Beginner RAW and lightroom advise

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stewie m

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72
Name
stuart
Edit My Images
Yes
I shoot mainly motorsport and air shows iv been thinking about giving RAW and lightroom ago for awhile what advise could you give me as someone who has never used RAW before or done any editing

thanx
 
Raw files tend to look a bit flat and nearly always need some work so at first the results can be a little underwhelming.

Best thing to do is download the trail and give it a go, there are looooads of videos on YouTube which are generally pretty good.
 
My advice to anyone starting to use Lightroom is to read up on how to install and set it up properly to suit your own requirements. It's more than just an editing program. It's an image cataloguing program too.
Now the issue with just bowling in and just using it is, if you do happen to end up using it as your main workflow tool and you don't do it right from the outset you will have a lot of work straightening it all out after the fact as it were. There are a lot of settings and choices to make, especially about how you file and catalogue your images. It's worth the effort IMHO. You can also buy a standalone copy rather than paying through the Adobe Nose! Of course Adobe want to extract as much cash from you as possible but you can find the standalone but you have to really search to find it they have it well hidden. Google stand alone copy of LR 6 you will eventually find it.

Of course you don't need Lightroom or Photoshop to edit RAW files there are many programs that will do that.

However there are a lot of advantages of shooting RAW as you probably know. You have a massive amount more latitude for editing with RAW. Shooting JPEG you do loose a lot of data and every time you edit an image and resave it you throw more away. You can probably set your camera to save your images to RAW and JPEG if you want to test the water. There are endless web site extolling the virtues of shooting in RAW. It's well worth the move Stuart.
 
I like the idea of getting it and have been thinking about it for a while but I'm unsure for some reason
 
*advice ;)

Here's a 50 minute Lightroom video tutorial I made explaining everything from importing images, user interface, basic tools and image exporting. Should give you a good understanding of how Lightroom works and what you can do with it. It was made for LR4 but it's 95% the same as LR6.

http://wearesophoto.com/lightroom-retouching-tutorial/
Lots of other editing and retouching videos on there too :runaway:

This will help too with regards to cataloguing etc - http://wearesophoto.com/how-to-import-photos-in-lightroom-5/
 
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stewie m said:
I like the idea of getting it and have been thinking about it for a while but I'm unsure for some reason
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Then download the Trial and see how you get on. ;) :)

The actual editing of images is not hard, and in many ways easier and quicker than other image editing programs, but the set up, importing and generally how it works can be a bit confusing initially. I prefer the Camera Raw plugin in Photoshop, which editing wise is exactly the same as Lightroom (if the same generation;)) though laid out slightly differently. I hardly have to actually go in to Photoshop very much, generally only preparing handouts at work which sometimes requires object removed or added, and / or text added, not things Camera Raw or Lightroom are very good at. ;)
 
69Bonni said:
My advice to anyone starting to use Lightroom is to read up on how to install and set it up properly to suit your own requirements. It's more than just an editing program. It's an image cataloguing program too.
Now the issue with just bowling in and just using it is, if you do happen to end up using it as your main workflow tool and you don't do it right from the outset you will have a lot of work straightening it all out after the fact as it were. There are a lot of settings and choices to make, especially about how you file and catalogue your images. It's worth the effort IMHO. You can also buy a standalone copy rather than paying through the Adobe Nose! Of course Adobe want to extract as much cash from you as possible but you can find the standalone but you have to really search to find it they have it well hidden. Google stand alone copy of LR 6 you will eventually find it.

Of course you don't need Lightroom or Photoshop to edit RAW files there are many programs that will do that.

However there are a lot of advantages of shooting RAW as you probably know. You have a massive amount more latitude for editing with RAW. Shooting JPEG you do loose a lot of data and every time you edit an image and resave it you throw more away. You can probably set your camera to save your images to RAW and JPEG if you want to test the water. There are endless web site extolling the virtues of shooting in RAW. It's well worth the move Stuart.
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Completely agree with this. It's a given that LR is a good raw editing tool so that bit is almost secondary. It's also relatively easy to learn the editing side of things. The important bit is how you want to manage your photos. I personally have about 20k of photos and so being able to find them again whenever I feel like it is so important. I'm a big fan of using keywords and then setting up smart collections to collect photos together with certain keywords (landscapes, people's names, cars, whatever). For specific events, I'll use normal collections and just highlight the photos that relate to that event. The big advantage of this approach (and I realise there are many other ways) is that it means there are multiple ways to find the same image. Where it's actually stored on your computer becomes largely irrelevant. Takes a bit of leg work in the first place and some on-going discipline but works well for me. There is a smart collection called 'without keywords' as standard so you can always find photos that you haven't yet tagged.

I also never export any image until I need it for something, so they just sit in lightroom with edits applied and then I export a jpeg, use it and then normally delete. It reduces clutter that way.
 
gad-westy said:
Completely agree with this. It's a given that LR is a good raw editing tool so that bit is almost secondary. It's also relatively easy to learn the editing side of things. The important bit is how you want to manage your photos. I personally have about 20k of photos and so being able to find them again whenever I feel like it is so important. I'm a big fan of using keywords and then setting up smart collections to collect photos together with certain keywords (landscapes, people's names, cars, whatever). For specific events, I'll use normal collections and just highlight the photos that relate to that event. The big advantage of this approach (and I realise there are many other ways) is that it means there are multiple ways to find the same image. Where it's actually stored on your computer becomes largely irrelevant. Takes a bit of leg work in the first place and some on-going discipline but works well for me. There is a smart collection called 'without keywords' as standard so you can always find photos that you haven't yet tagged.

I also never export any image until I need it for something, so they just sit in lightroom with edits applied and then I export a jpeg, use it and then normally delete. It reduces clutter that way.
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Hi Graham, Excellent points there, i must make a point of being more disciplined with tagging with keywords I don't always but i must make a point of making it a part of my workflow! Collections are a great help and make easy work on managing the image files.
I will have to pull up the "Without Keywords" collection and make sure all the images are tagged.
I pretty much do the same regarding exporting the files to jpeg. I like the idea of binning them after, thinking about it why would i need to keep the exported jpegs?
I am looking at managing my "Edits" better however, as i normally end up with several different edits of the same file especially if i have run the image through an external plug-in or PS. I must get round to deleting the images that are not keepers.

I can remember blundering through LR when i first loaded it up some years ago and trying to find the "Save" button;). That's when i decided to read up on Lightroom and use it correctly!
 
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If you like the jpegs your camera produces, shoot a few sample raw+jpeg shots. When you get lightroom, import both. Play with the raw until it looks similar to the jpeg and save the adjustments as a preset. Then you can apply these adjustments as a preset on import to give you a starting point. You will probably develop your own preset over time, but at least this means you have a starting point you are used to already.
 
It dose sound complicated but is it worth me getting do I really need it I'm not a pro photographer so only really do it for fun and memories wouldn't say it's a hobby or any thing like that but is it worth me getting especially when my photos are never really that good especially my airshow ones I all ways seem to struggle with the sky and I all ways feel disappointed with my photos
 
Hi Stuart

I always shoot in RAW, just for the fact of how much more information is stored which is Handy for editing. Just a quick example to show you how much info is actually stored, take a look at the two photos. The first is very under exposed (purposely, it was part of a stack for a HDR image) the second, is literally after moving a few sliders in Lightroom. If that was a JPEG there would be no where near as much detail left.

I use PS & LR, its only £8 a month which I think is quite reasonable
 

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stewie m said:
It dose sound complicated but is it worth me getting do I really need it I'm not a pro photographer so only really do it for fun and memories wouldn't say it's a hobby or any thing like that but is it worth me getting especially when my photos are never really that good especially my airshow ones I all ways seem to struggle with the sky and I all ways feel disappointed with my photos
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From your profile your camera is a canon 450D. If this is your camera to be compatible with lightroom you need lightroom 3 or newer to be compatible with RAWs from that camera. What this means is you can buy an older version of lightroom second hand at a lower price (I would guess around £30-40) than a CC subscription or the latest version (Lightroom 6). This will give you a chance to see if RAW processing is for you. If you find it is then you an upgrade the older version to Lightroom 6 via the adobe site for around £60 or go for a CC subscription. Before you do this you can download lightroom as a free trial version to 'try before you buy'.

Only you can say if it's worth the extra for the ability to edit RAWs. Lightroom is more than a RAW processing tool, I love the library module as it's great to organise images. Keywords and collections would be great tools to find help you find memories involving certain people, places or holidays.

With your air show photos have you posted any on here for advice/help. I find airshows can be difficult to get the exposure right when you have bright or cloudy skies. I find some positive exposure compensation helps as the camera meter is fooled into thinking the scene is brighter than it is as the subject is small in the frame with lots of bright/white sky.
 
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