Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Killer Tips

Hey folks, here’s a quick news update since I just finished teaching a workshop primarily on Lightroom and I figured I’d let you know where I’ll be teaching for the rest of the year. There’s another post today (another free preset) so feel free to scroll to the next post if you’re not interested in this.

Thank youI just wanted to say a great big huge thank you to everyone that came to my Great Smoky Mountains workshop this past weekend. We had a fantastic time and I made some really friends along the way. It was great getting to know all of you and the laughs we shared will stick with me for some time to come.

I also wanted to thank my friend Alessandro, from the workshop, for leaving such a nice comment here on the site. Here’s a peak if you’re interested. He totally made my day I can’t tell you how cool it is to see that I’ve helped people out like that. Thanks Alessandro (your pay off check is in the mail ) and thanks to the whole class for a great weekend!

Coming Up
OK, here’s where I’ll be for the rest of 2008 in case you’re thinking of coming out to a workshop or conference.

• May 5-6 - New York City: I’ll be teaching some Lightroom sessions at B&H photo on these two days. They’re totally free and you can find out more as well as register right here.

• Tuesday June 3 - Philadelphia, PA: I’m not sure about the details yet but I’m teaching a session for a CDW event (that is open to the public) that morning. I’ll update with details as they become available but I’ll definitely be there.

• August 9-16 - Hawaii Cruise: I’m teaching along side Dave Cross, Moose Peterson and Laurie Excel on a week long cruise through Hawaii. Folks, if you can make it out to this (I know it’s a stretch) it will be one amazing week.

• September 3-6 - Photoshop World Las Vegas: This is my favorite event of the year. It’s a 3-day Photoshop Love-Fest and hosts the best instructors in the world all in one place.

• October 15-18 - Bar Harbor/Acadia Natl. Park, Maine: This is another workshop for the Great American Photography Workshops (just like the one I taught in the Great Smokies last weekend). I’ve been to Bar Harbor before and I liked it so much that I’m going back. Sign up soon though. This is a hot spot for workshops and this one will definitely fill up.

That’s about it for now. I know there’s some more Lightroom training that I’ll be doing toward the end of the year but I don’t have the specifics yet. I’ll update here on the website as soon as I know. Thanks and I hope to see you out.

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I’ve got another quick video tip for you today (I mean really quick - like 60 seconds quick). It’s on a little known feature that helps out when using the Remove Spots tool and spotting your photos in general.

Click here to watch the video. (6Mb)

Now for some news and links…• Legendary wedding photographer (and just one all around really nice guy), David Ziser, has a workshop coming in July. David truly has a gift when it comes to photographing a wedding and working with people. Anyone who has been in one of his workshops comes out knowing it was worth 10 times what they paid. If you’d like find out more check out this link.

• You’ve heard me mention it before but Dave Cross, Moose Peterson, Laurie Excel and myself are teaching on a one week cruise through Hawaii. It’s got a great itinerary and a perfect mixture of classroom time, shooting time with the pros, portfolio review time with any of us, and free time to enjoy the cruise and the Hawaiian Islands. I’ve been to Hawaii once and it’s so darn cool because you’ve got landscapes, people, wildlife, flowers, fabulous sunrises, sunsets all in one place. Find out more and see the itinerary at Cruising Through Life’s website. Oh yeah, mention that you’re a NAPP member and you get a discount.

• I’ve been visiting the Weekly Photo Tips blog lately and Scott has some really nice finds on there. I’m especially liking his blog since he did a review of my Layers book Seriously though, review aside you’ll find some neat stuff on the website and Scott brings some unique posts to blogosphere.

• Terry White, author of the critically acclaimed Terry White’s Tech Blog (and one heck-of-a great photographer) wrote a cool post about controlling the whole studio from his laptop. It’s definitely worth a read and I’m sure you’ll find some other good stuff on his site.

And finally, an inspirational update…
• There was a lot of interest in the architecture and real estate post I did a few weeks ago. Well I got an email from one of the guys I mentioned (Thomas Grubba) and he pointed me to a Flickr group for Real Estate photographers. Not only is it inspirational but it’s educational too, as a lot of the photographers share their setups and experiences. The real estate market being what it is today, you can get a great competitive advantage if you work in this area by visiting this group. Heck, even if you’re selling your own home you might as well be the one taking your photos if your realtor pulls out their $110 point-n-shoot. Thomas also let me know that he and Scott Hargis (another really popular photographer in the business) are working on a DVD. Sign me up for it when it comes out!

Well campers that’s it for today. And yes, whenever I end a post with the word “campers” you know what that means. Yep, another cub scout camping trip this weekend. Say a prayer that the bird-sized mosquitos don’t get the best of me. See ya!
(photo credit: Thomas Grubba)

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I thought I’d share some of my Lightroom confessions in the hopes that I would either a) get a quick laugh from you as you realize you’re not the only one that does something odd in Lightroom or, b) undermine my professionalism and credibility by showing you some of the silly things I do. Make sure you leave a comment here if you have your own confession or just want to second your favorite of mine. Here goes:

1. Whenever I go into Photoshop I set the bit depth for 90% of my photos to 8 bit instead of 16 bit. Yes, I know I could easier call some of your first born ugly as opposed to choosing 8 bit but that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.

2. I don’t keyword my photos nearly as much as I should. I mean, I know the benefits of keywording. I keyword about 80% of the photos I import into Lightroom. But that’s not enough because you can bet whenever I search for photos, the ones I want to find end up being part of the 20% that I didn’t keyword. It probably has something to do with that 80/20 rule thing.

3. I’ve accidentally synchronized the develop settings on ALL 480 photos in a folder (on more then one occasion). While the settings I used may have worked on a few photos, the majority look really bad with the same develop settings. The worst thing is, that sometimes I didn’t know I did it and I’d later look through my photos cursing myself, wondering how the heck I could be such a bad photographer.

4. I hate metadata. I’m sorry, I had to say it. I can’t stand it when I look at feature lists for Lightroom (or any other product for that matter) and I see anything with the word “metadata” listed as a feature. It’s important stuff, I know, but it’s also very boring. I just assume it should be there but don’t try to sell it to me as a feature.

5. I love the benefits of metadata. The Metadata panel rocks and the benefits of good metadata support is very important. That’s what makes me feel bad about the #4 confession above. It’s an inner struggle I deal with daily

6. I add an edge darkening vignette to everything. I think it’s safe to say I’m addicted to the Lens Vignetting setting.

7. I avoid the slideshow module at all costs. If I’ve got a quick slideshow to show a friend or client near my computer then sure I’ll use it. If I’m presenting in front of a group I use Fotomagico on the mac. (iPhoto on the Mac or Slideshow Pro on the PC are really good too).

8. I NEVER EVER EVER EVER use Lightroom’s noise reduction feature. While we’re on the topic of things I never use, I don’t use the Camera Calibration and the Snapshots panels either. Oh and I rarely use anything other then the 3 contrast presets in the Tone Curve panel. Hey… this is confessions right. I’m just bein’ honest here.

9. I have 3 backups of all of my photos. However, I just realized that I only have 1 backup of my catalog. So if I’m so paranoid about losing my photos you’d think I would be just as paranoid about losing all of the work I’ve done to them right? Well I just realized as I wrote this that my Time Capsule (my backup drive for my mac) is the only backup I have of my Lightroom catalog. If something happened to it and my laptop (which are both in my house) then I’d be in trouble. That’s going to change today though, as I’ve started another Time Machine (the backup program on a Mac) backup at work.

10. I get upset every time I find myself constantly hitting D to go into the Develop module with a photo, then pressing G to quickly get back to the Library grid to pick another photo. Then pressing D again, and then G again, and so on. Truth be told, I guess I’m paranoid because I feel like I’m missing something because I never hear anyone else complain about this. So I quietly keep doing it.

11. I have WAY too many Develop presets. 156 to be exact. But I love ‘em so I don’t see it changing anytime soon.

12. Since I’ve gotten Lightroom, I’ve found I get just a little ticked when I have to take a photo into Photoshop for further editing.

13. Unless a feature is so good I just can’t stand it, I typically wait about 1 week before installing Lightroom updates.

14. It bugs me a little when people don’t believe that I didn’t “Photoshop” a photo. I may have Lightroom’d it, but I didn’t Photoshop it. And so what if I did!

I hope you enjoyed my confessions and leave one of your own as a comment here. Whether you agree or have a totally different one, go ahead and let us know.

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Yep, the Lightroom 1.4 update is back again. If you recall from some posts a few weeks ago, Adobe released the 1.4 update and then recalled it. Personally, it worked fine for me and I ran into lots of people that left it as is and never uninstalled the 1.4 update and things continued to work fine. But I know lots of folks that it didn’t work with as well. That said, whether you did or didn’t install it back then, it is back up again. It probably wouldn’t hurt to wait a few days before downloading it though
However, if you’re the kind that can’t wait, please post a comment with your findings here on whether things are still running ok. Thanks!

- Here’s the link for Mac users
- Here’s the link for PC users

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I figured I’d throw a bunch of stuff into one post today. Here goes:

Tips
Scott Kelby posted an article on his blog about shooting tethered into Lightroom. You’ll definitely want to check it out when you get the chance. Speaking of Mr. Kelby, his Digital Photography Book Volume 2 flew off the shelves at Photoshop World. Before my classes, I could look out and see people reading it right there as if they couldn’t wait to get home. Make sure you pick up your copy.

Lightroom News & Links
- Morey B. pointed out on the comments section from the LR 2 Q&A day, that the Lightroom 2 beta expires in August of 2008. Sounds like a pretty good indication of when we could expect the full release of LR 2 by doesn’t it?
- Adobe has recently launched Adobe TV. It’s got videos for everything from digital photography all the way to web developers, video pros, and designers. Plus there’s some neat Lightroom stuff from all around the industry on there. How does this tie into ME though, because it really is all about me (totally just kidding )? They’ve put some of my videos as well as some clips from past episodes of Photoshop TV. You can get to it by clicking right here.

Book News
- I just got my hands on a copy of my brand new, hot off the press, Windows Vista Book (co-authored with Kleber Stephenson). Basically Kleber and I realized there was no Vista book that was written in the lighthearted, easy-to-follow, just-tell-me-the-good-stuff manner that we like to write in. So we took it upon ourselves to write just that book. Vista’s got some great new stuff in it and we wrote the book to help you get the most out of it. Here’s the Amazon link to it.

Inspiration
- I’ve got two pieces of inspiration for you today. First is an update to one I posted about previously. Jessica Claire totally redid her site and, as much as I liked it before, I REALLY REALLY like it now. It’s just a refreshing blog/website/gallery to visit and I think you’ll enjoy what she has over there.
- There’s another website/gallery/blog that I’ve been reading a lot lately. It’s called Becker’s Blog and it’s by a guy named (you guessed it) Becker. It falls into that informational/inspirational category, as he not only posts his photos, but also industry insights, news, and links to some very top-notched stuff.

Well my fine feathered friends, that’s it for today. Check back tomorrow as I’ve got a cool video tip ready for you. Have a good one!
(photo credit: Becker)

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