Lightroom Presets – Red River Greeting Cards

Hey everyone. I’ve found some Lightroom templates from Red River that I thought I’d share. I don’t think they’re new but, well, they’re kinda new to me because I just found them. I’ve always been a big fan of Red River paper and I noticed that they have some greeting cards and templates for Lightroom 3 on their site. They even have a video on how to use the templates if you’re new to it. Here’s the link to download the templates. Enjoy!

More Lightroom Calendar Presets

Hey everyone! I hope you’ve enjoyed the free Lightroom Calendar templates from yesterday (thanks again to Ed Weaver for creating and sharing them). Just like last year, blog reader (Thomas Ljungberg) was kind enough to create some more calendar print templates for those of you outside the US. You can download the templates for free. He also has the full PSD files available for €10 in case you’re interested. If you download them, by all means please let us know what you think. Thanks!

Free Lightroom Presets – Calendar Templates

Happy New Year everyone! I had an absolutely awesome holiday week. Lots of rest and relaxation and time to recharge, and I hope all of you did as well. I’m kicking off the first post of the year just as I did last year – free calendar presets. Blog reader and photographer, Ed Weaver, sent me a message on my Facebook account last year with some presets he’d developed. Once I saw his sample image I immediately said to myself, “I wish I thought of that! I wonder if he’ll notice if I steal them and call them my own?” Totally kidding on the second part. I do wish I thought of it but I didn’t. Luckily Ed was kind enough to let me share the presets here on the blog last year and he’s updated them again for 2012. In fact, he even went above and beyond this year and included all of his source files and directions on how to use them.

Before we go any further, here’s an example (click to see it larger):

Installing the presets is a little bit different than normal so make sure you check out Ed’s installation guide included in the zip file. Also, Ed created the calendar templates using Pages, and he even added the source files if any of you want to look inside or tweak ‘em.

If you like these, I’d sure appreciate it if you share this page on your Facebook, Google+, Twitter accounts, and anywhere else. Also, please stop by Ed’s site, pay him a visit and say thanks. Finally, let’s give a big round of applause to Ed Weaver for sharing these. That’s what makes running this blog so cool. It’s the interaction and ideas that come from the people who visit it and if there’s anything that I’m incredibly grateful for this new year, it’s the support I get from all of you. Thanks Ed, you ROCK! I appreciate it and I know everyone here does as well. As always, let us know what you think. Enjoy!

Click here to download the zip file that contains all of the templates.

Lightroom News – Lightroom 3.6 (and ACR 5.6) Are Out

Some of you may have missed the news in all of the hustle and bustle of the holidays, but Adobe released Lightroom 3.6. There’s some new overall camera support as well as some new lens profiles too. There’s also some minor bug fixes. The best thing to do is check out Tom Hogarty’s blog for the full write-up. And of course, you can download the update over at Adobe’s website or simply just go to Help > Check for Updates after you launch Lightroom. Have a good one!

Lightroom Video – Creating Calendars in the Print Module

Hey everyone! I hope you’ve enjoyed the Lightroom Holiday template ideas that I’ve shared this week so far (and if you did, please share via Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc…). Sadly, today’s the last day, but I’m sure I’ll be covering other ideas next year as I come up with them. I did save one of my favorites for last though – creating calendars in the Print module. It’s really simple to do and looks great for the new year. You can create one calendar each month or you can create a whole year’s worth so it’s pretty flexible too. Here’s the link to the iStockphoto image(s) that I used, but as I showed you in the video, there’s a ton of other ideas out there as well.

Lightroom Video – More Holiday Graphics

Continuing on with the Lightroom template/tip-a-day theme this week, today’s video builds on what we did on Monday. We used the Watermark window to give our photo a frame. In that example, though, the holiday graphic was pretty much the dominant graphic in the image. This time, I’ve got a few ideas for you to keep the photo as the center of attention and just use smaller graphics around it. Also, in case you’re looking, here’s the link to the red bow image that I used as well as the one with the holiday bell ornaments and swirlys in it. Have a great Thursday everyone!

Animoto and NAPP – Get Two for the Price of One

Hey everyone. I just heard that NAPP and Animoto have a Two-for-the-price-of-one deal this week. Basically, if you sign up for an Animoto Pro account ($249), you get a $99 NAPP membership for free. If you haven’t tried Animoto yet then you at least need to give it a test run (it’s free). It’s an incredibly slick way to turn your photos, video clips and music into one killer video and they do all of the work for you. There’s really nothing else like it out there and people absolutely go crazy over these videos. And if you’re a Lightroom user, they’ve even got a plug-in that lets you preload Animoto video projects on Animoto.com directly from Lightroom. Just select the photos you want to use and press Export – the plug-in automatically resizes your images before exporting them to an Animoto project. So, if you’re an Animoto fan (or think you may become one) then this week is the week to do it (the special ends on Friday). Click here to sign up.

Lightroom Video – Holiday Slideshow Ideas

In keeping with my Lightroom template/tip a day for the holidays this week, I’ve got a video for you on how you can incorporate some holiday graphics into your slideshows. If you haven’t been following this week, I figured I’d do a video each day this week showcasing a way to use holiday graphics and templates inside Lightroom. Think of it as the 5 Days of Lightroom Christmas. Today’s tip involves using the Slideshow module and one of the things you can do to customize it so you’re backgrounds fit the occasion better. Also, in case you’re wondering, here’s the link to the iStockphoto.com image that I used in the tutorial. Hope you have fun with it!

Lightroom Video – Holiday Print Templates

As promised, here’s day 2 of Lightroom Holiday Template week. Keeping with the holiday spirit, I figured it’d be cool to do a video each day this week showcasing a way to use holiday graphics and templates inside Lightroom. Think of it as the 5 Days of Lightroom Christmas. Today I’ve got a really cool print template idea and it works perfect for holiday (or any theme really) photos. There’s a little bit of Photoshop work involved too, but if you watch the video through, you’ll see that you don’t really have to go through all that work (I’m just a glutton for punishment)
Oh yeah, here’s the link to the Fotolia.com image I used today. Have a great Tuesday!

Lightroom Video – Holiday Templates (The 5 Days of Lightroom Christmas!)

I’m in the holiday spirit so I thought I’d do a video each day this week showcasing a way to use holiday graphics and templates inside Lightroom. Think of it as the 5 Days of Lightroom Christmas. Today I’m kicking things off with a way to trick the Watermarking feature in Lightroom 3 to put graphics on top of your photos instead of just a watermark. Also, in case you’re wondering, here’s the link to the Fotolia.com image that I used in the tutorial. But seriously… the sky is the limit here. There’s literally hundreds if not thousands of images out there that you can use for this so explore a little on your own. Enjoy!