Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2

In a nutshell, exporting is the way to apply the changes you have made in Lightroom, everything from Develop adjustments to keywords, to new copies of your imported photos. The key word to keep in mind is copies. Lightroom is not applying these changes to your source photos.

Just to review the workflow, when photos are imported into Lightroom a record is created in the Lightroom catalog file (meaning the database). As you work with those photos inside of Lightroom more data is added to the catalog records for those photos. So the export process is how you get the data out of the catalog file and apply it to a new copy of your source files.

For example, let’s say you import a single photo from your camera’s memory card into Lightroom. In the Library module you added some keywords and added your contact information in the Metadata panel. In the Develop module you set the white balance, adjusted exposure, applied a new crop ratio and boosted the saturation. All of that work is written as a set of instructions inside the Lightroom catalog file as you work. There is no Save function. As you move a slider or apply a keyword you are literally writing data to the Lightroom catalog in real time.

Once you are finished working you might want to email a copy of that photo to someone or upload a copy to an online print service or deliver to a client. This is where the export process comes into play.

If you select that photo and click the Export button in the Library module, or go to File > Export, you are presented with the Export dialog box.

The Export dialog is where you define the parameters for the type of copy you want to create to suit the purpose you have in mind. You wouldn’t use the same settings to send a copy via email as you would for creating a copy to be printed, right?

The key setting on the Export dialog is the file format choice you make in the File Settings panel. This defines what type of copy you are going to create. Lightroom can save out copies in JPEG, TIF, PSD, DNG and original. The file format you choose will determine what other options are available for creating that type of copy.

Once you configure the export dialog as needed, and click the Export button at the bottom of the panel, Lightroom begins the process of creating a copy of the selected source file based on the Export dialog settings and then applying any Lightroom adjustments to that copy. So you see, you are not so much getting your photos out of Lightroom (since they were never in there), but rather you are getting the work you did in Lightroom out in the form of a new file.

Saving copies of your photos to your computer is indeed very helpful, but that is usually not the final destination you have in mind. Perhaps you are planning to upload them to a photo-sharing site, FTP them to your web server, or have them printed by a lab? What if you could add a better watermark, add a border, save out metadata as a text file or have more control over exactly what metadata is kept in your exported copies? All of these things (and more) are possible to do right out of Lightroom with the help of a few export plug-ins.

A new addition to Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 is the Plug-in Manager. This is simply a new interface for working with your export plug-ins.

You can access the Plug-in Manager two ways—from the File > Plug-in Manager menu or from the Export dialog itself.

Aside from helping you manage your plug-ins the Plug-in Manager even has a button which will link you to the Adobe Lightroom Exchange, which is a one-stop shop for finding (and downloading) the current crop of available plug-ins. Plug-ins are all created by third-party developers and new ones are added frequently, so check back from time to time to see what becomes available.

Some of my favorite export plug-ins are:

• LR2/Mogrify, great for adding a custom watermark and borders to exported photos (among many other things).
• Export-to-Flickr, does what it says.
• Jeffrey’s Metadata Wrangler, gives you greater control over the metadata added to exported copies.

There are many others, and more are sure to be added in the future. One of the most amazing things about these plug-ins is that they are either free or very low cost. Once you add these time savers to your workflow you won’t believe your good fortune, so be sure to thank the developers for their efforts!

OK, now that you’ve found a few plug-ins to try you may be wondering about how to get them into Lightroom? A fair question. Here’s how:

Step 1.

Download the plug-in files from the Lightroom Exchange. Export plug-ins have a .lrplugin file extension. Some plug-ins may come packaged in a zip file, so you will need to unzip those before Lightroom will recognize them.

Note: Be sure to check the plug-in developer’s web site for additional installation instructions. Some plug-ins require other applications to be installed to work properly or there may be other special instructions. The web sites are listed with the plug-in information on the Adobe Exchange.

Step 2.

Put the .lrplugin files inside the Modules folder and Lightroom will automatically find them on next launch. This folder is located:

Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Lightroom/Modules

XP: Documents and Settings\[username]\Application Data\Adobe\Lightroom\Modules

Vista: [username]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Lightroom\Modules

Here’s a shortcut to that folder. Open the Export dialog, click the After Export drop-down menu and choose Go to Export Actions Folder Now. This will open Windows Explorer (or Finder) to the above-mentioned Lightroom folder, which contains both the Export Actions folder and the Modules folder (along with others). Create a new folder named Modules if you don’t see it listed in the Lightroom folder.

Step 3.

Close and relaunch Lightroom once the plug-in files are in the Modules folder.

When Lightroom is open again, go to File > Plug-in Manager and you should see all the plug-ins listed and displaying a green light. If so, then they are ready to be used. You can also click on each plug-in to see if the developer provided any additional information about the plug-in or possibly a button to check for new versions of the plug-in (many are updated frequently).

Another good reason to check the developer’s web sites is to learn more about how to use each plug-in. Remember, even though you are using these through Lightroom these are not supported by Adobe. Contact the actual plug-in developer if you have any questions or problems with the plug-ins.

You can access the Preferences by going to Edit > Preferences on Windows or Lightroom > Preferences on Mac. Once the Preferences dialog box appears click the External Editing tab to access these settings.

By default Lightroom always chooses the most current version of Photoshop you have installed as the primary external editor, but you can configure other applications to be used in the Additional External Editor section.

The File Format, Color Space and Bit Depth options are the same as the previous version of Lightroom, and choosing the default settings is recommended.

One small, but much requested, new option is the ability to configure the resolution setting that is included in the copy that is sent to the external editor. The important point to keep in mind is that this is just a metadata setting and will not affect the pixel dimensions of the copy being created. Some people just like to have the option to decide what value is used.

The more exciting option that was added to Lightroom 2 is the ability to add multiple external editors! You can even create multiple configurations of settings for the same editor and save each configuration as a preset. Here’s how it is done.

Step 1.

In the Additional Editor section, click the Application Choose button. On Windows, navigate to the Program Files folder, then into the folder for the application you want to use as your editor and select the application file. On Mac, navigate to the Applications folder and choose the desired application. Once the application is selected click the Choose button.

This will set that application as the additional editor.

Step 2.

Configure the File Format, Color Space, Bit Depth and Resolution settings as needed to work with that particular application.

In my example I am going to create an 8 bit Adobe RGB TIF option for instances when I don’t want to use my default 16 bit ProPhoto options in the primary editor. This might for times where I’ve imported a JPG into Lightroom and want to edit a copy of it further in Photoshop. Since it was originally an 8 bit Adobe RGB image there is nothing to be gained by creating a 16 bit ProPhoto copy of it.

Step 3.

Click the Preset drop-down menu and choose Save Current Settings as New Preset.

When prompted, enter a descriptive name for your preset so that it is easily recognizable later. In my case I named it 8 bit TIFF Photoshop CS3. Click Create.

That’s all there is to it! However, the bonus is that once you’ve created that preset you can repeat the process and add as many other configurations of applications and settings as you might need.

Now, when you access the Edit In menu you will see your presets listed in the menu, which makes it a snap to move to the next editor in your workflow.

The tools we need for this job are in the Develop module. Select your photos and press D to jump on over. There are 2 techniques I’d like to show you. One only works on human eyes, but the other can be used for both humans and pets.

Starting with the Red Eye Correction tool, which is located in the Toolstrip just under the Histogram.

Step 1.

The Red Eye Correction tool doesn’t have a keyboard shortcut, so just click the eyeball icon to activate the tool.

This will expand the panel below the Toolstrip, which reveals the controls for this tool.

Step 2.

When working on the first eye you start by clicking in the center of the eye and slowly dragging outward both up and down and side to side. As you do this a circle will form and grow to the match the size you are creating by dragging outward.

You want to drag far enough that this circle is larger than the pupil (don’t worry about making it too large). Once you release the mouse Lightroom will analyze the area inside the circle and automatically reduce the red eye effect.

Step 3.

Use the Pupil Size and Darken sliders to fine tune the adjustment further. The goal is to reduce the effect of the glaring red color, so it is not noticeable when printed. It may never look exactly perfect when zoomed in at full size.

Step 4.

The Red Eye Correction tool will remember the size last used so simply single click on the center of the second eye to apply the correction, and then adjust the sliders as needed.

If you want to go back and tweak the settings on the first eye just click in the circle around that eye to activate it for editing. Press the Delete key to remove the active correction circle if you want to start over. The Reset button in the Toolstrip panel will only reset the red eye correction. Click the Close button to exit the tool.

Another way to tackle glowing eyes in people and in pets is to use the Adjustment Brush. Here’s how:

Step 1.Select your photo and press K to jump to the Adjustment Brush.

Step 2.

Zero out all sliders to start. Set Saturation to -100.

Step 3.

Choose a brush size that is smaller than the effected area of the eye. Give it a slightly soft edge.

Step 4.

Paint over the red eye to remove all trace of color.

Step 5.

Gradually decrease the Brightness slider to darken the pupil. By using Brightness instead of Exposure you’ll keep any catchlights nice and bright.

Step 6.

Apply the same settings to the other eye.

The nice thing about using the Adjustment Brush is that you have a little more control over the effect and it works on human red eye as well as dog and cat eyeshine.

If you find a combination of settings you like you can save them as a preset by clicking the Effect drop-down menu and choose save current settings as a new preset. Tip: Create a Zeroed preset that quickly zeroes out all sliders to serve as a safe starting point for all adjustments.

While it is usually best to try and avoid situations that you know may be problematic there are times where you really want to take the shot and take care of the problems later.

When evaluating your photos you are not likely to see the purple fringing in Fit Screen view. You need to zoom in to at least 1:1 view to see if there is a problem that needs fixing.

In this example the fringe areas are most visible along the dark edges of the tree branches. Let’s go through the steps I followed for reducing the fringe in this image. One thing to note is that you want to perform this correction after you have made your basic white balance and exposure adjustments.

Step 1.

Expand the Detail panel.

Under the Sharpening and Noise Reduction controls you will find the Chromatic Aberration sliders—the Red/Cyan and the Blue/Yellow.

As the nickname “purple fringe” suggests the most common color fringe we see is a combination of red and blue. By adjusting each slider we are expanding or contracting the red or the blue channel (respectively) in relation to the other two, which in turn reduces the visibility of the color fringe.

Step 2.

Zoom to at least 1:1 view.

There are two ways to do this. You can either zoom the entire image to 1:1, which is the most effective, or use the zoom window in the Detail panel, which can be very helpful when you want to keep the main image zoomed out to Fit view to see the entire image while you work.

While working with the zoom window you can click and drag on the image inside the zoom window to examine different areas of the photo, or click the crosshair next to the zoom window and click on an area of the photo itself to zoom in on that area. You can right-click on the zoom window and choose between 1:1 or 2:1 zoom level.

When making chromatic aberration adjustments I find a zoom level of 2:1 to be more helpful.

Step 3.

Adjust each slider in turn to find the optimal result.

This is a visual process, and you may need to go back and forth a bit to find the sweet spot. I start with the Blue/Yellow slider as that is often going to have the greatest effect, then tweak the Red/Cyan as needed.

Step 4.

Fine tune with the Defringe adjustment.

This is a subtle adjustment that can sometimes improve upon your manual adjustment. As you can see in the previous figure I couldn’t completely remove the fringe with the sliders alone. Setting Defringe to All Edges did make an improvement.

At 1:1 view the visibility of the fringing is greatly diminished and possibly even acceptable depending upon the output. One last technique I will use for really problem fringing is to expand the HSL panel, set to Saturation, and click on the Target Adjustment Tool. Then place the cursor over a remaining color fringe and drag down slightly to desaturate a small amount. Just keep in mind that this will affect the selected color everywhere in the image, not just the point where you are clicking, so depending upon the colors in the image this may not be desirable in all cases.

Here is a before and after showing the cumulative effects of the sliders, defringe and a targeted desaturation of the fringe area.

First, the only change from Lightroom 1 to Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 in regards to the crop tool is its new home. It moved from the Develop module’s Toolbar to the new Toolstrip under the Histogram.

You can still jump to the Crop Tool from anywhere in Lightroom by selecting a photo and pressing R.

Once you are in the Crop Tool you can choose between different crop overlays to help you find the strongest composition by pressing O to cycle through them, or look under the View > Crop Guide Overlay menu.

Cropping to an aspect ratio not a size

One of the most important things to keep in mind is that in Lightroom you crop to an aspect ratio, not a size. Size is determined during output (such as a print from the Print module or when creating copies during Export).

Every photo has an aspect ratio, which is just a way to express the relationship between the long side and the short side. A square photo has an aspect ratio of 1:1. As soon as you’ve have one side longer than the other you have a rectangle and the aspect ratio changes accordingly.

A common photo aspect ratio is 2:3. You can determine an aspect ratio by dividing the long side by the short side. So, for a shot from a D200 is 3872 x 2592, so if we do some math: 3872/2592 = 1.49, which we can round up to 1.5. So, our aspect ratio is 1:1.5, which is just another way to say 2:3.

So for example, if you want to produce a print that is 5 x 7 you would first crop your photo to match a 5 x 7 aspect ratio. Here’s how:

Step 1.

Select the photo and press R to jump to the Crop Tool.

Step 2

In the Toolstrip, click the Aspect Ratio drop down menu and choose the 5 x 7 preset (or for a different aspect ratio you could choose Enter Custom and enter the dimensions that match the aspect ratio you want to use). Lightroom will set the crop rectangle to match that aspect ratio.

Step 3.

Click the Lock icon to close it (press A to close/open the lock), which locks in that aspect ratio so that if you move the resize handles you won’t change the aspect ratio.

Once you’ve finalized the crop you can switch to the Print module and create a layout with 5 x 7 cells and the photo will fit snugly inside the cell.

If you want to send the photo away to be printed you would select your photo and go to File > Export. On the Export dialog, choose your file type in the File Settings panel, then expand the Image Settings panel and check the Resize to Fit box. Configure Export settings as desired. Click Export to have Lightroom create a copy of the source file that matches the settings you’ve chosen.

Change the orientation of the crop

There is an aspect of the Lightroom crop tool that is not as intuitive as it could be (based on how often the question gets asked), and that is how to change the orientation of the crop rectangle.

Let’s say you have a photo with a landscape orientation, but you want to create a portrait orientation crop within it. Here’s what you need to do:

Step 1

Select the photo and press R to jump to the Crop tool.

Step 2.

Choose the aspect ratio you want to be applied. Close the lock icon to “lock in” that aspect ratio.

Step 3.

Grab a corner resize handle and drag to the opposite corner along the longest edge until the orientation of the crop rectangle flips.

Since the aspect ratio is locked in, as soon as you decrease the length of the long side to the point that it is no longer the longest side the orientation has to switch to maintain the aspect ratio. Once the orientation has changed you can re-position the photo for best composition. Believe me it is easier to do than explain! Give it a try.

Cropping multiple photos easily

If you have a lot of photos to crop to the same aspect ratio it is much faster to apply the crop ratio to all the photos in Grid view of the Library module first, and then make any tweaks in the Crop Tool later. Here’s how:

Step 1.

Press G to jump to Grid view and select all the photos to be cropped.

Step 2.

Expand the Quick Develop panel and then expand the Saved Preset section.

Step 3.

Click the Crop Ratio drop-down menu and choose the desired aspect ratio. This will apply that ratio to all selected photos at once.

Step 4.

Press R to jump to the Crop Tool and make any composition tweaks as needed.

I hope that takes your cropping experience to the next level and speeds up your workflow a little more!

While there is a Vignette panel in Lightroom 1 it was intended to be a correction tool for fixing the slightly dark edges around a photo that can result from using certain combinations of filters and lenses. It worked OK for that purpose, but many people enjoyed using it more as a creative tool to add a darkening (or lightening) effect to the edge of some photos. The only problem was that Lightroom 1 only applies the vignette to the outer edge of the source photo, so if you also crop that same photo in Lightroom 1 you risk cropping away the vignette effect as well. Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 remedied that problem with a significant enhancement to the Vignette panel that added new controls for creating “post-crop” vignettes strictly for creative purposes. Let’s take a look.

The Vignette panel in Lightroom 2 contains two sets of Vignette controls:

Lens Correction: This section works just like the controls in Lightroom 1, which are intended to correct an actual vignette problem. The effect is only applied to the outer edge of the original photo, but not the cropped version.

Post-Crop: This is a new set of controls that are strictly for creative purposes and will automatically be reapplied after any subsequent cropping is performed.

In this tutorial I’d like to specifically focus on the new set of sliders in the Post-Crop section.

There are four sliders in the Post-Crop section of the panel:

• The Amount slider controls the amount of vignette you can apply to the photo. A positive amount lightens the vignette and a negative amount darkens it.
• The Midpoint controls how far into the middle the vignette effect extends. A Midpoint of 0 applies the vignette amount as far into the middle as is possible.
• The Roundness slider controls the shape of the inside edge of the vignette effect. The higher the Roundness setting the rounder the inside of the vignette effect will be, with a +100 setting equaling a circular vignette effect.
• The Feather slider determines how soft the vignette effect fades into the middle. A setting of 0 means no fading (or softening) of the effect, while a +100 setting is the maximum amount of fading from middle (lightest) to edge (darkest).

Let’s take a look at an example photo where I’ll add a creative vignette that is more like an interesting white border effect.

Starting with all sliders set on their default amounts the photo looks like this:

Let me walk through the steps I took to add a white border.

Step 1.

Since I wanted a white border then I need to apply the maximum positive Amount setting of + 100.

Step 2.

I don’t want any fading at all in this effect so I set the Feather slider to 0.

Step 3.

I want the shape of the inside of the vignette to be as rectangular as possible so I set the Roundess slider all the way to -100.

Step 4.

The final step to get this effect is to adjust the midpoint slider to the point where the border is wide enough to suit your taste. I liked the look of setting it to 10.

I like the look of that effect and will sometimes add it to photos in a slideshow as a way to create a double border and offset the photo from the slide. Of course there is a wide range of effects you can achieve with various combinations of settings on those sliders.

Here’s the cool part. Even though I’ve finished adding that border I can still correct the crooked horizon without losing my vignette. If I press R to jump to the crop tool I can quickly straighten the photo, which will result in some cropping by default. Note: Once you move to the Crop Tool the vignette effect will be hidden until you exit the Crop tool.

After straightening the photo I press D to apply the crop and my vignette affect is reapplied to the newly cropped and straightened photo.

The Snapshots panel, located between the Presets and History panels, inside the Develop module is a handy means for recording the settings of the photo you are working on at significant points in your workflow.

By default a new snapshot called Import is automatically created during Import and appears in the Snapshots panel. You can add new snapshots by clicking the plus sign, and delete any snapshot by clicking the minus sign at the top of the panel. You can preview snapshots in the Navigator panel by moving the cursor over the snapshot. This works just the same as previewing Presets and History states.

Snapshots are very similar to history states in that they allow you to freeze settings at a certain point in your workflow and return to them or use them to compare against your progress.

Snapshots are arranged in alpha-numerical order automatically as you create them. Let’s walk through an example to see how they can be useful.

One of the first things you are likely to do with a new raw photo is apply a camera profile and set white balance. How you proceed from that point may vary, so this can be a handy point to create a snapshot for comparison sake as you move forward.

Step 1.

Click the + sign at the top of the Snapshots panel. This will result in the New Snapshot dialog displaying.

Step 2.

Give the snapshot a descriptive name and click Create.

Since snapshots are arranged alpha-numerically I’ve gotten into the habit of numbering my snapshots as I create them so that the order of steps is more clear. Chances are you won’t remember the order if you revisit an image days, weeks or months down the road.

Another way to create a snapshot is to use a history state. Just right-click the desired history state and choose Create Snapshot from the contextual menu.

Notice that the history state label is used as the default name of the snapshot. You can leave it this way or customize as needed.

After you have been working for awhile it is helpful to use the Before and After view to see how far you have come. Snapshots can come in handy here too. The default Before view is the import state. That may be helpful in some cases, but I usually like to compare against the look of the image after the camera profile and white balance has been applied since that is my preferred starting point.

Step 1.

Go to View > Before/After and choose a preferred view option.

Step 2.

Right-click on the snapshot you want to use as the Before state.

Step 3.

Choose Copy Snapshot Settings to Before to update the Before view with these settings.

Now you have a much more useful comparison to assess how the photo is progressing. If you decide that you don’t like where this is headed you can click on a previous snapshot and jump back to that state and continue from there.

Now you may be thinking that you can already do that with the states in the History panel, and this is true, but it doesn’t take long to produce a lot of history states. Isn’t much easier to jump back to a snapshot that you named (and numbered)?

You can right-click and rename any snapshot (except the default import) at any time, and update a past snapshot with new settings via the same contextual menu. Oh, and snapshots can be written to a file’s XMP metadata (unlike history states), which means it is possible to store your snapshots with the file itself and they will even be visible inside of Camera Raw.

While snapshots may not be useful for every photo nor every work session they can be a powerful tool when you need them, so give it a try!

The Quick Develop panel’s sole purpose in life is to speed up your workflow. It is essentially a mini Develop module built right into the Library module. It is not intended to replace the Develop module, but rather to give you the ability to tap into the power of the Develop module while we are making that first pass of edits in the Library module.

For example, imagine you’ve just imported all the photos from a shoot and are in the process of weeding out the keepers from the clunkers. You find a few shots that are composed well, focus is sharp, but a little over (or under exposed). You are in decision making mode, not processing mode. Why break your flow by jumping to the Develop module to see if these are worth saving when you can expand the Quick Develop panel and give the exposure setting enough of a tweak (in either direction) to inform your decision? Perhaps you have a Develop preset that you forgot to apply during import or your in-camera white balance setting was wrong, well with just a few clicks you can apply it to an entire folder right from Grid view. This isn’t finished processing, but rather a quicker way to get to a better starting point.

Let’s expand the panel and see what is there.

There are 3 main sections of controls—Saved Preset, White Balance and Tone Control—and a Reset All button. Clicking the small left-facing black arrow can expand each section further.

The Saved Preset section provides access to all your Develop presets. Unfortunately, they will appear in one long list absent the folder structure you may have created in the Develop module’s Preset panel, so if you have a lot of presets this will be a very long list. In addition, you can apply a new crop ratio to a batch of selected photos while in Grid view or use Treatment to switch between color and grayscale.

The White Balance section provides access to the various white balance presets as well as separate Temperature and Tint adjustment sliders.

The Tone Control provides all the rest of the adjustments found in the Basic panel of the Develop module. Tip: Hold the Alt key on Windows or Option key on Mac to change the Clarity and Vibrance adjustments to Sharpening and Saturation respectively.

The adjustments provided by all the sliders are rather broad strokes compared to the controls in the Develop module. Clicking the double-arrow produces an adjustment in greater increments than clicking the single arrow. For example, the single arrow Exposure adjustment results in a 1/3 stop adjustment while the double-arrow equals a full stop adjustment.

A very important difference in how these adjustments work compared to the Develop module is that these are relative adjustments as opposed to absolute adjustments. This means that if you select multiple images in Grid view and increase Exposure by a single arrow click all photos will have their individual exposure settings boosted by 1/3 stop over whatever exposure setting they already had. However, if you had the same photos selected in Develop with Auto Sync enabled and you increased the Exposure slider by the same amount you would instead be changing all selected photos to the exact same exposure setting.

The Reset All button will revert all selected photos back to the import state.

You can use the Quick Develop panel controls in all views of the Library module, but you can only apply batch settings to groups of photos while in Grid view. If you have multiple photos selected in any of the other view modes you will only affect the most selected (active) photo.

One last aspect to keep in mind is that when you work in the Library module you are seeing previews that may not be rendered as accurately as they are in Develop. So, if you want the truest preview you should always press D to jump to Develop and zoom to 1:1 view. When finished, press E to jump back to Loupe view or G to Grid view and return to the Library module.

The best solution to this problem is to avoid it completely and only rename your files in Lightroom; reconnecting renamed files is tedious—you must do each one individually.

The steps are the same as reconnecting moved folders and photos. The only difference is that you’ll have to repeat the steps over and over for each renamed photo. Lightroom has no way of knowing what the new name of each photo is unless you tell it and confirm it each time.

If you have lots and lots of renamed photos, it would probably be easier to rename them back to the original name outside of Lightroom (use the same application you used to change the name). This way Lightroom will simply reconnect to them as if nothing had changed. Then, you can rename them properly from within Lightroom and swear to yourself that you’ll never do that again.