Canon 1DS Mk III, 1/3 @f11, ISO 200, 24mm (EF24-105 f/4 L)
I’m always drawn to textures and colors, especially when the light helps accentuate them in an image. Back lighting is probably my favorite light to work with, though it is also the most difficult in my opinion. But there is no better way to bring out dimension and depth that really helps a viewer “step into” the scene photographed, both visually and emotionally.
I used an 2 stop graduated filter in the field to darken the sky, and then used Lightroom to dodge some areas around the trees that became too dark. I haven’t printed this image yet, but for sure the rich detail deserves at least a 24 x 36 print. I’ll share the specifics of how I print it, what paper I use, and how it turns out – thanks for reading!
Check out Robert's website for images, workshops, webinars and more! LINK
I’ve been using Adobe Lightroom as my RAW converter and photo editor of choice since version 1 launched a few years ago. Until last year I still relied on Photoshop to complete the bulk of my editing work. Why? Because I was stubborn – an old curmudgeon who didn’t want to change. Looking back, I wish I’d taken the advice of my friend and Lightroom guru Nat Coalson, who for years has been extolling the virtues of completing as much work as possible within Lightroom.
Finally I got smart and listened to Nat’s advice. I now do about 90% of my processing within Lightroom, only using Photoshop to blend multiple exposures or for complicated cloning – both of which just can’t be done in Lightroom’s current version. Even then, I import the finished product back into Lightroom so my entire image collection is in one place and easily searchable.
Lately I’ve noticed that many of my photo workshop clients are just now diving into Lightroom. Many of them are doing so with trepidation. Some of them are taking the plunge because I’ve badgered them into it. Regardless, if you’re new to Lightroom I’ve got a few tips to share that are guaranteed to save you time and effort down the road. These tips come from my own hard won experience. I hope they help you find Lightroom bliss.
Keyword From the Start
You may not be a professional photographer or even have any aspirations to become one. It doesn’t matter. Metadata is king and you should keyword your images from the very beginning. I also recommend that you enter a title and description for each photo. Why? If you ever plan to upload your images to flickr, your own website or any other photo sharing sites, the title, description and all of your keywords will automatically carry over. I didn’t keyword from the start and as my stock photography business grows, I’m reallywishing I had.
Buy A Lightroom Reference Book
The Adobe engineers did a remarkable job of designing Lightroom to be extremely powerful while remaining user friendly. Nearly every adjustment in Lightroom can be accomplished through the use of sliders. However, some of the terms may be confusing to those who are new to Lightroom. Clarity, vibrance, black point – huh? Additionally, there are keyboard shortcuts, presets, camera and lens profiles, catalogs, collections, ratings and more that aren’t exactly intuitive. A good reference book, like Nat Coalson’s “Lightroom 3: Streamlining Your Digital Photography Process” will save you get you up and running with a minimum of time and frustration.
Keep It in Lightroom
This one took me a while to adopt. I really wish it hadn’t. I use Lightroom for 90% of my processing, switching over to Photoshop only to do exposure blends, complicated cloning and image prep for print. Until Lightroom offers layers and a better cloning tool I’m forced to use Photoshop for these techniques. However, Lightroom does have a powerful printing module that I simply haven’t yet explored. I will soon.
Why keep everything in Lightroom? Lightroom’s database capabilities are second to none. By cataloging all of your images inside Lightroom you’re ensuring that they’re always easy to reference. You can search for images using a number of variables, including keywords. If you’re a stock photographer this is especially important as it eliminates the hassle in trying to find images for photo submissions. All of your images under one roof? Nice!
Back-up Your Lightroom Catalog Early and Often
This is probably the single most important advice I can offer. We all know the value of backing up our data yet not all of us do it as often as we should. I’m guilty of it in some regards but not when it comes to my Lightroom catalog. Luckily, Lightroom makes it stupidly simple to ensure you never forget this critical step. Lightroom can be set up to prompt you about a back-up every time you quit the program. At that point you have the option to back-up the catalog or just close the program. Take it from someone who learned this lesson the hard way: back up your catalog every time you close Lightroom. In my early days of using Lightroom I was far too lax about this. My catalog became corrupted and, because I’d never backed it up, I lost all the work I’d done on every single image in the catalog. All of it. Hundreds of hours worth. Don’t let this happen to you.
Presets Speed Up Your Workflow
Lightroom allows you to create presets for certain functions, such as exports and keywords. Generally speaking, you’ll save quite a bit of time and effort if you set up presets for commonly used actions. For example, if you spend a lot of time photographing in Arches NP you can create a preset containing keywords that apply to all images from Arches. One click and the keywords are automatically populated.
I also frequently use export presets. A recent photo submission consisted of almost 200 images that needed to be at a specific size and in jpeg format. First I added all the images for the submission to a “collection”, then I created an export preset, selected the entire collection and started the export. A few minutes later the entire submission was ready to be burned to a CD and shipped off to the client. You can read more about how I use Lightroom collections to speed up my workflow here.
Bonus Tip: Plug-ins Are Your Friend
No, you don’t have to use plug-ins to really benefit from Lightroom. But, I find that they make my life much easier. Unless you’re new here, you already know I’ve got a love affair with the Nik Software Complete Collection . There are dozens of other plug-ins that allow you to work faster and smarter, some of which are even free. This link to the Adobe Lightroom website will give you an idea of what types of plug-ins are available. If you find a few that work for you, you’ll soon realize just how much of a timesaver they are.
So, there you have it. My five – okay, six - tips for new Lightroom users. If you’ve got a tip to share I hope you’ll do so in the comments section below. I’m certainly not a Lightroom expert and would love to hear how you’re using it to speed up your workflow!
Learn more about Bret, view his images, scout his workshops and read his blog here.
I’m a little late to the party when it comes to using Collections within Lightroom. My friend, workshop partner and Adobe Certified Expert Nat Coalson has been recommending their use to me for at least two years but until last week I’d never really seen the benefit. Now that my eyes are finally open, I thought I’d share how I’m using Quick Collections with all you good folks. I hope it’s helpful.
Last week I put off working on a large submission because I just wasn’t looking forward to all the work involved in assembling it. Yeah, I know – it’s a good problem to have and I shouldn’t be such a slacker but frankly, I am. At any rate, I started thinking about how I could streamline the process when I hit on a genius idea: create a Quick Collection of the images to submit and then export them all as properly sized jpegs.
It’s easy to add photos to a Quick Collection. As you scroll through the filmstrip all you have to do is press the “B” button and they’re automatically added. Once your Quick Collection is complete, select all the images and export them using whatever settings are needed. When you’re done, you can remove all the photos from the Quick Collection and you’re ready to do it all over again when you receive the next submission request.
Another option would be to make a new Collection for each submission. This way you’ll always have a record of each submission in the event that you need to resubmit the images, or for later reference when you’re making a fresh submission and don’t want to send duplicate images.
Learn more about Bret, view his images, scout his workshops and read his blog here.
I use the “Lights Out Mode” in Lightroom frequently as part of my final editing process, so here's a quick tutorial on how I do that.
Learn more about John, view his images and check out his blog here.
Hello everyone. John Batdorff here, and today I want to talk about a feature I really enjoy using at the end of my editing process, and that's the Lights Out feature. When I'm done editing my image and I think I'm where I need to be, I'll use the Lights Out feature to just view the image without all the distractions of the panels and lightroom.
To activate the Lights Out feature, all you need to do is press the "L" key on your keyboard. When you do that, it will go to dim first. Now, I don't use this that often, but some people like this feature to review their images and then make changes to their images, because you still can see your developmental panel and all of that. What I have my setting at is 70%, and I'll show you how to change that in a second. But what I like to do is go to Lights Out, which you hit the "L" key again, and boom, all we have now is the image and I can review the image. This is where I think about what kind of adjustments I want to make, or if it's done and ready to go.
Just remember, hit "L" again to go back to full view. Some people will freak out, and they'll be like, "Oh, I can't get anywhere." Well, you hit "L" again and that takes you right back to the beginning.
So to change your Lights Out setting, all you need to do it go into Edit, Preferences, and right here where it says "Dim Level," that's the dim level that we talked about that first time that you hit the "L" key. The default is at 80. I use 70 because I think you can see the controls a little better, even though I don't really use it that much. Let's just take a look at this again, This is dim, this is at 70% dim. Like I said, you still have access to everything. Once again, we hit "L", that's Lights Out and then, oh, we're freaking out. What do we do next? We go back and we hit "L" again and we're back.
So just remember, you're cycling through the "L" key, once to dim, once to Lights Out, and then once to come back to lights on.
I hope this was helpful. If you have any questions, feel free to drop me an email at john@batdorffphotography.com. Take care.
For the recent “Real World Lightroom” workshop, I wanted to show students the creative power of Lightroom 3 as both a RAW processor and a way to make great slideshows for presenting their work. Here’s a short video made using the slideshow module of Lightroom showing before and after versions of some of my recent photographs.
Here’s How I Made It
- For the images, I selected several that would serve as the after slide. Then I created virtual copies of each one and cleared out the adjustments so that they looked like they were just imported. These were manually sorted in the slideshow module so that the before images were in order. Also, I had to make sure the cropping and alignment was the same so that the image wouldn’t seem to shift too much during the fade transition.
- For the intro and outro slides, I created the graphics in Photoshop at 1920 x 1080 resolution, the final output size of my slideshow when exported . Once I exported the slideshow from Lightroom at 1080p, I imported the video file into Premiere Pro CS5 and added the intro and outro slides and music. I could have created the video entirely in Lightroom, but would have lost the ability to have the intro and outro slides show full screen.
- For the background, I modified a cool wallpaper from Bartmelme Design which are available for free – (thanks guys!), and placed it as my background image in Lightroom – a very cool feature.
Finally, I uploaded the video to Vimeo, but you can use any number of other video sharing sites
Hope that inspires you to create your own slideshows in Lightroom and get creative with presenting your work in a way that helps you stand out from the crowd! Any questions or suggestions, please let me know!
Learn more about Robert, his images, his blog and his workshops at his website: www.robertrodriguezjr.com
On a recent visit to one of my favorite locations in the Hudson Valley, I was fortunate to find some very unique weather conditions. Recent sub-zero temperatures and lots of snowfall created some really strong foreground elements, and I was able to “walk” out on to the frozen Hudson to try and capture some interesting perspectives. My goal here was to emphasize as best as I could the relationships between the foreground and the mountains in the distance. This included lines and shapes, highlights and shadows, as well as the color variations as you move from the cool foreground to the warm and bright light in the distance.
More than anything else, I wanted to capture how I felt, which was mostly excitement, incredibly alive breathing the crisp air @ 5°, but also warm from knowing I was doing exactly what I wanted to do.
These are all part of the “ingredients” that I talk about in my workshops that help contribute to an image that is visually interesting, and hopefully conveys the feeling and mood of the scene. Of course, capturing the image is only part of the process – interpreting the RAW file to achieve your ultimate vision is just as important to the overall workflow. The creative decisions made in the processing stage is the focus of this video, the “why” of moving a slider in Lightroom. I hope you enjoy this podcast episode – I have several more coming in the near future. As always, please leave any questions or feedback in the comments section below – I always enjoy hearing from you.
Learn more about Robert, his images, his blog and his workshops at his website: www.robertrodriguezjr.com
Editor's note: A big welcome to Robert Rodriguez Jr.! We ran across Robert's stuff by way of blog contributors Brett Edge and Guy Tal. From images, to videos, to blog posts, Robert puts out some amazing content. Hailing from the Hudson Valley and passionate about conservation, Robert conducts workshops as well.
You can find links to Robert's site at the end of this article.
Make sure and read this post all the way through, as Robert's explanation of his Lightroom processing is very informative.
We look forward to more of Robert's posts!
Cold Sunrise - Lake Placid, Adirondacks
This was a very cold, early morning hike to a great sunrise location in the Adirondacks, and I really wanted to convey this feeling in the image “Cold Sunrise”. There are many cues that you can use to express how you feel when you’re at a particular location, and these involve all of our senses including sound, touch, smell, etc. Here I’ve tried to convey touch and feel by leading the eye onto the texture of frozen snow on these rocks in the foreground.
In addition, I think that the low fog in the valley conveys that stillness and silence that we often associate with these types of atmospheric events. When we can’t see very clearly, our other senses become more acute, and even though this is a photo, it triggers that sense in our minds to imagine what it would sound like to be there. Notice also the strong diagonals which guide the eye as mentioned before – cool to warm, texture to smooth, dark to bright, all contrasting elements.
Anyone looking at this photo will immediately understand what it must have felt like to stand on this frozen rocky ledge – at least that is my hope, and why it is important to continually practice the language of photography.
• Lightroom Workflow
As a bonus, I’ve included my Lightroom workflow so that you can get a better sense of how I processed this image with these ideas in mind in order to create the best interpretation of the RAW file.
1) Here is the original capture, with the default settings in Lightroom. Aside from a small amount of highlight clipping in the sky, the histogram looks good and I have maximized tonalities by exposing to the right. The image looks a little dark, but I wanted to make sure I didn’t lose any sky detail which was beautiful and adds the warmth to the image – a critical component to the overall feel and composition.
2) Next I made some adjustments in the Basic Panel, mostly increasing the Fill Light to bring out the dark foreground, Recovery to control the clipped highlights, and Clarity to bring out the texture of the ice and snow. I also added a bit of Vibrance for color. This works together with White Balance, which I increased from 6000k to about 6700k – this adds some warmth to the sky and removes some of the blue cast from the snow.
3) Next I wanted to try and increase the mid tone contrast – again with the idea that the textures in the image will help convey the feel – ice, frozen, rough, cold – even the trees appear like frozen statues, and adding contrast emphasizes this. I used the Tone Curve panel to added a tight S curve. This step helps the midtones, but prevents the deep shadows or highlights from being affected. Adding extra points high and low on the curve prevents this from happening.
4) I decided I wanted to darken the sky to help bring out the soft cloud textures, so I decreased the Luminance value of the Blues in the HSL Panel. This will also darken areas of shadow that often have a blue cast, so care must be taken not to go overboard. I wanted to a subtle effect, so -17 felt about right.
5) Now we come to the Detail Panel – one of the most important aspects of this image, and here I used fairly standard settings - Amount=66, Radius=1.0, Masking=25. However the important setting here is Detail=100. The Detail slider in Lightroom acts as a halo suppressor, meaning it tries to prevent halos, the ugly glow around edges when high sharpening is used. While often useful, it can make an image somewhat softer as well, especially a high frequency image like this one. I didn’t want to compromise that, so a setting of 100 removes all halo suppression and gives me the sharpest image possible. Remember that this requires a very clean image (little or no noise), and a sharp capture to begin with.
6) Finally, I was still not happy with the overall mood of the image – I wanted to sky to play a stronger role in leading the eye and conveying a sense of depth. Up to now it just seemed to bright and washed out. I added a Graduated Filter to with a setting of Exposure= -0.15, Brightness= -49. The key here is not to lose the highlights, but bring down the overall brightness of the sky and stretch the tonal values. Had I just used Exposure, then I would have lowered the whitest part of the sky only, which was not my intent. By using mostly the Brightness control, the sky becomes more dynamic and richer – the finishing touch to the image.
• Conclusion
I hope this is helpful in illustrating how I make technical AND creative decisions when processing an image in Lightroom. Having a clear idea of what you want to say with an image is extremely important, and aids the workflow tremendously. Thanks for reading and hanging in there through my explanations, and feel free to post comments and suggestions below.
PS- I teach this extensively in the Real World Lightroom 3 workshop where I go much more in depth and work through a bunch of images explaining how the creative process happens in the field, and continues in the digital darkroom.
Learn more about Robert, his images, his blog and his workshops at his website: www.robertrodriguezjr.com
Tonight I feel a bit like a mad scientist. For some unknown reason I got an itch to try something totally new in Lightroom and Photoshop. I made this image of bison grazing in the meadow at Mormon Row in the Tetons while there a couple weeks ago. Straight out of the camera the image wasn’t terribly exciting but I felt it had potential. Those of you who are familiar with my work know that my images are generally pretty straightforward. I don’t apply creative effects and I process the images to look more or less like the scene did when I photographed it. A little tweak of contrast here, add some saturation there, darken a sky now and again and do a little dodge and burning – voila, the final image appears. I have nothing at all against images that have been heavily manipulated. Photography is an art and we should feel free to create our art on our own terms.
Now, I have obviously taken some serious creative liberties with this image. For starters, my camera doesn’t make square photos. I used a fairly heavy digital grad filter to darken the sky with a heavy dose of clarity to give more separation in the clouds, added some global negative vibrance to mute the colors, made a curves adjustment to increase contrast, dodged the bison to make them stand out a bit more from the meadow, added a vignette and some “grain” – all in Lightroom 3. I exported the image to Photoshop CS4 and experimented with different blurs using the gradient tool to keep the bison sharp-ish while blurring out the background. I didn’t like the results of any of those efforts. What to do? Hmmm…
I decided to see what Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 could do for the image. I used their “Classic Soft Focus” filter first, painting on the effects only where I wanted them. I was getting closer but something was still missing. I tried a few other filters that didn’t work out before discovering the “Glamour Glow” filter. A very subtle application gave me the results I was looking for, again brushed on sparingly. I used Nik Viveza 2 to add some additional global contrast and whiten the whites. The final step was to use Nik Sharpener Pro to sharpen only the bison. What you see here is the final result of all that wackiness. Total processing time: about 35 minutes.
I think one of the greatest attributes of digital photography is that it has opened up a whole new world of creativity, both in the field and in post-production. When it doesn’t cost a penny to click the shutter most photographers are more willing to try new things, experiment with composition and stretch the boundaries of what they’re comfortable with. Things get even more exciting in the digital darkroom with panoramic image stitching, HDR, blended exposures, an endless variety of filters and plug-ins, not to mention what is possible with nothing more than Lightroom and Photoshop. And, if you don’t like the results of your weird science, it’s real easy to go back to square one and start all over!
What do you think? Some have said this image is “too flat”. Some simply don’t get it. That’s cool. Certainly, this is not the kind of processing that is going to appeal to everyone. I’m just really curious to hear your comments as I really stepped out of my comfort zone with this one. Be as harsh and critical as you dare. I’m a big boy and I can take it. What have you done to experiment and broaden your creative vision? Let’s hear some ideas!
You can learn more about Bret, view his wonderful images, and read his blog here: Bret Edge Photography
Earlier this month Adobe released “candidates” for Lightroom 3.2 and Camera Raw 6.2 and today they have released the final versions of these updates.
These final version contain even more bug fixes and support for 16 new cameras (up from 12 on the candidate releases) including support for the just recently announced Canon 60D.
Lightroom 3’s Crop Tool makes it easy to change your photo’s orientation from horizontal to vertical or vice-versa. Press the ‘R’ key to activate the Crop Tool, then press ‘X’ to change the orientation of the crop. You can do this in previous versions of Lightroom by dragging a corner, but LR3 makes it easier and quicker.
Learn more about Rob, view his images and check out his workshops at his website.
Tonight I feel a bit like a mad scientist. For some unknown reason I got an itch to try something totally new in Lightroom and Photoshop. I made this image of bison grazing in the meadow at Mormon Row in the Tetons while there a couple weeks ago. Straight out of the camera the image wasn’t terribly exciting but I felt it had potential. Those of you who are familiar with my work know that my images are generally pretty straightforward. I don’t apply creative effects and I process the images to look more or less like the scene did when I photographed it. A little tweak of contrast here, add some saturation there, darken a sky now and again and do a little dodge and burning – voila, the final image appears. I have nothing at all against images that have been heavily manipulated. Photography is an art and we should feel free to create our art on our own terms.
Photo of the Day – Light Mind, Rockefeller Preserve
Thursday, July 28th, 2011Light Mind, Rockefeller Preserve
Canon 1DS Mk III, 1/3 @f11, ISO 200, 24mm (EF24-105 f/4 L)
I’m always drawn to textures and colors, especially when the light helps accentuate them in an image. Back lighting is probably my favorite light to work with, though it is also the most difficult in my opinion. But there is no better way to bring out dimension and depth that really helps a viewer “step into” the scene photographed, both visually and emotionally.
I used an 2 stop graduated filter in the field to darken the sky, and then used Lightroom to dodge some areas around the trees that became too dark. I haven’t printed this image yet, but for sure the rich detail deserves at least a 24 x 36 print. I’ll share the specifics of how I print it, what paper I use, and how it turns out – thanks for reading!
Tags: lightroom, Photo of the day
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