS IS BETA SOFTWARE!!!!! OK. Now that that’s out of the way let’s do the quick tour of what’s new in Lightroom 4 Beta!

The broad categories are:

  • Better Video Support
  • Geolocation capabilities
  • Simplified Basic Adjustments
  • New Shadow & Highlight controls
  • New local adjustments
  • Soft Proofing!!!
  • Photo Book creation
  • Email capabilities

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2012 Is Here! Are You Ready?

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Jan 012012
 

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2012! Are you ready for a new year? Did you get everything accomplished in 2011 that you set out to do? If you are like most humans on the planet you probably have some things on your 2011 list that still need doing. One of the nice things about a new year is the fresh outlook we can apply to the upcoming twelve months. If we didn’t get to everything on our list we can reassess and determine if they were really worth doing or if they should be brought forward to this year’s list.

Here are some Lightroom suggestions to add to your 2012 list:

  • Update your watermarks and metadata presets. It’s a new year. If you use the year in your copyright notices (i.e. Copyright © 2011) then remember to change the year to 2012 in all your presets and watermarks.
  • Make 2012 your keyword year. Make a commitment to keywording in 2012. Go through your current keywords. Make sure there aren’t duplicates because of number or case. Look for things like cat, cats, Cats, etc. Keywords can really make your catalog function like a well-oiled machine! If you aren’t familiar with the power of keywording start with Peter Krogh’s excellent article on keywords at dpBestflow.
  • Review 2011. Take some time and review your images from 2011. Gather the best together into a collection. Consider sharing these on your social networking sites. Whether it’s flickr, Facebook, Google+, 500px or… let the world see your work. Be proud of your accomplishments.
  • Get to know the Lightroom Community. Thanks for reading Lightroom Secrets! If you haven’t yet had a chance take a look at some of the sites listed on the sidebar under Interesting Sites. Seán McCormack put together a great twitter list at http://www.pixiq.com/article/lightroom-twitter.
  • Learn, learn, learn. You can never learn enough about photography and Lightroom. Take a look at the Lightroom videos at Adobe TV. Check out the great free tips from the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) at http://www.photoshopuser.com/lightroom (while you’re at it why not consider joining NAPP?) Take some courses at Lynda.com. Play with Lightroom and learn all you can!
  • Try something new. Try a new processing technique in Lightroom. Try shooting a different way. If you never take night shots try that! If you never use the adjustment brushes then give them a try. There’s bound to be something you can try in 2012. Have fun doing it and don’t worry about the outcome. 100 terrible shots may lead to that masterpiece! You won’t know unless you try.
  • Have fun! Always remember Rule 5. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Experiment. Go on a photo walk or two. Join a local camera club or user group.

The new year is filled with bright and shining possibilities! But, we can only look back on the year positively if we take the initiative now. Time passes us by rather quickly. Don’t wait for tomorrow or next month. Get out there now and capture those priceless images. Be positive. Be courageous. You won’t regret it!

Boost Lightroom’s Creative Options with Topaz Lens Effects

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Dec 152011
 

Expanding Lightroom with Topaz Labs Plugins

It’s been a while since I paid you all a visit here at Lightroom Secrets; it’s good to be back! Today I will show you how to expand Lightroom’s editing capabilities by integrating third party plugins into the mix. Typically, this is handled via the Plug-in Manager in the File menu, but we’ll follow a slightly different process here. Specifically, we’ll look at Lens Effects from Topaz Labs (which incidentally, you can get for $50 off between now and December 24, by entering the code “simplefocus” into the Topaz shopping cart).

Lens Effects is a plugin that contains a variety of creative blurring effects, as well a number of traditional lens filter effects. Examples include things like a Tilt-Shift lens preset, motion blurring, a Graduated Neutral Density preset, and something called Creative Blur, which is the preset we will focus on in this tutorial. The objective is to take a silhouette image of a cliff diver at sunset, and use a combination of creative focus and some selective processing in Lightroom to create a scene that draws the viewers eye to the divers without taking away too much detail or color.

Quick Setup Tips

To access Topaz Labs plugins from Lightroom, you need to do two things. First, install the Lens Effects plugin as you normally would, then, install an add-on program (should be available from the same installer) called “Fusion Express 2″. Once you’ve done that, go to Lightroom’s Preferences and under “External Editing”, select the Fusion Express 2 app and apply the settings shown below.

Before you start, tell Lightroom where to find Topaz Fusion 2...

From this point, you can right-click on any image thumbnail in the Library module, in the Filmstrip, or on any open image in the Develop module, and choose Edit In > Edit in Topaz Fusion Express 2. When you do this, you will be greeted with a dialog that lets you choose the specific Topaz plugin you want to use  (shown later).
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A Clever Use of Smart Collections

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Dec 042011
 

It was a cold and rainy day today. A perfect time to catch up on some video podcast viewing!

One of my favorites is Terry White’s Adobe Creative Suite Video Podcast. I really recommend that you subscribe to this FREE podcast in iTunes. Just click here to learn more and subscribe.

In the last two episodes, Terry talked about a very clever use of Smart Collections with Publish Services. He shows us how to create smart collections that tie into a regular collection and duplicate the content across several Publish Services. In his example, he has a regular collection in which he keeps 24 of his most recent portfolio level shots. He wants this same set published out to Flickr, Facebook, SmugMug, Google+, etc. without having to manually recreate those collections in each Publish service. Terry walks through the steps to set this up.

If you want to see these videos without subscribing (although I don’t know why you wouldn’t subscribe) you can check them out on his site. The first video is How to Use Lightroom 3′s Smart Collections in Publish Services. The second talks about doing this for Google+: How to Publish your Photos From Lightroom Directly to Google+.

If you’ve been keeping current with you podcast viewing this may be old news. But, I thought is was rather clever and wanted to share it with you in case you missed it. Enjoy!

Back to Basics: The Crop Tool

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Nov 302011
 

Tucked away in the Develop module is a seemingly innocuous little tool – the crop tool.  But, looks can be deceiving! There is quite a bit hidden away in the crop tool to help you find just the right image within your image.

While it is always a good idea to compose your shots and get it right in the camera there are still many instances where you will want to crop out some of the extraneous material from your image. Perhaps there is a trash can in the far right edge. Or your horizon splits the frame right across the middle and you’d like more sky than land. Crop tool to the rescue.

In addition to the usual uses for the crop tool, there is also an artistic aspect. Some shots can yield several final images. In fact, there is a whole world of cropping just waiting for you. Don’t believe me? Just take a look at Rikk Flohr’s excellent site all about cropping – Holy Crop!

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Lightroom’s Little Vines

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Nov 182011
 

A small story before we get started… As I was putting together the screenshots for this article I saw a tweet pop up from Laura Shoe about her latest article “When to Use Lightroom’s Two Different Vignetting Functions.”  The coincidence made me laugh. Anyway, check out Laura’s article for more information and while you are at her site check out her excellent training DVD!

People, being the creative beings they are, have long sought ways to enhance and decorate their work. As the printed word progressed, little vines and flowers were added to separate chapters or sections of a story. The french word vignette was used to describe these little vines. Vignettes indicated the edges of a story. Later, photographers started defining the edges of their images by darkening or lightening the outer parts of the frame. This technique also came to be known as a vignette. The image told the story and the vignette helped define the edges.

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Back to Basics: Grid View Options

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Oct 312011
 

Every so often it is good to review the basics. Sometimes we discover new things. Other times we are reminded of things we learned early on. So let’s take a look at the view options available in the Library grid.

The grid is the foundation of the Library module’s functionality. Here is where you can quickly scan, rate, flag, group, remove, and otherwise deal with and organize your images. Each image occupies a cell on the grid. In its most basic mode your images can be the only thing in the cell.

Lightroom has a myriad of options for displaying information in each cell. This can tell you quite a bit about the image without having to consult any of the panels or modules. Let’s take a look at what we can do with view options!

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