Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Killer Tips

Summer is in full swing, SPF 45 and lemonade are flowing, and that inspired my latest preset. Actually, summer has been in full swing here in Tampa, FL for about 6 weeks but hey, I love the heat so it’s all good for me. This week’s preset is named Summer Haze. I was working on some photos and I was trying to get across that summery, warm, hazy feeling and this is what came out of it. The preset adjusts the white balance, Vibrance, Saturation, and Split Toning sliders. I even tossed in a bit of a Tone Curve adjustment on it in the Shadows since the other settings seemed to muddy the photo up a bit, and I thought it needed some more blacks to bring back the contrast. It works great on fun-styled photos outdoors and even makes a pretty nifty wedding effect.

I hope you enjoy. Speaking of summer, I’m bailing out of work a couple hours early today to head to Busch Gardens. They have this “Summer Nights” things going on and it’s a lot more bearable later in the day. Hmmmmm… Summer Nights. Sounds like a good name for a preset Enjoy!

Click here to see a sample of the preset.
Click here to download Matt’s Summer Haze Preset
Click here to see a video on how to install presets.

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Happy Friday again. Everyone seems to be enjoying the HDR video so I thought I’d include a whole post about HDR stuff. First off, let’s start with some software:

Software
There’s a few programs you can use for HDR.
1) Photoshop - I’m not a huge fan of Photoshop’s Merge to HDR
2) Photomatix - definitely my favorite. Oh yeah, NAPP members get a 20% discount. Here’s the link to the NAPP member website to get the code.
3) FDR Tools - Cool enough. I’ve tried it but I like Photomatix more. It just seems more intuitive to me personally.
4) Dynamic Photo HDR - This program looks like the best of all of them to me. The interface looks awesome. However, it’s PC only so I haven’t been able to try it out yet.

Learning
• I did a 2 part NAPP tutorial on the NAPP members website. One on Merge to HDR in Photoshop and another one on using Photomatix.
• I think HDR really shines for real estate and landscapes. Here’s a neat article on using HDR for real estate photography.
• Stuck in Customs has a cool tutorial
• Ben Willmore is teaching a class on it at the upcoming Photoshop World in Las Vegas
• Another HDR tutorial I found on Flickr

Inspiration
Finally, here’s some inspirational links to some great HDR photography.
• The mother lode of all HDR inspiration over at Flickr’s HDR group.
• Photomatix’s website has some really great examples of HDR. Check out Maciek Duczynski’s portfolio there for some amazing stuff.

As always, if you’ve got some related news, links, websites or tutorials let us know in the comments area. Have a great weekend!

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Lately I’ve really been into shooting HDR images. I bracket just about everything that I can. Why? Not because I like the fantasy-like effect that’s been popular. Honestly, it’s just not my style but I can definitely appreciate it for certain photos. For me though, it’s more about having real world HDR. It saves me time in Photoshop and I’m amazed that I’ve never explored HDR for my landscape and interior photos until now. I’ll explain how, why, and how I’ve incorporated Lightroom into my HDR workflow as well as what I use to process my HDR images in this week’s video. Oh yeah, if you’ve got any cool HDR links, galleries, or tutorials out there make sure you mention them in the comments section. Thanks!

Click here to watch the video. (24MB)

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First off, I’d like to thank Matt Pavel for posting a comment last week and suggesting a preset based on the Sin City look. I’ve always been a fan of that look and it was fun to see what was possible with Lightroom. Before we go too far, this preset isn’t the exact Sin City look. There’s a lot more going on with this effect then we can do in Lightroom. But working on it at least inspired this preset which I think comes pretty close. So here’s the deal. The main idea behind the Sin City look is pretty much a desaturated high contrast photo with some red saturation left in. The preset is mostly a desaturating effect. But it also leaves certain colors saturated (reds and oranges). The idea behind this is that you’ve got to have something in your photo that has those colors in it. Even if it’s just a photo of people though, it should work since the skin tones will fall in those saturated colors. Also, there’s two flavors to this preset - a light red one and a dark red one so it changes how bright the reds appear. So thanks to Matt for suggesting the idea and thanks to everyone who takes their time to visit the site and leave their comments. I know it takes time but it’s what makes this site better and better every week. Enjoy and let me know what you think.

Click here to see a sample of the preset.
Click here to download Matt’s Sin City Presets
Click here to see a video on how to install presets.

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Time for another Friday tip. As you’ve probably seen if you’ve followed this site for any amount of time, I love presets. If you love them too you’ll need to make sure you’re backing them up in case your computer ever crashes. Or, maybe you want to move your presets from a laptop to a desktop or vice-versa. Here’s a quick way to back up everything related to presets.

(edit by Matt K: many thanks to Mike for posting a comment on an even easier way to do this - thanks Mike!)

1) Go to your Lightroom preferences. Lightroom menu on Mac and Edit menu on PC.
2) Click on the Presets tab.
3) At the bottom of the dialog you’ll see a button that reads “Show Lightroom Presets Folder”. Click on that.
4) Backup the “Lightroom” folder to your backup device or disk.
5) Sit back and revel in the fact that your presets are now safe

That’s all there is to it. All of your presets live in that folder so as long as it’s backed up you’re good to go. Well, that wraps up another week. Have a great weekend - hit ‘em long and hit ‘em straight and if you don’t play golf then you should probably keep from hitting things all together. See ya!

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