My Workflow | Part 4: Processing

So far we’ve managed to work out where the shot was taken, get it into Lightroom and work out whether it’s keeper – now what?

I personally start with Presets, they allow you to quickly see what a photograph would look like when processed in different ways.

My favourite are the ones from Matt Kloskowski at Lightroom Killer Tips website, specifically I like the following bunch as shown in the examples…

Here's a photos on its original and 5 preset forms

BW1-ST1 : from 640Pixels.com – a yellowy split tone monochrome.
Full Auto -WB : from proPhotoShow.net - as if it were processed magically
Matt’s Bleach Bypass – (More Color) : from LightroomKillerTips Like a photo sat out in the sun for a while
Matt’s Surreal Edgy Effect – Medium : from LightroomKillerTips Best on main subjects, a hard edge look.

However I’ve grown to like to process my shots in a few different ways to, so I’ve created this Preset – Mono Architecture Pink (rename it to .lrtemplate after download), which works will on architecture in my experience, although I’ve had fun on landscape as well. You will probably need to play with the curves after using it though. I’m also entering it into the EpicEdits Action and Preset Extravaganza project. Here’s it in use…

Apart form presets apart from the normal tweaks (which I learnt from trial and error and the excellent tutorials at PhotoWalkthrough.com

My default adjustments

I try not to use the vignette, but I do tend to desaturate slightly and then add vibrance and clarity to the shot, use the good old S curve and throw a lot of recovery in.

Sadly as my camera isn’t overly great at anything over 200 ISO I have to use Noise Reduction – I find the best to use is NoiseNinja – luckily there is a how to video created for it

So we’ve now got a pretty photo, time to get it up on the net? Not quite, that happens on Tuesday, tomorrow we play with the metadata one last time. See you then!