Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Killer Tips

Here’s one of those “Holy Crap!!! I never knew that!” tips. First, it’s a Develop module tip so you’ll have to be in the Develop module to use it. Next, it’s a Histogram tip so you’ll have to know where the Histogram is to use it (it’s in the top right of the Develop module). OK, now that we have that behind us check it out. You can develop your photos visually with the Histogram. Just hover your cursor over areas of the Histogram and you’ll see sections become highlighted. Each section (there are 4 total) corresponds to a slider in the Basic panel. On the far left is Blacks, then Fill Light, then Exposure, and finally Recovery. Once your cursor is there just drag to the left or right to adjust that setting on the histogram directly. How’s that for some Friday coolness? Enjoy your weekend (we’re putting our Christmas tree, or the politically correct “Holiday Tree”, up so I know I’ll enjoy mine).

This website has been up for over a year now and as I looked through, I couldn’t really find a video where I covered Split Toning in detail. I’ve mentioned it here and there but from looking at forums and comments, I realized that lots of folks had questions on the basics. Fortunately, Split Toning is really easy and, as you’ll find out, after watching this video you’ll know pretty much all there is to know about it. Enjoy.

Click here to watch the video. (21Mb)

I’m back from a long weekend off and I feel totally revitalized. It’s amazing what a few days off will do for ya’. This weeks’ presets hit me over the weekend. I photographed a good friend of mine, Derek, and his family (see the next post for more). As I was going through the photos, I kept experimenting with the white balance presets (cloudy, daylight, etc.) and it was getting to be a pain in the neck to go back and forth. I started thinking how great it would be if when I hovered over the white balance setting I could get a quick preview of what it would look like. That’s when this hit me. I created presets for each white balance setting. Since you can hover over a preset in the Develop module and get a preview of the effects in the Navigator panel above it worked perfectly. I’ve only been using them for a couple of days but I gotta tell you I’m happy I made them. Now they’re yours too for the taking. Enjoy ‘em and make sure you scroll down for the next post for a little “behind the scenes” on my weekend shoot.

Click here to download Matt’s White Balance presets
Click here to see a video on how to install presets.

Hey folks. Here’s a photo I took this weekend and I thought I’d give you the low-down on the setup for a shot I call “Super Baby!” (get it, low down, set up - I know, it’s bad ). Anyway, a good friend of mine, Derek, asked me to photograph his wife and new baby. He assured me the baby was really great and when that happens you can usually count on a miserable day. But let me tell you - she was the cutest, happiest, best-behaved baby I’ve seen in a long time. I’ve never photographed a more pleasant child and I don’t think she cried once. As for the set up - here goes:
1) Photo taken with a Nikon D200 and a Nikon 17-55 2.8 lens
2) f/11 at 1/160th of a second. ISO was set to 400 (I forgot to change my ISO from my previous shoot - insert expletive %&$# here!)
3) No tripod and I didn’t shoot tethered into Lightroom. With the baby, there was just too much moving around.
4) White Backdrop
5) Lighting - Elinchrom Octa Light Bank (I’m in love with it!). Scott Kelby did a write up about it on his blog so make sure you check it out to find out more.
6) Props: A white rattle with a little Santa Claus on the end of it and lots of goofy adults standing behind me waving and making funny faces and sounds (OK, I may have made a few funny sounds too but not funny faces).
7) Not much done to this one in Lightroom. I increased the Exposure setting by about 1/2 stop. Bumped Clarity to around 40 and used the HSL panel to boost reds and blues (shirt and jeans).
8. I moved into Photoshop only to remove some spots/folds/wrinkles from the white backdrop and a little selective sharpening on the eyes.

A big thanks to my pal RC for helping me out during this shoot. Plus, he reminded me early on that I had my B&W polarizer on the lens. After all, why wouldn’t you want a polarizer on before a studio shoot? Seriously, I always forget to take it off, and I couldn’t figure out why my shutter speed was so slow. Thanks RC

Hey everyone. I thought to myself this morning that I could go out at the crack of dawn and buy a bunch of cheap stuff that I didn’t really need or… I could stay home and write a tip for the blog. I chose to sleep in and do the latter So…part of managing your library is getting rid of the photos that shouldn’t be there, right?. I know… I know… sometimes it’s hard because we get emotional about the photos and keep ones that maybe shouldn’t be there. However, no matter how great of a photographer you are there’s undoubtedly a handful (or more) of photos that are just out of focus, blurry, or the subject has their eyes closed. Well here’s something to help you get rid of them quickly. First, I go through the Library module and press the letter X (for Reject) on any photo that needs to go. Then, when you’re all done, go up to the Photo menu and choose Delete Rejected Photos. You’ll get a dialog asking if you want to remove them from the Library (which leaves them on your computer) or if you want to delete them from your computer all together. I usually delete from the computer because I don’t want them taking up space on my hard drive. Here’s the thing. I’ll generally do this when I first import my photos to reduce the amount of photos I manage. However, I’ll often go through older folders a month or two (or six) later and do it again. I always find photos later on that I realize I should have deleted earlier. Well that wraps up another week. Have a great weekend!