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+--- Thread: Sharing my experiences (/showthread.php?tid=2989)
Sharing my experiences - williamting - 02-03-2012
1. If I think I have over edit/touch up and would like to see how it looks "in between", ie, perhaps slightly lighter, I would slide the opacity and see the different strength. I would stop sliding when I see a good balance.
2. If I am not sure about customer's reaction and may like to continue editing after showing them. I would use Save Session. File->Save Session. This option is not available from plugin.
3. Although PP can open RAW file, I seldom use it because of it limited control. I would use PS or Lightroom to open RAW file and from there, I use plugin to go to PP.
4. In my workflow, I open my image on PS, make a duplicate layer and use the duplicated layer for PP processing. Only after PP, I will continue to edit on PS. The original layer will be kept just in case it is needed.
5. If I need to make a composite photo, eg, combining body parts from different shots, I would do it before calling up PP. The different layers in PS need to be merged (and/or duplicated) before going to PP. Avoid transparency in PS before going to PP.
6. If there are more than one face to be edited in PP, avoid smoothing or blurring any part of the image before sending to PP.
... more to come
RE: Sharing my experiences - Slynky - 02-04-2012
Good hints, William. Some are obvious (after you've seen how things work...like needing to dupe the layer before using PP and making sure all the layers you want to work on are merged), but it's nice to have them so people don't "learn the hard way".
I might add (though it's probably not necessary) that RAW files need some post-camera processing by nature of them being, well, RAW. My work flow is always to get the image looking right (color, saturation, sharpness, etc.) out of RAW first and then using PPro if necessary. So for me, it looks like LightRoom (and develops) --> Photoshop (editing) --> PPro plugin (retouching) and save the file back to LR as PSD.
RE: Sharing my experiences - williamting - 02-04-2012
Slynky, fully agree with you. I should mention that I use both Lightroom and PS (photoshop). My choice is:
1. If the JPEG image is acceptable, then I use PS to open the files directly.
2. If the JPEG is not acceptable, I will have to make a decision on using LR or PS. I will use PS if there are only minor adjustments. Otherwise, LR will have to be used first.
RE: Sharing my experiences - Slynky - 02-04-2012
(02-04-2012, 04:54 PM)williamting Wrote: Slynky, fully agree with you. I should mention that I use both Lightroom and PS (photoshop). My choice is:
1. If the JPEG image is acceptable, then I use PS to open the files directly.
2. If the JPEG is not acceptable, I will have to make a decision on using LR or PS. I will use PS if there are only minor adjustments. Otherwise, LR will have to be used first.
I'm a recent convert to LR - Having had experience with PS since version 4.5. I prefer LR over PS now even though there are some many more ways now to edit in PS non-destructively (but I have to think about them sometimes), ALL LR edits are non-destructive.
And, the keywording is better in LR than BR (and BR fails WAAAAY more often).
RE: Sharing my experiences - williamting - 02-05-2012
Slynky, thanks for your sharing. I have to admit that sometimes I am undecided over PS and LR for processing raw. But one thing I tried to do is to ensure that the initial exposure is as accurate as possible so that I don't even need PS or LR to tweak RAW. It is simply too time consuming. I tried to keep RAW processing down to less than 5% of the total. I paid heavily for the camera to do the job for me already and I think it is doing quite a good job.
RE: Sharing my experiences - Slynky - 02-05-2012
You don't have to read to many books by professionals to see what you've written. It's a common theme--do as much as you can at exposure time to reduce your time afterwards.
RE: Sharing my experiences - williamting - 02-05-2012
(02-05-2012, 06:35 AM)Slynky Wrote: You don't have to read to many books by professionals to see what you've written. It's a common theme--do as much as you can at exposure time to reduce your time afterwards.
Actually it is quite common sense. A few times, I thought I could tweak better than what the camera can do. I "played" with all the adjustment only to find that the camera did a better job!