Mac Photography Tips

What is Your Digital Photography Workflow? October 5, 2009

Filed under: Aperture 2.0, Beginner Tips, Intermediate Tips, Photoshop, workflow — bakari @ 10:36 pm

When you begin getting serious about digital photography, you’ll eventually discover that you perform similar steps when processing your photos in applications like iPhoto, Aperture, or Photoshop. The steps you take to process your images is called a workflow.

I wasn’t aware of my workflow until I started shooting and processing photos on a professional level, which meant that the amount of time I spent on working on images impacted how much money I made on the project. I realized my goal was to shorten the amount time it took me to complete a project while also doing an effective job at processing the images I shot. The only way to reduce the time was to find ways to streamline my workflow.

To get a better handle on my workflow, I actually started documenting my process (including screen shots of the process) in working with Aperture 1.5 and then 2.0. By doing this, I could figure out steps that were taking longer than they needed. It was important, for instance, to stay consistent with the keywords I was using for each job and finding a way to quickly access them. For example, it took me several jobs to realize that I could put all my wedding related keywords in the Keyword Controls panel of Aperture, instead of just a few group of words at a time. I got the set down 15 keywords. A smart album is created based on each keyword. This one little step helped out my workflow tremendously. (Learn more: Keyword Control Sets in Aperture)

aperturekeywordpanel

Other important aspects of refining my workflow included creating shortcut keystrokes, and various exposure and exporting presets for regularly used features. I streamlined my rating system, using only 3 and 5 stars. I created a set of Finder folders and duplicate the set for each new wedding job. I export files to those labeled folders and copy them to DVD for my clients.

My workflow also extends, of course, to Photoshop where I’ve created actions for nearly everything I do to photos in the application. Like many experienced Photoshop users I have lots of advanced free and paid for actions that are important to keep up with. I keep my most used actions near the top of the actions panel and I’ve tried to color-code and assign F-stop keys to frequently used actions.

photoshopactions.png

The goal is to be clear about what I’m doing in Photoshop and not aimlessly experimenting with all its features. There’s nothing wrong with trying out new techniques in Photoshop or your workflow itself, but most times it’s important to have a basic process that you use when working with photos. A workflow not only saves time, but it helps you do quality post-processing (i.e. what you do after you take photos and import them into an image application.)

As an image application is updated or new ones come along, you can further refine your workflow to make it more efficient.

If you have a strong workflow or you have questions about developing a workflow, feel free to leave a comment. I’m eager to hear from readers.

 

Bring Back the Sky July 17, 2009

Filed under: Aperture 2.0, Automator workflow, Photoshop — bakari @ 9:49 pm

photoshop-tipsNote: click on the title of this article to see the photos better.

Sometimes when you’re shooting with subjects in the foreground and the blue cloudy sky in background, it’s hard to take a photo whereby both the foreground and the background are sufficiently exposed.

That’s the case with this photo below. Shooting in RAW mode, I exposed for the sky so that I could maintain its detail. As you can see, though, the bride and groom are under exposed. But the power RAW mode enables you to work with under exposed photos a lot better than in shooting in JPEG mode.

Picture 6.png

When I correct the exposure for the foreground subjects, I loose detail in the sky. As you can see in this photo. So what to do?

Picture 2.png

1. Well, in Aperture or Lightroom, make a duplicate copy of darker exposed sky photo. While selected, you darken the sky even more if need be. Next, select the other copy of the photo and properly expose it for the foreground. You will lose detail in the sky, but that’s the point. You’re wanting bring detail in the foreground in this copy of the photo. Use adjustment tools (e.g. contrast, Definition, Vibrancy) that you normally use to make the foreground subjects look the way you want.

Picture 3.png

2. Next, open both photos in Photoshop. Holding down the shift key, select the background layer, in the layers palette, of the lighter/over exposed sky photo, and drag it onto the darker exposed sky photo. After doing so, you should see the lighter sky photo on top, with the well exposed foreground.

3. Now click the Layer Mask button at the bottom of the layer’s palette. This will put a layer mask over the photo you just dragged in. Select the Brush tool, and make sure your foreground color is black. Using the brush tool, at about medium size, start brushing back in the darker sky, leaving the rest of the photo as is.

layerspallette.png

Presto, you now have brought back the darker sky to match the better foreground. You can flatten both layers and save the photo back to Aperture or Lightroom. The other opened photo of course doesn’t have to be saved. And here’s the result:

Picture 5.png

I hope these instructions make sense. If not, I’d be happy to make a video of the process.

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Simple Out of Focus Background Technique December 23, 2008

Filed under: Intermediate Tips, Photoshop — bakari @ 9:35 pm

Thanks to Photoshop and other image processing applications, we can improve our photographs in ways that are not always possible when we’re doing the actual job of shooting photos on location. Here’s a particular example I wanted to share that is easy to apply to similar images.

During a recent wedding reception, I made a number of photos of the bride and groom before they started eating their meal. In making my first few shots, I didn’t really notice the distracting background painting of the French nobleman that looks annoyed by the couple. Yet, at the same time, this painting does add to the ambiance of the reception.

beforafter.png

So how do we fix the problem? Well, we could simply crop the painting out of the photo. Like this:

BeforeAfter (blur background).png

But if want to keep the painting in the background, it’s pretty simple to just blur it out in Photoshop. Here’s how:

1. Open the image in Photoshop, and duplicate the background layer.

2. Go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur. Blur the image, paying particular notice of course to the background. Don’t worry about the foreground of the image, you will fix that in the next step six.

Untitled.png

3. Now, at the bottom of the layer’s palette, click the Layer Mask button (the third one from the left of the palette that has a square and circle in the middle.)

Untitled.png

4. Now make sure the foreground color in the Tool’s palette is black.

Untitled.png

5. Select the Brush tool in the Tool’s palette. It should be a hard brush about medium size. Make sure the layer mask is selected in the layer’s palette.

Untitled.png

6. Use the brush tool to “paint” back in the areas in the foreground of the image that you don’t want blurred out.

In the before and after, we can clearly see that blurring the background helps keep the focus on the couple and not the distracting French guy in the painting.

beforeafter-1.png

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