Your LR4 Workflow

Mike_T

Mike_T

Messages
185
Name
Mike
Edit My Images
No
I'm an avid user of LR4, having moved from LR3, but I have to admit that compared to some my workflow probably leaves a lot to be desired.

To that end, I'm wondering if any of you chaps would be willing to share your workflows, how do you archive, back up, and work on your images etc. Hopefully this will aid some of us newbies in getting the most out of LR4 and our workflows.

Thanks
 
i make duplicate copy on import to another drive.

i then go through all the images and rate them.

i then start adjustments on the rated ones, one by one, applying previous settings when suitable etc.

once im happy with a complete set i delete all the unrated ones and recopy the folder to another backup as well as the catalogue file.

does that help?
 
kman said:
i make duplicate copy on import to another drive.

i then go through all the images and rate them.

i then start adjustments on the rated ones, one by one, applying previous settings when suitable etc.

once im happy with a complete set i delete all the unrated ones and recopy the folder to another backup as well as the catalogue file.

does that help?
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's the kind of thing I'm looking for!
 
Import into LR with the lens correction preset
Delete the rubbish (in my case loads)
Rate if any of the pictures are likely to be published
Basic adjustments
crop if required
add clarity
go back to the rated images and possibly edit in viveza, silver efex then sharpen in nik sharpener
sync all photos with smugmug
weekly backup to external hard drive
 
My workflow is as follows:
Copy images from card and convert to DNG, storing them in my Photos folder then organised by YYYY/YY-MM-DD, whilst importing I apply my metadata preset (contact/copyright info etc) and develop preset (lens correction, wb, camera profile and a few personal tweaks) at this stage I also get Lightroom to place a copy on my external hard drive.

I use flags to pick/reject images, then filters to ensure I am happy with my flagging, then delete the rejects and set the "Flagged" filter for the next stages.

I process the images, starting at the basic panel in the develop window and working top to bottom.

I add the images to the map module.

Then I do all the individual image captioning etc (anything which applied to the who set would have been applied on import).

Lastly is use publish services to get the images where they need to be.
 
It does depend on what I'm doing, but generally I import as RAW's to Mac and two external HD's.

Images on the mac go into a lightroom folder with subfolders for each shoot, basic metadata is also applied on import.

I dont rate my images, they're either keepers or not, so I just flag the keepers and then export the flagged pics into a new collection.

Open the collection in the develop module, crop, straighten, adjust etc, apply global WB if all shot in similar light.

After that I just export as required using my presets for Blog, Portfolio, Press etc

Hope that helps :)
 
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i have got cs5, what workflow do you use for this?
is lr4 better than cs5? for photos
 
I guess the only thing I do differently from the rest is to use Fast Picture Viewer 64 to sort and copy the keepers straight from the card.

I really can't be bothered waiting for LR to generate full size previews of a couple of hundred images (many of which will be deleted), so I can check for focus and sharpness.

By the time LR would have generated a dozen preview images I have whizzed through a hundred or so viewing them at full size straight from the card.:)
 
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scottyboy said:
i have got cs5, what workflow do you use for this?
is lr4 better than cs5? for photos
Click to expand...

I Prefer Lr4 but you can just use bridge to sort out your rubbish and flag your best, then do initial editing in Raw, then move onto Pshop to finish
 
Copy images into relevant folder titled with job name and place into a folder on my external drive that's either named WORK or PERSONAL.

Link LR to the folder through import. Keyword at this point.

Sort images, ditching really bad ones, then numbering/flagging images for use.

Do required adjustments then export as a TIFF or JPEG, which are then uploaded onto a remote server for the guys at work to download.

Job done.

Because of the amount of shooting I do for work, a hard drive doesn't last that long so each drive is named with a year, which makes it a bit easier to find things.
 
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Craikeybaby said:
My workflow is as follows:
Copy images from card and convert to DNG, storing them in my Photos folder then organised by YYYY/YY-MM-DD, whilst importing I apply my metadata preset (contact/copyright info etc) and develop preset (lens correction, wb, camera profile and a few personal tweaks) at this stage I also get Lightroom to place a copy on my external hard drive.

I use flags to pick/reject images, then filters to ensure I am happy with my flagging, then delete the rejects and set the "Flagged" filter for the next stages.

I process the images, starting at the basic panel in the develop window and working top to bottom.

I add the images to the map module.

Then I do all the individual image captioning etc (anything which applied to the who set would have been applied on import).

Lastly is use publish services to get the images where they need to be.
Click to expand...

Craikey - how do you get Lightroom to do the copy to back up HD, or are those your working copies?
 
This is an archive, everything I import to Lightroom goes on this drive (and gets synced to an offsite copy) so if I ever need to go back to a raw file I've removed from Lightroom I can.

I'm not at my Mac now, but it is an option at the top right of the import dialogue, to copy files to a second location.
 
Because I use picture styles quite a lot I first copy the files to my ex HD then use Canon DPP to convert to Jpeg, I then import the jpegs to lightroom, pick the ones I want by flagging then sort by attribute (flag). I then add them to a new collection. I then go through the flags using some of the presets I have, and do any crops healing etc. Anything that goes into the ablum, I bring into PS to do a full edit on from the raw file.
 
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