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Cs4 + lr
gloo
Registered Users Posts: 19 Big grins
Hey. In my first thread here I was recommended grabbing LR. I've downloaded the 30 day trial and in between work and studying for finals next week, I've tried to play around with it.
Is there an easy way to go from LR to PS? like editing a raw file in LR and then taking it to PS to do some further work? It doesn't seem like LR works with some of the plugins (like color effex pro) that I have.
and is there a way to bring the collections I had in bridge to LR?
what does your work flow look like? how do you import, organize and then edit your pics with LR or LR and PS?
thanks!
Is there an easy way to go from LR to PS? like editing a raw file in LR and then taking it to PS to do some further work? It doesn't seem like LR works with some of the plugins (like color effex pro) that I have.
and is there a way to bring the collections I had in bridge to LR?
what does your work flow look like? how do you import, organize and then edit your pics with LR or LR and PS?
thanks!
"An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind" - Gandhi
Canon Rebel XS
17-85 USM
100mm 2.8 macro lens
100-300mm usm
Canon Rebel XS
17-85 USM
100mm 2.8 macro lens
100-300mm usm
0
Comments
Look under Photo/Edit in/Edit in Adobe Photoshop. This will create a Photoshop copy that will be listed in the catalog. It's faster to use the keyboard shortcut on the menu or right-click the image to get to the command.
Since Lightroom is a metadata-based editor and Photoshop is a pixel-based editor, Photoshop plug-ins do not work with Lightroom. Lightroom has its own plug-ins market.
I don't think so...can't think of a way
Import. With a preset so images always go into the right date folders and with the right copyright/creator info.
Use Library to assign Pick/Reject flags to narrow down the best. If needed, use Star Ratings to sort out the survivors even more. All goes quickly with the keyboard shortcuts. Then edit the best in Develop. If Develop doesn't have the tools, hit shortcut to pop image open in Photoshop.
Instant mass delete the rejects. Then keyword the rest before archiving them.
Canon Rebel XS
17-85 USM
100mm 2.8 macro lens
100-300mm usm
Wait...I thought of a way
Open the collection in Bridge
Select everything and assign a special keyword (like "Collection2LR")
Import into Lightroom
Use Lightroom's Keyword panel to isolate just items with your special keyword
Make a Lightroom collection out of that
Then delete the keyword if you don't need it anymore
So far the integration of Silver Efex and Lightroom has been a little buggy for me (and I imagine that Color Efex will work the same way). Lightroom prompts you to make a TIFF or PSD copy of the file for editing with Silver Efex (same way it does for editing in Photoshop). At that point it should launch Silver Efex, but nothing happens. I then have to select the new TIFF (so far haven't gotten it to work with PSD) and select Edit in Silver Efex Pro again to get it to launch. After that it works fine. Because of this I find it pretty much just as easy to edit the file in Photoshop and use the Silver Efex Plugin there (which does work with PSD). I sometimes like to mess with the layer blending options and opacity in Photoshop anyway after applying a conversion. I mostly use Silver Efex for Black & White, but I find that I can get some great looks for color photos by setting its layer blending to something like Overlay and then adjusting the opacity.
Lightroom 3 also has some presets that offer some creative B&W and Color looks similar to Silver Efex and Color Efex, but the Nik software of course provides more options and better control. I use the presets to play around and decide whether or not I want to convert an image to Black & White; then I make the copy and do the actual conversion in Silver Efex. The Lightroom presets aren't bad though, so I'll sometimes use them for a quick and dirty conversion. The default settings for many of the LR3 presets take some adjustments too far in my opinion, but you can at least adjust them to taste using the adjustments panel.
Sean
Cool, well done sir!
Also, just curious - how much time do you spend on your PP work? I hear of people who spend days (on their landscape stuff. I understand spending more time on portrait work) fine tuning their shots. I have rarely, if ever, spent over an hour doing PP work. if anything its 5-10 min max. Is this just a personal preference or is it more that I'm still a pretty hobbyist photographer?
Canon Rebel XS
17-85 USM
100mm 2.8 macro lens
100-300mm usm
Days sounds a little extreme. It depends on factors like: How much I like the photo, how much work it needs if there are technical issues or tweaking needed to get it where I want it to be, whether I want to play with different looks, what the output will be, etc.
Some photos get my minimal post-processing treatment. In LR3 I will quickly develop one shot in a series, and then copy the Development settings and paste them to the other photos in that series. The next tier up will get more individualized treatment, but I still might spend only a minute making WB, exposure, and detail adjustments. The more technical problems a photo has, the more time I will probably spend. By technical problems I mean shots that were not properly exposed, or that were properly exposed but the camera didn't have the necessary dynamic range, or shots that were taken at high ISO and have noise. It could also mean shots that were taken under less than ideal conditions and I need to make more drastic adjustments to cut through haze or clean up shiny foreheads due to harsh flash spots. For these I might spend 5 to 10 minutes and use both LR and Photoshop.
But my favorite photos might get very special treatment in order to get something extra out of them. Maybe it's just trying to get the color and detail right, maybe it's dodging and burning different areas of the image to maximize detail, maybe it's to try different looks. For my favorite shots I might try multiple color looks and one or more black & white looks. The more I like a photo, the more I enjoy playing it with and trying out different looks. I can spend an hour on a favorite photo, and I might come back to it again in the future and play some more. I will say that this type of playing is where the Nik plugins (as well as the LR3 presets and various free actions for Photoshop) can come in handy. They let you quickly try different looks until you find something you like that you can tweak to taste. Much of the time you could get the same look in LR3 or Photoshop without the help of a plugin, preset, or action; but it will take you longer and you will invest more time in adjustments that you might end up undoing anyway.
Sean
If I have a photo in LR I want to tweak more in PS I right click on it and pick edit in PS an new copy is loaded into PS but the original remains untouched.
My Work flow
In my import I apply a preset adding copyright and photographer info to the files; I add initial keywords if needed and a backup copy of the photos is made to a separate HD.
After the import
I start to go through the shots and flag to reject or add a color flag
(I shoot a lot of football so my color labels are setup like red-action yellow-pregame and so on) this goes very quick using keyboard shortcuts x rejects 6=red
Then I will filter to show one or two colors then I apply keywords and adjust the ex-color etc. If all the shots were done in similar light I copy the settings from the first one and paste to the rest.
I will then apply a star rating to the ones I am going to upload.
All of this is going through 400-600 shots and can take me a day to do, If I am very busy it may take another day to get them all complete.
A note one reason I may take a little more time is I shoot night football so it is low light so I have more tweak of noise
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Canon Rebel XS
17-85 USM
100mm 2.8 macro lens
100-300mm usm
That's why it's a good thing we get to try a lot of this software before we buy! I didn't care for LR the first time I tried it, but I like LR3 much more. True that Photoshop has more editing options, but I definitely prefer using LR3 to Bridge CS4 and I can still edit in Photoshop. As far as speed goes, Bridge CS4 takes longer to build previews for me than LR3 does, so LR3 seems speedier to me when I'm culling, reviewing, and comparing images. I hope that will still be true after I've imported all 50,000 of my images.
You have to use what your comfortable with. If I had to pick one feature in LR that I like over cs4 is the non destructive editing, even when I do major editing or tweaking in PS from LR my original is not touched.
http://www.realphotoman.com/
Work in progress
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