Hey everyone. I’ve got another Before/After video for you where I start from scratch in Lightroom, jump into Photoshop and back to Lightroom (but don’t forget to scroll down because there’s another post today). I’m even throwing in a black & white conversion in Nik’s Silver Efex Pro at the end. I mention in the video that I’m writing something more about the B&W conversion, but unfortunately I won’t get the chance to put it up this week. So check back next week for the full story on this photo. In the meantime, enjoy the video.
Have a good one!
I love teaching and photography... In that order. I feel that enjoying photography, and photo editing can get WAY too complicated. So my personal mission (and favorite thing to do), is to create education that simplifies the process of taking great photos, and how to edit them to get the results you’ve always wanted.
Great as always Matt! Your classes over the years have helped my photography in leaps and bounds. You have a nice, natural workflow that for me takes the guesswork and sometimes frustration out of editing – more time for shooting. Thanks a bunch mate!
How do you decide how much sharpening to use? You said you used a lot with the D800 due to the detail in the image but what specifically are you looking for to decide when to stop or when to add more? P.S. Love the photo – where you playing with the Big Stopper?
Thanks Frank. It wasn’t the Big Stopper but I did have a 3-stop ND on for some longer exposure.
As for how much sharpening, honestly, it’s an eyeballing kind of thing. I know what over-sharpened looks like (crunchy halo’d jaggy edges) so I sharpen until I see that effect and then pull back. Since the file size is so large, I can usually increase and go further than I used to with a 20 MB file.
Thanks!
I noticed you didn’t use the lens correction in LR, I thought for sure you would with such a wide angle photo like the one you were working with. Any thoughts?
You could of course. I didn’t think anything needed correction though so I was good with it as is.
Enjoyed the tutorial Matt.
Today I learned one more thing about LR 4.1.
Your presentation in Lansing, MI was an excellent program. I learned more that day in the first two hours than I could have imagined.
Do you have any plans on doing a tutorial on LR 4.1 and HDR imaging? I presently use Photoshop CS5 HDR Pro and Photomatix but have heard that LR does a great job.
I’ll make sure I get something in the works Bill.
That was awesome Matt. Thanks so much for posting. I love that you did the entire workflow through all programs!
Fabulous Matt. Thank you. All of your tutorials really help and I can’t hardly wait for your Lightroom 4 seminar in Seattle! WooHoo!
Thanks a lot! I love your Tut’s!
Hey Matt
Really like the photo. Nicely done.
Regarding Silver Efex Pro 2 couple of things to mention…
1) Dynamic Brightness is a selective brightness adjustment in that it protects (or perhaps more accurately limits) changes to shadows when brightening and highlights when darkening. So you don’t wash out or blow out the image in the same way you would with the global Brightness slider.
2) Don’t be too quick to abandon the Film Types panel! It’s not just about trying to simulate TriEx or so forth. It also allows you to adjust color sensitivities similar to the adjustments in ACR and Lightroom which is very powerful. And it works great in concert with the Color Filters you already enjoy; you can use the sensitivity sliders to further enhance. Also, within the Film Types is a tone curve for greater contrast control if you want to stay within the SEP2 interface (rather than using Curves in PS). Finally, the Grain engine can help mask noise or other image artifacts (and of course add a more organic look to the image if that’s your goal).
Great tutorial as always, Matt! I’m a great fan of ColorEfexPro and SilverefexPro. The one thing that caught my attention in the tutorial was the tip on the Highlight slider when using the Gradient tool in Lightroom. I’m going to have to work with those local tools a little more. Thanks for that tip!
Dennis
Always a pleasure. Great tutorial. I don’t know how I would survive without Colorefex and Silverfex pro these days. 🙂 Thanks Matt!