Presets – The Trick to Getting Good Prints

Hey everyone! I’m out in Las Vegas teaching at Photoshop World this week, but I wanted to kick the week off with a topic (and some presets) that I get asked about often.

The Old Printing Problem
Every time I get in front of a crowd and teach Lightroom I get a lot of questions about one topic… Printing. But the questions have changed over the years. The printing questions used to revolve around the color being off in the print compared to the screen. While I still get those sometimes, I think the industry as a whole has become more educated about using printer profiles and monitor calibration. I also think the software/hardware manufactures have improved things to make printing easier as well. So the color issues have subsided for the most part (in my experience from the people I talk to at least).

The New Problem
What I hear more and more though, are questions about why our prints come out darker than we expected. Whether you’re printing the photo to an inkjet or sending them to a lab, they just seem darker than what you see on screen. The primary reason for this is the screen we look at our photos on. Nearly everybody has these beautiful backlit LCD screens. There’s simply no way that this bright back lit screen can represent what my photo is going to look like when it’s printed. It’s got light behind it for Pete’s sake! It’s not a soft proof thing either. Soft proofing in Photoshop doesn’t help this. In order for you to really preview what your print would look like, you’d have to set the brightness of your screen down considerably. I don’t know about you, but I like my bright screen. It’s nice to look at and I’m not willing to sacrifice what I look at all day long for this. If I were printing more during the day, then maybe it would be worth it, but (for me at least) it’s not.

A Solution In Lightroom
So here’s what I do. If my print comes out too dark, I go to the Develop module and increase the Brightness setting by about 10-15. Exposure tends to blow out the highlights pretty quickly, so I don’t use it as a fix for dark prints. Brightness does a good job of just brightening the entire photo but still keeping the overall color, shadows and highlights intact. Then I print the photo again. If it’s still too dark, I increase the Brightness setting more (maybe 20-25).

You Don’t Have To Do This All the Time
While this trick works great, I typically don’t have to create test prints every time. Use it on a few test prints and you’ll hone in on what setting works best for your monitor/printing combination and style. You can create a preset for it (or just download the ones below) and you’ll have a quick way to simply increase your photos brightness before you print (knowing it’ll come out the right way since you’ve already tested this out).

Disclaimer: Remember, this is what I do and what works for me. I’ve calibrated my screen, my printer, soft-proofed and performed several exorcisms on my computer and this seems to be the best way for me to get what I see on screen to match what I get from the printer. If your results vary, let us know what works for you. Thanks

• Click here to download the presets.

A Quick Note About Comments on this Site

Hey folks. I just wanted to let you know I went into my comments folder for the blog today, and saw that over 200 of your comments were caught in Spam. I’m really sorry about that so please don’t think I was moderating them or deleting them. The only ones I tend to delete are when people are downright mean. Heck, I even let the guy who corrected “me” grammar through today
Anyway, now that I know something’s weird with the spam filter I’ll keep an eye on it. Thanks!

Lightroom Print Presets – Multi-Photo Custom Grid

I’ve got a pretty cool Print module preset this time around. It utilizes the new Custom Print Package feature in Lightroom 3. It’s based on a 12×12 inch paper size. There’s room for 15 photos in it which makes a really nice way to show off some travel photos or even a portrait session. Here’s how it works: First download and import the new print template. Look at the directions below and make sure you DON’T install this in the Develop module like you do the rest of the presets. In the Print module, go to User Presets and select the new template. It’ll show a blank page and all you have to do is drag your photos from the filmstrip into it. The bottom left corner is reserved for an Identity Plate so you can put your name (or studio name) there. I created the one you see below in Photoshop and used it graphic option in the Identity Plate.

Here’s a few samples (Click for a larger version).

(Photo Border option turned off)

(Photo Border option turned on, Page Background Color set to white)

(Photo Border option turned on, Page Background Color set to black)

Customize – you can also customize this one by changing the “Page Background Color” option as well as the Photo Border settings at the top right of the Print module.

These are a little different to install than your usual Develop presets:
1) Unzip the preset zip file on to your desktop
2) Go to the PRINT MODULE (NOTE: THESE ARE NOT DEVELOP PRESETS SO DON’T INSTALL THEM THERE!)
3) Go to the Template Browser on the left. Right click on the words User Presets and choose “Import“.
4) Select the .lrtemplate file you unzipped in Step 1 and click Import (NOTE: DO NOT IMPORT THE ZIP FILE)

• Click here to download the preset.

Video – Lightroom Camera Calibration

Happy Friday. This week we’re going to take a look at the Camera Calibration panel. There’s a few different things you can do here from customizing color based on your camera to using a color target. Also, there’s a couple of things I mentioned in the video. First, here’s the link to the article from Eric Chan if you want to delve into this topic more. It’s uses an older version of Camera Raw but a lot of the information is still relevant. Also, here’s a link to the X-rite ColorChecker Passport that I mentioned as well. Enjoy and have a great weekend.

Click here to download the video to your computer. [Right-click and choose the "Save As" option]

Worth-a-click

Here’s a few links to check out. I’ve also got a video coming on the Camera Calibration panel and calibration in general so keep an eye out for that too.

• Jason D. Moore posted a review of Scott’s new Lightroom 3 Book for Digital Photographers

• Adorama has a channel over on youtube.com. There’s a little bit of everything worth checking out, from training to gear reviews.

• Unique Photo has teamed up with Sigma and Photoshop World instructor Kevin Ames, for some online webinars. Their first one is this evening. It’s definitely worth $20 to get some insight into Kevin’s photography.

• Of personal interest to me, Nikon just announced a new 85mm f/1.4 lens. I know the old version is probably still going to remain a great lens, but I don’t have one. Why you ask? See, I first used the previous 85 f/1.4 about 2 years ago. I personally got caught up in all the rumors that said a new one was coming out “any day now” (stupid rumors!), and held off on buying one even though I LOVED it. I’ve even rented it from Lens Pro To Go because I just couldn’t do without it on some photo shoots. So I’m ready. I’ve had a little (OK, big) chunk of money ear marked for this lens for way too long, so I’m psyched to see it finally out.

Have a great day!

Do you tend to under or over expose your photos?

OK, weird question – I know. But do you find you typically underexpose or overexpose your photos. Here’s why I ask. Believe it or not, It makes a difference when it comes to your Lightroom edits. Years ago, I read a white paper from the late Bruce Fraser. Bruce was a pioneer in many aspects of digital imaging and I encourage you to give this white paper a read (it’s actually a pretty quick read too). Now, knowing that many of you won’t read it and the fact that white papers can get REALLY technical, I’ll paraphrase.

Bruce basically writes that our cameras capture a lot of information in the highlights. Way more than we think. He points out that it’s typically best to try to capture as much of the highlight information as possible without actually blowing out the highlights. Why? Because programs like Lightroom and Camera Raw are so good at bringing back highlight detail, while trying to bring back detail in the shadows and dark areas can often have negative effects on your photos (there’s lots of noise in the shadows).

I read this about 4 or 5 years ago and I instantly became happier with my photography and post processing. It was great to finally bring the Exposure slider toward the left a little instead of always increasing Exposure or Fill Light (I used to underexpose because I was always afraid of coming anywhere close to that histogram touching the right side). When I’m outdoors my Exposure Compensation on my camera is always set to at least +1/3 or +2/3 and I’ll push the exposure as far toward clipping as I can get if I know there’s some shadowy areas in the photo.

Now before you answer the question keep this in mind. First, the question is just for fun. I’m simply curious so please don’t read too much into it and write a long comment telling me all about gamma and compressive nonlinearity (I hate the word gamma by the way). Also, if you’re shooting in the studio a lot this doesn’t apply to you as much. For me, I find I don’t have to modify many settings on my studio portraits. I’d get that done with the lighting in the studio. I’m talking about things like outdoor portraits, sports, travel, and landscape photography where we don’t always have the ability to balance light in all areas of the photo to get the exact proper exposure. So we have to make a choice – underexpose to make sure you capture all of the highlight detail or overexpose to make sure you capture the shadow detail?

News – Scott Posts About What He’d Like to See in Lightroom 4

If you haven’t stopped by yet, make sure you check out Scott Kelby’s blog today. I don’t want to spoil it too much but Scott wrote a really interesting post about what he’d like to see in Lightroom 4. Stop by and let him know what you think, if you agree or not, and any features that you think need to make it into Lightroom 4.

Lightroom Pro Q&A with Nat Coalson

Hi everyone. Here’s another in a series of mini-interviews with some of the Lightroom pros out there where they’ve answered a short series of questions about how they use and feel about Lightroom:

Today’s Guest: Nat Coalson.

Bio/Intro: Nathaniel Coalson is a travel and fine art photographer, teacher and writer based in Denver, Colorado. Nat has worked professionally in photography, imaging and printing since 1987. His work has been exhibited extensively, received numerous awards and is held in private and corporate collections. Nat is is an Adobe Certified Expert in Lightroom and Photoshop, and is a top-rated instructor who has taught digital photography and imaging to photographers at all levels. He is the author of two Lightroom books including Lightroom 3: Streamlining your Digital Photography Process, published by Wiley in 2010. He has written articles on Lightroom for magazines including Photoshop User and Great Output and is a contributing writer at TheLightroomLab.com. For more information and to see Nat’s work visit www.NatCoalson.com.

Q. How many presets do you have in the Develop module?

A. have hundreds of Develop presets installed (downloaded from various sources on the web) but I rarely use any of them, except when doing demos. (For people just starting to use Lightroom, applying Develop presets is a great way to learn what the different adjustments do.)

The six presets I use on a regular basis are specific to the cameras I used for most of the photos in my catalog. My presets include custom settings for:

- Basic adjustments such as Blacks, Brightness, Contrast, Clarity and Vibrance;
- Either a flat Tone Curve, or a parametric curve with +5 Lights and -5 Darks;
- Custom sharpening settings; for example, on photos from my Canon 5D Mark II, my default sharpening settings are Amount 45, Radius 1.0, Detail 45, Masking 15.

Photos from my other cameras use different sharpening (and noise reduction) settings; in each of my default Develop presets, all the settings are fine tuned for that particular camera.

In my standard workflow, I apply these Develop presets during Import, and beyond that I don’t use Develop presets very often. Each photo (or sequence of similar photos) gets processed individually, as needed. I start by envisioning how I want the photo to look, and use the various Develop adjustments to make it that way. If I want to apply the same look to other photos, I use Sync to apply the settings from the active photo to the others.

Q. What’s your favorite panel besides the Basic panel ( Sorry the basic panel is too much of a gimmee)?

A. My favorite panel (besides the Basic panel) is the Toolstrip. I know, I know… it’s not really a panel But I use graduated filters and adjustment brushes on almost every image.

When just beginning to Develop a photo, I visualize how it might be made more appealing by dodging and burning (lightening and darkening) localized areas of the image, and sometimes I do that work first.

I really like the fact that with Lightroom, if I want to apply local adjustments first, any global adjustments made later are blended seamlessly. You can use any of the Lightroom tools, at any time, and the final rendering combines them in the optimal way (which isn’t always the case with Photoshop layers).

Q. What panel/slider/feature do you use the least?

A. I don’t know – I’ve forgotten it even exists!

Hmmm… let me look… I guess I’d have to say I almost never use the Random Order option on the Playback panel in Slideshow. Usually I want the slides to show in a specific order. But the Random Order option could be handy if you don’t want to show any bias in the order, such as with a selection of images made by a group of people.

Otherwise, in my typical workflows, I generally use most of Lightroom’s functions at one point or another.

Q. Do you keyword (All the time/Sometimes/Never)

A. I keyword all my photos, all the time. I have two basic scenarios for my photos: work done for clients, and work done as self-assignments that I offer for licensing and/or as prints. In both cases, adding keywords helps me easily find any photo within the Lightroom catalog. And with photos offered for sale online, having them loaded with keywords dramatically increases their visibility on the web, because search engines index all the keywords embedded in image files.

I always add at least a few keywords (using hierarchies*) during Import. Then I add more keywords and/or hierarchies to batches of photos that make it through my initial rounds of editing. My edited photos typically get a lot of keywords, especially my final selects, for which I individually add detailed keywords (plus captions and titles) specific to each photo.

*About keyword hierarchies: in the Keyword List panel, you can drag and drop to “nest” keywords into parent/child relationships, or “hierarchies”. When you apply a child keyword to one or more photos, you have the option to also automatically apply all the containing keywords to your exported photos. Using hierarchies can be a huge time saver and also helps keep your keyword list tidy and manageable.

Q. Do you use Collections (All the time/Sometimes/Never)

A. I use Collections all the time; they are one of the most important benefits of Lightroom’s catalog (database) architecture. In my standard editing workflow, when I’ve edited down to my final selects I put them into a Collection, after which I rarely return to the Folder source. You can access Collections from within all the modules, so (unlike folders) you can choose different groups of photos to work on without needing to go back to Library.

Historically, I’ve used regular Collections more than Smart Collections, but this is starting to change. I’ve made regular collections for all kinds of purposes: client projects, portfolio selections, gallery or publication submissions, competition entries, web galleries, photos to be printed, etc. These days I’m starting to make more Smart Collections with keywords and/or attributes as criteria.

Q. Favorite Lightroom Plug-in?

A. My favorite Lightroom plug-in changes depending on what I’m doing with my files. Export plug-ins are really useful for batch-uploading photos to the web; these days I’m frequently using the Dossier de Presse (for NextGEN galleries) and Photoshelter plug-ins.

Timothy Armes’ suite of Lightroom plug-ins is also extremely helpful for a wide range of purposes (see Photographers-Toolbox.com.)

Q. If you could add one feature to Lightroom what would it be?

A. That’s a tough one… Lightroom gives me nearly everything I need to process my photos and share them with the world!

One thing I’d really like to see added is soft proofing. This is a key step in my printing workflow, and one for which I still need Photoshop. Soft proofing lets you preview what an image will look like when printed on a selected paper/printer combination; you can then make any necessary adjustments to tone and color, prior to printing.

For example, most canvas media have a relatively narrow color gamut and tend to print dark. With a soft proof preview, I can use adjustment layers to boost saturation, open up the shadows, etc. before I make the print.

Without soft proofing, photos printed on different papers, canvas etc. will come out looking quite different from one another. Soft proofing allows you to make very consistent reproductions of your photos using a wide range of media.

If Lightroom provided soft proofing, prepping files for super-accurate color output would be much easier!

Nat Coalson
www.NatCoalson.com.

Weekly Worth-a-click

A few things to check out while surfing the web today:

• DVD Contest Winner – I had a contest yesterday and the winner of my new Lightroom 3 Power Session DVD is Debi Anderson. Congrats Debi!

• onOne Software is hosting a series of free webinars

• Lightroom 3.2 is now available as a beta on Adobe Labs.

• For the first time ever, Photoshop World (where me and a bunch of other Lightroom pros will be teaching Lightroom) is selling 1-day passes. So if you can’t swing getting out to the full conference just come out for a day.

• Nik Software’s Viveza 2 Plug-in is now 64-bit friendly

• If you’re looking for some inspiration today check out the landscape and nature photography of Saurabh Deoras. Wow!

Have a great day!

News – My New DVD is Out!

I just got a copy of my new Lightroom 3 Power Session DVD today. The DVD is meant for anyone already using Lightroom who needs to get up to speed on the new features in version 3. It’s also available as a Kelby Training online course so you can check it out online or grab the DVD if you’re not an online subscriber. And since I have absolutely no need for a copy of my own DVD I figured I’d give one away here on the site. So leave a comment. Just say hi or whatever you’d like to say and you’ll be entered to win. Leave your comment by midnight on Tuesday and I’ll randomly pick one to win. Good luck!