Street Photos with a Vintage Look

Something that I haven’t pursued in a very long time is that of capturing the look and feel of life on the streets. Just last week, I was given the challenge of preparing a five minute talk on the topic of my choosing for a video presentation. Preparation time for this talk was just under two hours. I knew that I would prepare a talk on photography but I was hard pressed on deciding the content. Then it dawned on me that I hadn’t shot any street scenes in a number of years – and so my mind was made up. As I said, I had a little less than two hours, so I hopped on the street car and headed to the busiest place I could think of – the central train station in Munich.

Original photo of the Street Car

I wanted to present a nice cross section of photographic techniques for my talk and so I was willing to try all kinds of experiments outside of my normal “comfort zone”. In the short time frame I had allotted myself for the shoot (30-40 minutes), I took just over a hundred photographs. I chose to shoot high-contrast black and white images to enhance the drama of the shots, so I set my Canon 30D to shoot JPG (B&W) and RAW. Upon completing the shots, I rushed back to the seminar, quickly sorted my shots and delivered my talk.

Afterwards, when I got my photos back into Lightroom, I saw that I had a number of relatively interesting shots and started developing them. Well, one thing led to another, and I came up with the small collection of six (6) new Lightroom presets that I’d like to share with you.

Exploring the Street Photography Presets

While developing the shots in Lightroom, I was going after a super high-contrast look that quite frankly adds a certain amount of drama to any photograph. I started out with a basic preset – black levels cranked way up, recovery and fill sliders adjusted to match the shot I was developing. Once I tried the “look” on a number of shots it became apparent that I would need a few different levels of contrast to match the majority of shots I had taken.

It was actually quite “by accident” that I ended up creating the vintage look you see in some of these shots. I was jumping back and forth between the new presets I had developed and I accidentally clicked on a brown-toned preset I had recently developed for some portrait work. I stopped, took a look, and liked what I saw.

So what you’re seeing here is the evolutionary development of a brown/sepia vintage preset that can be toggled on/off to co-exist beautifully with the various high contrast looks!

	This is one of the photos I will use to show the various presets I’ve developed for this collection. It has a good range of tones and colors, although it was taken on an overcast day.
	The base preset of the collection – Focus – Street Life. It basically enhances the blacks, edges up the fill and recovery sliders, sets contrast to 100%, introduces a touch of negative clarity and rounds out with a good mix of sharpening and noise reduction.
	The next level – Focus – Street Life (Hard). In this preset the clarity slider sweeps decidely into the plus range to a value of 80. Adjustments to the tone curve start advancing those shadows WAY into the negative range. Sharpening and noise reduction remain the same.
	I’m now switching to another sample photo so that we can see the progression better. Here the photo without any preset effect.
	The next level – Focus – Street Life (Harder). In this preset the recovery, fill and black sliders are advanced – almost to the values you would need to create an HDR effect. (you’ll be able to see the HDR effect better in another sample below) Adjustments to the tone curve continue into the negative range. Sharpening and noise reduction remain the same.
	The last level – Focus – Street Life (Soft). Now just so that things don’t get too crazy, I’ve included a softer version. This could be used in those photos where a subdued effect is desired.
	Now you’ll see in the screen capture above that there’s two presets I haven’t touched on. They can be used in conjunction with the other 4 presets to toggle a “Vintage Effect” on or off. Shown here is the Street Life (Soft) + Street Life (Vintage On) effect. Just keep in mind you can toggle the vintage mode on for each of the four presets. We’ll see more examples below.
	Here’s another example of two presets used together. Shown here is the Street Life (Harder) preset applied to this photo. In order to turn on the “Vintage” effect you simply need to apply the “Vintage On” preset on top of the other preset. (as shown below)
	Shown here is another photo with the Street Life preset applied. To add the vintage effect you apply the “Vintage On” preset on top of the other preset. (as shown below)
	Since the Vintage preset is already applied, we can switch over to another Street Life preset to see how it will look. Shown here is the same photo with the Street Life (Harder) preset applied.
	And by clicking on the “Vintage Off” preset we can see how the same photo looks without the “Vintage” effect. To remove the vintage effect you apply the “Vintage Off” preset on top of the other preset. (as shown below)

Download the Lightroom “Street Life” Presets

Well I think you get the idea how these new presets work.

	Download the Focus Street Life Presets
	Collection:	Focus Street Life Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	7. September 2009
	Size:	3.2 KB
	Downloaded:	43,366 times.

I know that many of you like to upload your photos to Flickr or other photo sharing groups. I too am very active on Flickr in the Presetting Lightroom group and I’d really like to see what kinds of great shots you produce with these presets. If you use these presets and upload your photos to Flickr or elsewhere, how about “tagging” your photos with “Focus-StreetLife” as a keyword in Lightroom. That way I can search Flickr for the keyword and see the shots where these presets have been used.

Installing the Presets

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this video is for those that need a little help in installing Lightroom presets. The video also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.

Photo © M. Kohlhofer

One of my favorite times for taking photos is at night. Therefore, it’s probably about time that I finally wrote an article about shooting at night. You will be faced with an entirely new set of challenges to master this photographic venue. In this article, I will give you a number of tips, and if this is your first time out, to help make sure you’re properly prepared.

I’m also introducing a new photo gallery into this site. I posted a question on Twitter that I was looking for a new Flash based photo gallery. A few minutes later, Oliver (aka @fotolist on Twitter) came back with a winner! I’ve played around a bit with dfGallery 2.0 and am suitably impressed. Watch for the photo link at the end of this article to see the first photos in the Gallery.

While developing the photos for the gallery, I found myself using a number of settings over and over again, so naturally, I’ve bundled these settings into two new Lightroom presets that I’m making available for download. The presets basically remove or reduce some of the inherent color casts you’ll find at night, they adjust the recovery and contrast levels to compensate for timed exposures and also have built-in noise reduction to counteract any noise or other artifacts that may develop. Ok, lots of stuff, let’s get started …

Getting your Equipment Together

Before you go out on a night shoot, you should make sure that you’re properly prepared. The obvious things of course – check that the battery in your camera is fully loaded. There’s nothing more frustrating than getting to your destination and realizing you’ve only got enough battery life for about 10 minutes of shooting. Don’t forget your tripod! Probably the most important piece of equipment you’ll have for a night shoot! You’re going to need it (period). Unless of course you’re planning on doing some high-ISO work and your focus is street photography. Additionally, here’s a few more tips to make sure that you’re prepared for the shoot.

Manfrotto Tripod Black - 055XPROB	I’ve already mentioned a tripod. It’s going to be your best friend for the next few hours. I know it’s a pain in the ass to drag along and set up, but the results will be worth it. This clever tripod has a center column that can be swung into a horizontal position allowing for creative and flexible camera mounting. You’ll see me setting it up in a shot further down the page.
MAG-LITE from Mag Instrument	Take along a flashlight! You’re going to be shooting in the dark! Now unless your camera has a back light for your settings display your going to need it to see what you’re adjusting. At some point, you’re also probably going to be looking for something in your camera bag and a flashlight will come in handy. And let’s not rule out signaling for help should you get lost.
Spare Battery and Flash Card	Take along a spare battery and film (Flash Card). Enough said.
Timer Remote Controller TC-80N3	Get a remote release. I haven’t got one of these babies yet, but I’m currently looking at getting one. There’s nothing more irritating than getting that perfect shot only to see slight blurring effects when you get the shots loaded into Lightroom. (you’re definitely not going to see any slight blurring on that tiny 2-3 inch monitor on the camera!) Shown here is a unit that includes a remote timer for doing time-lapse photography.
Reflective Safety Vest	Make sure you’re properly dressed for the night. If you’re shooting on a cold night, a warm jacket is always nice to have. Also, gloves will ensure you don’t freeze your fingers off. If your ears are sensitive to the cold, take along a hat. If you’re planning on shooting along a busy road or highway, a safety vest is highly recommended. It’ll really spoil your shoot if you end up in the hospital because someone didn’t see you standing on the side of the road.
Mirror Lockup Function	In order to minimize the vibration caused to the camera when the mirror flips up just prior to exposure, I set my Canon 30D to pre-lock up the mirror. Most modern DSLR’s will have a similar function buried somewhere in a sub-menu. Just another precaution to avoid the tiny bit of vibration that will cause minute levels of blurring in your photo when the mirror flips up just before the exposure!

Time for the Photo Shoot

In this latest night shoot, it was terribly cold, it was lightly raining and there was lots of wet mushy snow on the ground. Now I don’t really like the cold or snow but I wasn’t going to let that stop me. We arrived at our first location and before taking the first shot I set up the self-timer feature of the camera to make sure I was not “touching” the camera at the time of exposure. The logical alternative is a remote release adapter (which I don’t have yet) that will allow you to remotely “fire” the camera. This, combined with the mirror lock-up, would ensure I had no undesirable “shaking” of the camera.

Preparing the tripod for the next shot.
(click on photo to enlarge)

Equally important is to know your equipment! There’s no point in fumbling around in the dark with your gear when you don’t know how something works. Practice with your camera and learn it well. I was certainly glad that I practiced re-orienting my Manfrotto tripod. I needed to re-adjust on that night and I remember the surprised look on Michael’s face when I pulled the center post out of the tripod and turned it 90 degrees! The first thing he said was, “Hey, my tripod can’t do that!”

Photo shot with this setup.
(larger version in gallery)

“Had I gone out shooting street-life, I would have left the tripod at home and set the camera at 1600 ISO or even 3200 ISO and would have worked with a wide open aperture. The camera would have been set on aperture-priority to give me the fastest possible shutter speed for a given aperture.”

For the majority of the shots that I took on this evening, I used an ISO setting of 200. There was no need to shoot anything higher, I had a tripod and had all the time I needed to get the shot. I was typically shooting with apertures around f/8 – f/22 and exposure times ranging from 2 to 20 seconds.

You need to do whatever it takes to get the shot!
(click on photo to enlarge)

Now just for the record, I’m going to say one more time – “I just hate the cold, ice and snow!” But, I would never let that get in the way of me “getting the shot”. One of the key ingredients in photography is to find a unique and interesting vantage point from which to shoot your subject. This is a lesson I learned many years ago and have been rewarded with better photos since. Don’t be content to shoot at eye level – change your elevation, and you’ll begin to “see” a whole new world!

Finished photo taken at our second location.
(larger version in gallery)

Take your time in setting up the shot.
(click on photo to enlarge)

On our last setup of the evening, we briefly stopped to photograph a shot I had seen on our way to the monastery. I had wanted to photograph it earlier but Michael convinced me we could get it on the way back. I’m sure glad I did, because it has become one of my most popular Flickr uploads. You can read the details behind this shot’s Lightroom post-processing on Flickr. Feel free to leave a comment as well – I’d love to hear from you!

Download the Lightroom “Night” Presets

While I was developing these shots in Lightroom it dawned on me that the settings I used might be a good starting point for those who want to try some night shooting. In the download, you will find two presets – one for color shots, the other for converting your color into black & white night time shots.

The color preset reduces the color casts that are commonly found in night shots. It then fine tunes your black, contrast, vibrance and saturation settings. A healthy dose of color cast reduction is applied with the hue, saturation and luminance sliders. Also, I’ve added a nice blend of noise reduction and sharpening to round things off. Now don’t forget to have a look at the photo gallery below to see these presets in action. Enjoy!

	Download the Focus Night Lights Presets
	Collection:	Focus Night Lights Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	10. March 2009
	Size:	1.41 KB
	Downloaded:	11,349 times.

New Photo Gallery featuring Night Photos

Photo © M. Kohlhofer
(click on photo to enlarge)

As I mentioned in the introduction, I’ve implemented a new photo gallery to showcase the photos from this night’s shoot. As you can discern from the photo on the left, I consider this shoot as a huge success! I didn’t take a lot of shots but the nicest ones have made it into this week’s gallery. Enjoy the show and feel free to leave a comment on the gallery page!

If anyone has a question about this article or Lightroom in general, you can always contact me on Twitter under my account (@profiphotos).

Until next time, I wish all of you, a pleasant round of night photography.

Click on the photo above to view the photo gallery. Once the Gallery is loaded, you can control it’s behavior using the menu bar at the bottom. For best viewing & listening I would suggest you select the “Full Screen” option and then click on the sound icon to turn on the music. Enjoy!

Due to the immense popularity of the my last article on HDR photography in Lightroom (still #3 in the popular articles list), I decided it was time for another. Just recently, HDR Soft released their newest version of Photomatix Pro software which includes a plug-in for Lightroom. Well it seemed like the perfect fit for this week’s article. In order to demonstrate the seamless integration into Lightroom, I decided to produce the video you see below. Instead of showing you how the software works (there are tutorials and videos on HDR Soft’s WEB site for that), I opted to show you how it integrates into Lightroom. I was fairly impressed!

What’s more, I wanted to provide you, my readers, with an opportunity to try it out for yourselves. Included in this article is a section where you can download the source images, the preset I used to process the files in Photomatix Pro, and finally the Lightroom preset I developed to “finish the shot”. What more could you want, download Photomatix Pro from HDR Soft (free trial) and you can use the photos you see in the video to try it out!

HDR Source Photos for Video

The source files for this video were taken last year at a rock quarry in the vicinity of Freising. On this particular day I had the perfect conditions for shooting a number of HDR source photos. There was no wind to speak of, the sky was speckled with a bit of cloud cover and the sun – well, I just love it when the sun shines! The photo at the start of this article was also taken on the same day. You can see the almost perfect mirror-like reflections in both shots.

First photo in the HDR series.

Second photo in the HDR series.

And the third photo in the series.

Video: Photomatix Pro in Lightroom

This video shows the Photomatix Pro plug-in for Lightroom. It takes you through the steps to properly install the plug-in and then shows just how easy it is to produce HDR photos in Lightroom. What is also explored is the capability of using presets with Photomatix Pro to speed your work flow to quickly get those HDR shots back into Lightroom for final processing. A fun, light-hearted 8 minute video gives you a thorough introduction to creating HDR photos within Lightroom.

The HDR Photos from the Video

Once again, here are the completed shots, processed first with Photomatix Pro and then finished in Lightroom. You can watch them being created “live” in the video! After the video was shot, the only changes I made was to crop the photos just a little tighter than you see in the video. Hey, it’s a photographer’s perogative to make the shot look as good as it can.

The photo as it was sent back to Lightroom from Photomatix Pro..

And after a bit of post-processing in Lightroom.

Download Photomatix Pro

HDR Soft continues to offer a 30-day free trial of the Photomatix Pro software. You can follow either of the first two links below to get to their site. Or try your luck at winning a copy at the Flickr photo contest – option number three below.

• Download from HDR Soft’s WEB Site – while there be sure to look around and check out some of the other videos they provide links to.
• Photomatix Pro Lightroom Plug-in on Adobe’s Lightroom Exchange – by following this link you will have the opportunity to download the Lightroom plug-in only via Adobe’s site. Ultimately you end up downloading it from the same link as the one above. But, you could leave a positive comment for others to see on this site.
• Win a copy of Photomatix Pro – until February 28th, 2009 you could win a fully licensed version of this software. All you have to do is enter a photo in the Flickr Presetting Lightroom photo contest. There’s not a lot of entries so you’ll have a good chance of winning.

Download the Photos and Presets

You don’t think I’d let you go home empty handed do you? I’ve prepared a “zip” file download containing the 3 (three) photos you saw in the video, the Photomatix preset and the Lightroom preset created in the video. These photos are being offered to you under the Creative Commons license. It means you can use these photos for learning purposes but credit to the original photographer (me) must accompany the photo(s) for any other use. These photos are not to be used for commercial purposes or passed off as your own. These are not photos you can do with whatever you please – the copyright remains with me! Read the details of the Creative Commons license that apply to these photos and presets.

	Download the HDR Photos & Presets
	Collection:	HDR Photos/Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	22. February 2009
	Size:	11.93 MB
	Downloaded:	32,864 times.

Installing the Presets

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this video is for those that need a little help in installing Lightroom presets. The video also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.
• To install the preset in Photomatix Pro, you’ll have to extract the preset from the “zip” archive and manually copy it into the “Presets” folder in the directory you chose to install Photomatix Pro into.

I am involved with a group on Flickr that is sponsoring a photo contest. We’re looking for contest entries of your dramatic moments in life. This is our first ever photo contest so I’m hoping to reach new people who would like to join in.

Flickr is a very popular photo community (it’s free) that anyone can use to share photos with your friends and loved ones. Our group, called Presetting Lightroom focuses on Lightroom and specifically on using develop presets. If you are a regular visitor here and/or are one of the thousands who have downloaded a Lightroom preset here – we’d love to see your work!

Our Current Sponsors

Our friends over at HDR Soft have generously offered a fully licensed version of Photomatix Pro as one of the prizes. If you have ever photographed a high contrast scene, you know that even the best exposure will typically have blown out highlights and flat shadows. Photomatix Pro now offers two ways to solve this problem – HDR Tone Mapping and Exposure Fusion. This popular HDR software package even ships with a Lightroom plug-in! Not a bad prize for one of the winners.

LIDF – Life in Digital Film – On top of that, Michael is giving away three (3) copies of LifeInDigitalFilm’s Cold Storage Preset Collection. The winners get every preset released at LifeInDigitalFilm in one convenient package, along with 12 exclusive presets that you can only get in this collection. The collection includes a Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw preset for every film emulated. His recent Lightroom preset Kodak Ektachrome 100VS does just wonders to punch up the colors in your photos.

Photo Contest Link

By clicking on the photo below, you will be transported to our Presetting Lightroom group on Flickr where you can read all about this new photo contest. Not a member of Flickr, no problem you can sign up for free! So what’s holding you back, develop your favorite shots in Lightroom and submit them in the photo contest. You’ve got a reasonably good chance of winning and meeting some new people to boot. A win/win situation!

See you on Flickr!

Lately I’ve been browsing the WEB and have often come across some really nice high-key photos. In an effort to foster up some publicity for the Presetting Lightroom group on Flickr, I decided to produce this tutorial on how to achieve this “look” in Lightroom.

Now, I must admit, I was partially inspired by Matt Kloskowski’s new High Key Effect presets which he recently posted on his blog. If you’re just looking for some good presets, you can download a copy of Matt’s High Key presets by following the link here. If you’d like to see how you can create this effect for yourself then read on …

The biggest challenge in this particular shot, since it was a regular type of outdoors shot, was in minimizing the inherent shadows and dark areas in the photo. Had I set out to produce a high-key kind of shot, my efforts in Lightroom would have been much less challenging. On the flip side, you can use this technique to turn any old ordinary photos into stunning high-key shots.

I’m not releasing my own preset in this article, it’s just This is a tutorial on what sliders and what tools to use in Lightroom, to create this effect. I made some judgment calls along the way to produce this shot and in some cases if you’re looking for a more contrasty effect (seems to be very popular), I will point out the settings to change as we go.

Step by Step Guide to High Key

What follows is a step by step approach to build yourself a high key photo in Lightroom. Follow along if you like, print out the article, but most importantly, explore what Lightroom can do! Lightroom’s editing is non-destructive so you won’t harm your original photo and you can always back up to ANY previous step.

	This is the original photo with some cropping applied.
	Click on the image to see the settings full size. And now we can see what the shot looks like with the basic settings applied. You’ll notice that we’re starting to loose some of the background details and the lighter tones in the photo are beginning to wash out – but there’s still an abundant amount of dark areas. These we’ll get rid of as we go.
	Click on the image to see the settings full size. Once we apply the tone curve settings (shown on the left) we basically wash out more of the highlights and begin to lighten up the shadow areas. You’ll note that I chose to leave the Point Curve at Medium Contrast. Here you could select “Linear” or “Strong Contrast” and slightly alter the overall effect.
	Click on the image to see the settings full size. The next logical step is to see how much of the “high key” effect we can achieve with the addition of the vignetting tool. The settings shown here are pretty much the maximum you can pull out of the current vignettes in Lightroom. Some of you may be thinking, “that’s not bad – good effect”, and if you are happy with the look so far, by all means look no further. But there’s still things we can do to enhance the photo. For example, you’ll probably notice that there are still some distracting background elements in the shot. We’ll take care of those next …
	Click on the image to see the full screen shot. In this shot I’ve turned off the white vignette (switch is highlighted in yellow) so that we can better see the effects of adding a graduated filter. I’ve added one in this screen shot and aligned it with the contour of the face. By adjusting the “spread” of the graduated filter the filter can seamlessly be made to blend in with the face. The only adjustment I’ve added is to the brightness slider – to begin to wash out the background.
	Click on the image to see the full screen shot. Now I’ve added a few more grad filters completing eliminating the background. Each grad filter has more or less brightness added, just enough to eliminate the background. A by-product of this approach to “vignetting” is that we have complete control over each area of the photograph. In the last grad filter, I’ve defocused attention on the hair by making multiple adjustments to this filter (as can be seen in the screen shot). Tips: When adding grad filters to your photo and they appear to have the wrong orientation, you can flip them using the ‘ key. Also, when adjusting the “spread” of the filter, hold down the ALT key to anchor the pin.
	Click on the image to see the full screen shot. One last thing, let’s not forget the Adjustment Brush! It too plays a valuable role in creating that outstanding masterpiece in Lightroom. Now just for fun, and this step is wholly optional, I’ve added some sparkle to this girl’s eyes and a bit of color to her lips.
	And the final shot! Some will say the additional Lightroom vignette is not required. Of course that’s up to you – if you don’t like it, don’t use it! I made two additional small adjustments in this final image using the “Spot Removal” tool. I found the folds in the skin and the girl’s sweater (still visible in the lower left of the previous shot) somewhat distracting, so I removed them. Also, there was a small reflection in each eye that made the eyes “look strange”. I also removed them using the spot removal tool. On the small images here you’ll be hard pressed to see a difference but it was there. But don’t stop there, go ahead and experiment! Nothing you can do will break anything. For those that want a more “contrasty” look, play around with the Exposure and Black sliders and you’ll surely get that effect. If you like this type of article, tell me about it in the comments section below.

Downloads Here

I’ve just added the download of two new presets that are soon to be added to a new master collection. Save yourself some time and download these two (2) new presets that are demonstrated above. Additionally, for those of you that would like to download a copy of this article I’ve created a download link for that as well. Simply click on the large Adobe Acrobat symbol or on the name of the PDF file and you can save this article for future reference.

	Download Presets – Focus Beauty High-Key Presets
	Collection:	Focus High-Key Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	23. February 2009
	Size:	1.89 KB
	Downloaded:	3,637 times.

	Download Article – Creating a High-Key Photo in Lightroom 2
	PDF Article:	Creating a High-Key Photo (PDF)
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	18. February 2009
	Size:	1.47 MB
	Downloaded:	3,073 times.

Flickr: Presetting Lightroom Group

If you’ve read this far then you’re the kind of person who would enjoy a visit to the Presetting Group at Flickr. We want you to come out, share some presets (if you’ve made them) or learn how to make some of your own. There’s a lot of talented people in our group who’d be happy to welcome you.

Did I mention, we’re also hosting our first ever Photo contest. The theme is “dramatic moments in every day life“! While a complete list of prizes hasn’t yet been confirmed, you are invited to exhibit your best shots in the contest post, and who knows, perhaps you’ll win something along the way. If you’re not a member of Flickr, no problem, you can join for free and then submit your favorite photo in our contest. We ask that all participants kindly tag their photos with the following tags – “PresettingLR” and “Contest0209“. Upon the completion of the contest, the photos will be available for viewing in a Flash gallery. So come on out and join the fun!

It’s time again to release a new Lightroom 2 preset. This preset differs from the ones I’ve presented in the past in that it requires some previous knowledge of Lightroom and presets to get the most out of it. For this reason, I’ve produced a small 9 minute video to act as a tutorial for those wishing to explore this advanced preset. Shown on the left is a typical look that can be achieved with this preset. You can compare it with the “out of camera” photo on the right. (click on the photo to see a larger view).

As a side note, I thought I’d comment on the new Lightroom “Release Candidate” 2.3 from Adobe. I think with this release, version 2 of Lightroom has finally matured into a stable platform which professionals and amateurs can rely upon. I too, was plagued with some of the problems in Lightroom 2.2 – and this release candidate was a welcome relief. Thanks Adobe, for quickly getting a solid program out to your users! The accompanying instructional video was even produced utilizing the new Lightroom 2.3 RC (ran like a charm).

Either scroll down or click on the “Read More” button to get to the goods.

Watch the Video

Click on the LARGE photo below to start the video.

As you can see, there’s a lot of creative potential in this preset. I’ve shown it on a winter landscape, but you should try it out on all your landscape shots, that need that “little something different”. The techniques shown in this video apply to the majority of the presets that belong to the Focus Beauty Collection of presets also found on this site. They’re a great way of precisely focusing your viewer’s attention on the subject in your photographs.

Download this Video

If you’re pressed for time and would like to watch the video at your leisure, I’m providing the following download links. Pick the one that best matches your viewing environment and click on the link to download.

Download Apple iPod Video (mp4) – 640×480 pixels, 4:3 format – 61MB
Download the Flash Video (flv) – 750×420 pixels, 16:9 format – 26MB
Download MPEG/Quicktime Video (mp4) – 750×420 pixels, 16:9 format – 49MB

Watch Related Videos

Here’s a small list of other related videos we’ve produced in the past.

Some Before and After Shots

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snowscape Snap and Dramatic Sky preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snowscape Snap and Dramatic Sky preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Download the Dramatic Sky Preset Here

	Download the Advanced Dramatic Sky Preset
	Collection:	Dramatic Sky Preset
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	26. January 2009
	Size:	1.33 KB
	Downloaded:	83,151 times.

For Flickr Users – Tagging Your Photos

Since I have become more involved with the “Presetting Lightroom” group on Flickr, I’ve become aware that many people are “tagging” their photos with the Lightroom presets they’ve used to develop them. In order for me to see what kinds of great shots you produce with this preset, I would ask that you “tag” your photos with “Focus-DramaticSky“. In my experience, I don’t get a lot of comments and I almost never learn what types of shots are developed using my presets. Since the preset is free – is it too much to ask?

Also, the group on Flickr has assembled a collection of presets with before and after shots. Here’s a link to the post on Flickr or you can click on the image below.

Your Comments Please

Why not take a moment and tell us what you think about this week’s post. Your feedback will help me to determine if and how often I produce these free presets.

Unofficially, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2.3 and Camera Raw 5.3 Release Candidates will be made available for download later today 8 PM – GMT. Additionally, it is reported that Lightroom will now be available in eight new languages.

Adobe UK Press Release:

Adobe has released Photoshop Lightroom 2.3 and Photoshop Camera Raw 5.3 Release Candidates, both available immediately for download from Adobe Labs. The ‘release candidate’ label indicates that this update is well tested but would benefit from additional community testing before it is distributed automatically to all customers. The Lightroom and Camera Raw teams would like the community to help verify the quality of this update through normal usage as this will ensure that the application is tested on a wide variety of hardware and software configurations not available internally at Adobe.

Both release candidates provide additional raw file support for the Nikon D3X and Olympus E-30 cameras. In addition,the Lightroom 2.3 Release Candidate provides a solution to a memory leak that affected some customers of the Lightroom 2.2 release.

Adobe is also pleased to announce the availability of Lightroom in eight new languages, including Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Korean, Chinese (simplified) and Chinese (traditional). The Lightroom 2.3 Release Candidate available on Adobe Labs includes these additional languages, and Adobe greatly appreciates any feedback the community can provide the Lightroom team. Feedback can be provided on the Adobe User to User forum.

Links to Download

By clicking on one of the following links, you’ll be directed to Adobe Labs where you’ll find the new Lightroom 2.3 Release Candidate update and the Camera Raw 5.3 Release Candidate updates.

• Lightroom 2.3 Release Candidate for MAC/Windows
• Adobe Camera Raw 5.3 Release Candidate for MAC/Windows

Please Note: The Camera Raw updates are for Photoshop – you don’t need this for your Lightroom update. Have a blast guys.

Like many of you, I’ve been rather busy this month wrapping things up in preparation for Christmas and the end of the year.

Something I haven’t done in a few years is to produce a photo calendar for family and friends. As usual, I forget how much work is involved in selecting just the right shots (36 this year) and the careful editing and cropping of the photos to get them just right. I was pressed to find a quality set of shots for the month of December, so I did what every other photographer would do – I went out and shot some new ones.

What came out of that shoot were two new Lightroom presets that will really bring out the fine details in your snow close ups. Last time, I presented some winterscape presets, so – this time it’s about the details. I’ve included a number of sample shots so you’ll have a good idea of what the presets will do for you.

Samples Showing the Presets

The two new snow presets are designed for close ups of snow. If you try them out on a snow scene they will definitely render the scene too contrasty. For a good winterscape preset, try out the Snowscape Snap preset from last week.

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snow Details preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)
Original Photo (RAW)	with Snow Details preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

About the Presets

There’s actually a lot more to these presets that you might imagine. No, I didn’t just crank down the contrast and make the photo darker. The recovery slider was bumped up, fill and black levels were adjusted and clarity, vibrance and saturation were also fine tuned. Additionally, the tone curve was optimized for the snow and some specialized sharpening applied. To round things out, I added a bit of noise reduction.

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snowscape Snap preset (this is from my last article)	with Snow Details preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Since there will probably be situations where a moderate, and other times an extreme amount of detail is required, I’ve opted to produce two presets – Snow Detail and Snow Detail XL+. I haven’t embedded exposure adjustments in the preset because everyone has their own preference for that. Therefore, adjust your exposure levels before applying the snow preset. Once the chosen preset is applied, you’ll probably have to adjust your exposure (+0.40) and perhaps add some warming (Temp +350) to get the best effect for YOUR photo.

Installing the Presets

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this video is for those people that haven’t done this before. It also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.

Download Here

	Download the Snow Detail Presets
	Collection:	Snow Detail Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	18. December 2008
	Size:	1.39 KB
	Downloaded:	19,823 times.

What’s up Next

If time permits, I’ve got two more presets I’d like to share with you before the year is out. They are a set of advanced presets, and not for the inexperienced.

I’m in the process of producing a small video to show you how to get the most out of them. I’ll be taking you right from the original photo, applying the preset and then show you how to fine tune it to match your photo. Additionally, all those who’ve already downloaded the Focus Beauty collection will see first hand what can actually be accomplished with this system. Here’s a sneak preview (right) of a photo with another new Focus Beauty preset.

I’m also upgrading to Windows Vista on my main system so I can see how Lightroom 2.2 behaves in a 64-bit environment. There’s still a lot to do before the end of the year, but in the mean time, enjoy the new presets and let me know if they work out for you.

Until next time,
Cheers, Markus

Now that the colder winter weather is here it’s time to look at some snow presets. Having just returned from a photo shoot in the great white north, I’ve come up with a couple of new Focus Beauty presets that will work well on your favorite winter scenes.

As is often the case with winter scenes there is an abundance of snow and an overall lack of color. In order to bring some sparkle back into these winter landscapes, I came up with some Lightroom presets that bring definition and color into your shots. What follows are a number of shots that show these two new presets in action.

The Presets in Action

Depending on the type of weather you’ve encountered on your shoot you can choose which base preset to apply. I first wanted to produce a generic snow preset that can be used to bring some definition back into your snow scenes. As was the case in my latest shoot, I often had to deal with overcast conditions. This meant I could optionally use a preset that was posted here from last month. The following two shots compare the new “Snowscape Snap” with the previously posted “Overcast – Soup to Snap” preset. (click on the small image to see a larger version)

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snowscape Snap preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)	with Overcast – Soup to Snap preset

Now that you’ve seen the difference between these two Enhancer presets, I’ll leave it to you to decide which one works better with your shot. Below, I’m going to introduce the second new Focus Beauty preset called “Focus> Warm/Cold Landscape (Center)“. It works best when the horizon line is somewhere in the middle of the photo. For those that can’t wait for your Christmas gift, you can easily move the horizontal gradient in the preset up or down to match your photo.

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snowscape Snap and Warm/Cold Landscape preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Original Photo (RAW)	with Snowscape Snap and Warm/Cold Landscape preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Original Photo (RAW)	with Overcast – Soup to Snap and Warm/Cold Landscape preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

The Lightroom 2 Presets

• The “Snowscape Snap” preset is a new addition to the Focus Beauty collection. It brings some definition back into your snow scenes. If a stronger effect (with more contrast) is desired, use the preset below.
• The “Overcast – Soup to Snap” preset can be used to compensate the dull, dreary look of photos taken on an overcast day. It can brighten up even the most dull photo.
• The “Focus> Warm/Cold Landscape (Center)” preset is a new addition to the Focus Beauty collection. It applies a warming effect to the upper part of the photo while rendering a bluish tinge to the bottom third of the photo. As usual, I didn’t make the effect too pronounced, but if that’s what you’re after – crank up the saturation.

Since neither preset makes any adjustment to your exposure level, it is best to change your exposure before applying the preset. This way you can best evaluate if the given effect suits your photo. If you already downloaded the complete Focus Beauty collection, you can additionally stack one of the Enhancer presets on top of these two.

Installing the Presets

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this video is for those people that haven’t done this before. It also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.

Your Comments Please

Why not take a moment and tell us what you think about this week’s post. Your feedback will help me determine if and how often I produce these free presets.

	Download the Winterscape Presets Collection
	Collection:	Winterscape Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	8. December 2008
	Size:	2.46 KB
	Downloaded:	27,326 times.

So the question surrounding this week’s photo is – is it an HDR (High Dynamic Range) photo? With the advent of digital photography, HDR photography has always been a favorite topic. I personally love HDR photos when they are done correctly and not just for the WOW effect.

It always amazes me just how much of the tonal range that we see when taking the photo is lost in the inadequate technology of the day. Naturally, everyone wants to be able to recreate the scene that was seen at the time of shooting and this is why HDR photography has gained such a wide popularity.

There are many programs available and many techniques published through out the Internet on doing it just right. There are tricks and techniques to export photos to Photoshop for further HDR processing. There are even Lightroom export plugins to feed popular HDR software. But, is it possible to create the HDR effect solely in Lightroom?

Series of HDR Source Photos

Source Photo 1 (JPG)	Source Photo 2 (JPG)	Source Photo 3 (JPG)

The three photos above were combined and tone mapped in a popular HDR software package. The resultant photo was saved as a TIFF and imported into Lightroom. In Lightroom a few minor adjustments were made to compensate for the low contrast that is typical of an HDR photo.

The Results

HDR Photo (JPG)	Focus Beauty (JPG)

By building a preset specifically for this example, I was able to closely approximate the effect of an HDR photo in Lightroom 2. I started with the Source Photo #3 and used the “Focus – Center (Landscape)” preset as a template. I then manipulated pins and exposures until I came up with the new “Focus> HDR Landscape” preset. By nature of the fact that Focus Beauty presets typically give you a large degree of control, I was able to fine tune the photo to produce the dramatic effect you see above. I was pleased to see that the flexibility of the Focus Beauty system was up to the challenge.

This Week’s Lightroom 2 Presets

After completing the HDR preset, I built two additional Focus Beauty presets that will find a use in specific situations. In the near future, I will be offering a new release of Focus Beauty (Version 1.5) that will also include these three new presets. Until then, you can download them now and give them a try.

This week’s presets are;

• Focus> HDR Landscape
• Focus> Foreground Lite (Land)
• Focus> Dark Skies (Land)

Installing the Presets

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this video is for those people that haven’t done this before. It also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.

Downloads Here

Included in the first download is the Source Photo #3 (JPG) and the newly created Focus Beauty preset “Focus> HDR Landscape“. It was clear to me that this preset is very specific and tailored to the included photo. I am offering it for download as an example of what can be achieved in Lightroom. The photo and preset are being provided under the Creative Commons license which means you can freely use this photo for learning purposes but credit to the original photographer (me) must accompany the photo for any other use. This photo is not to be used for commercial purposes or passed off as your own. This is not a photo you can do with whatever you please – the copyright remains with me! Read the details of the Creative Commons license that apply to this photo and preset.

	Download the Photo and Preset used – “Focus> HDR Landscape”
	Collection:	Nov. 27 Photo and Preset
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	27. November 2008
	Size:	2.03 MB
	Downloaded:	67,536 times.

	Download the “Focus> Foreground Lite (Land)” Preset
	Collection:	Foreground Lite Preset
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	27. November 2008
	Size:	1.5 KB
	Downloaded:	32,000 times.

	Download the “Focus> Dark Skies (Land)” Preset
	Collection:	Dark Skies Preset
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	27. November 2008
	Size:	1.3 KB
	Downloaded:	31,303 times.

The entire Focus Beauty Builder Collection of presets can also be downloaded by clicking on the link in the “Related Articles” below.

Your Comments Please

Why not take a moment and tell us what you think about this week’s post. It is being provided as a learning experience for those learning Lightroom and/or honing their skills with the software. Your feedback will help me determine if and how often I produce these free presets.

Did you ever notice that most Lightroom develop presets drastically alter your photo? What is that? Is it so that you can see the change in the tiny preview window? I’ll admit, I’ve produced some of these as well, but this week I’m going to focus on some presets that produce very subtle effects.

In my little neck of the woods, we have an over abundance of overcast days. Rather than complaining about it, I decided to develop a couple of presets that are designed to deal with those dull, dreary days.

What follows are a number of shots that show these two presets in action. They can be stacked one upon the other to give full control over the end result. Since the effects are so subtle, I’d suggest that you click on the smaller image to see a larger view.

The Presets in Action

Original Photo (RAW)	with Overcast – Soup to Snap preset	with Focus> Isolation Warming preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Original Photo (RAW)	with Overcast – Soup to Snap preset	with Focus> Isolation Warming preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Original Photo (RAW)	with Overcast – Soup to Snap preset	with Focus> Isolation Warming preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Original Photo (JPG)	with Overcast – Soup to Snap preset	with Focus> Isolation Warming preset (this is a new Focus Beauty preset)

Using the Presets

Since neither preset makes any adjustment to your exposure level, it is best to change your exposure before applying the preset. This way you can best evaluate if the given effect suits your photo. Naturally, these presets were designed to bring some new life into photos shot on an overcast day, but you might be surprised – they will add some punch to many of your shots. I’ve tested these two presets on a wide range of shots and can honestly say they made most of the shots look better.

If you already downloaded the complete Focus Beauty collection, you can additionally stack one of the Enhancer presets on top of these two.

The Lightroom 2 Presets

The “Focus> Isolation Warming (Center)” preset is a new addition to the Focus Beauty collection. It applies a slight warming effect to the lower part of the photo while rendering a slight darkening effect in other sections of the photo.

The “Overcast – Soup to Snap” preset can be used to compensate the dull, dreary look of photos taken on an overcast day. Used in conjunction with the above preset can brighten up even the most dull photo.

Installing the Presets

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this video is for those people that haven’t done this before. It also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.

Your Comments Please

Why not take a moment and tell us what you think about this week’s post. Your feedback will help me determine if and how often I produce these free presets.

	Download the Overcast Presets Collection
	Collection:	Overcast Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	20. November 2008
	Size:	1.88 KB
	Downloaded:	9,943 times.

Here’s the new photo of the week. Since I thought this could be a great learning opportunity for those just getting into Lightroom 2, I made a small format change to the photo of the week column. Instead of just publishing the develop settings used to create the photo of the week, I’m publishing the original photo AND the preset used in Lightroom 2 to develop that photo. This way you can see for yourself what changes were made to the original photo to achieve the finished photo presented here.

The only requirement is that you have a copy of Lightroom 2. If you don’t own a copy of this magnificent photo management software from Adobe, a link is provided allowing you to obtain a free 30 day evaluation copy.

Original Photo

Original Photo – Straight out of Camera (SOOC)

Included in the download is the original photo (converted to JPG) I took this last week. It is being provided under the Creative Commons license which means you can freely use this photo for learning purposes but credit to the original photographer (me) must accompany the photo for any other use. This photo is not to be used for commercial purposes or passed off as your own. This is not a photo you can do with whatever you please – the copyright remains with me! Read the details of the Creative Commons license that apply to this photo and preset.

Keyword Hierarchy for this Photo

It is very important to keyword your photos. I can’t stress this enough. It’s not always the most glamorous job but you should get into the habit of doing it with each and every shoot. You will thank me later when you’re looking for that one shot and were able to quickly locate it. And why? Because you added keywords to it!

Included in the download is a keyword file specific to this photo that can be directly imported in Lightroom. Import it by using the “Metadata ->Import Keywords …” option in Lightroom 2. It’s an example of how you would set up a keyword hierarchy in Lightroom. Obviously, the WEB Site and the Focus Preset branches are specific to my needs but I’ve left them in as an example.

Colors Yellow Decay Emotions Loneliness Focus Preset Beauty B & W Color High Contrast Light Contrast Nature Leaves Trees Branch Seasons Autumn WEB Site Gallery Lightroom 2

Some Details about the Shot

This photo was taken a few days ago when I was just itching to get out and shoot. The entire week was plagued with overcast skies, rain and cold – the kind of autumn weather where you just want to stay indoors. On the day of the shoot, it had cleared a bit and I saw the sun for the first time in days. I grabbed my camera, went for a walk and snapped the photo you see here. I was only out for a half hour, took about 35 shots and really liked this one. A similar shot which was developed with a different Focus preset can be seen in my Flickr account (there’s not a lot there yet, but I’m working on it).

The Lightroom 2 Preset Used

For this photo, I used the preset “Focus> BW-Hi-Contrast (Center)” to develop the photo. I made the following modifications to the preset – saturation, clarity and sharpness were reduced. In the various quadrants of the photo, exposure was reduced by 1/2 to 1-1/2 stops, and contrast was bumped up to 100%. The other Develop settings can be viewed once you import the photo and apply the preset below. In all, this photo took less than 4 minutes from start to finish.

I’d also like to mention a wonderful Lightroom plug-in (LR/Mogrify) developed by Timothy Armes that was used to produce the borders and watermark on this week’s photo. It is a very flexible plug-in available for download at his site. There’s a version for Lightroom 1.x and a new version specifically for Lightroom 2. The plug-in and associated installation instructions for LR/Mogrify can be found by clicking on this text.

By clicking on the link below, you agree to abide with the stated Creative Commons license applied to this photo and the accompanying Lightroom preset.

	Download the Photo and Preset used – “Focus> BW-Hi-Contrast”
	Collection:	Nov. 12 Photo and Preset
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	12. November 2008
	Size:	3.66 MB
	Downloaded:	10,809 times.

The entire Focus Beauty Builder Collection of presets can also be downloaded by clicking on the link in the “Related Articles” below.

Downloads from Adobe

• Download a free 30-Day evaluation copy of Lightroom 2.1 for Windows
• Download a free 30-Day evaluation copy of Lightroom 2.1 for MAC

Your Comments Please

Why not take a moment and tell us what you think about this week’s post. It is being provided as a learning experience for those learning Lightroom and/or honing their skills with the software. If you develop a shot of your own using the preset provided, include a link in a comment so that everyone can see your use of this preset.

Something new – a Lightroom preset you can use to build other presets! This is a radical new concept in how we think about develop presets in Lightroom. This system is based on the commonly accepted “Golden Rule of Thirds” that will help you to produce better photographs within Lightroom.

I’ve included a number of sample presets which show you just how powerful and flexible this system is. It is designed for Professionals who want to develop the best photos in the least amount of time. Also, serious amateurs will love the practically unlimited combination of presets you can build – once you understand the system. There’s a wealth of information and samples on the following page.

What is Focus Beauty Builder?

Well it’s not like any other Lightroom preset you’ve ever seen before. It makes a leap forward in how we think of using presets in Lightroom. Focus Beauty is a tool that allows you to quickly build professional grade Lightroom presets – in essence, it is a preset used to build presets!

The concept behind Focus Beauty is the important principle of the “Golden Rule of Thirds“. Have a look at the grid on the left. It takes an imaginary photo and divides it into a sectional grid, three by three. As a general rule, subjects placed in one of the areas where the grid lines intersect, or line up with one of the lines, (horizon for example) are known to make the photo more pleasing to the eye. History has shown that the best artistic works have followed, and are in fact – the founding basis of this principle.

Focus Beauty takes this one step further by providing you a tool to build on this principle. By judiciously using the localized adjustment tools in Lightroom you can further enhance and draw your viewer’s attention into these “Golden” sections of your photo. After coming up with the concept, I started playing with the core preset and discovered that it has great potential in building a variety of other Lightroom presets.

The Core Presets

Basically, there are 5 core presets (all based on the first one).

• Focus – Center
• Focus – Top Left
• Focus – Top Right
• Focus – Bottom Left
• Focus – Bottom Right

and additionally 6 modifying presets, one of which can be stacked on top of the core preset.

• Focus – Enhancer White (+1)
• Focus – Enhancer White (+2)
• Focus – Enhancer White (+3)
• Focus – Enhancer Black (+1)
• Focus – Enhancer Black (+2)
• Focus – Enhancer Black (+3)

After having built the core presets, I had to develop some sample presets because the core presets don’t do anything by themselves. They are a template to be used in the building of other presets. So here’s a small sampling of presets I’ve already built with FBB.

Focus Beauty Sample Presets

Just a quick note to these samples. All images shown here are generated entirely in Lightroom 2.1. Nothing was modified or enhanced in Photoshop. All sample presets demonstrated here were created with Focus Beauty Builder (FBB) and are included in the collection available for download.

Based on BW-Color (Center) + Enhancer White (+2) In this example we see the use of the BW-Color preset to isolate or Focus on this little girl’s face. The Enhancer White preset was stacked on top to give the white border effect.

BW-Color (Center) + Enhancer Black (+1) A simple application (without modification) of the BW-Color preset. Combined with the Enhancer Black preset gives this image a unique look. This sort of look is not normally possible with Lightroom.

Based on Isolation (Center) + Enhancer Black (+1) In this example we see the use of the Isolation preset. Built into the Isolation preset is a bit of background blurring to enhance the effect. The Enhancer Black preset was stacked on top to give the black border effect.

Based on Isolation (TR – Top Right) This effect is created using the Isolation (TR) preset. It was modified slightly to better match the positioning of the flowers. This is a relatively easy task that is outlined below. This sort of effect is well suited to WEB design or Ad copy layout where you’d like a strong foreground element but require a muted background for text.

Ring of Color (BL – Bottom Left) In this sample, I wanted to show the flexibility of the preset builder. Here you see the blending of colors in different areas of the photo combined with B&W and sharpness effects. Another wild example of this technique can be seen in the Alien effect further down.

Based on Soft Focus (Center) Naturally there has to be a preset for giving the dreamy, glamor look. You can’t see it in these thumbnails but the eyes are sharply in focus while the remainder of the photo gets that soft look treatment.

Based on Color Strip (Center) Want to have just the middle of the photo in color – no problem. Naturally, simple landscape effects (dark sky, colored sky) are also very easy to do.

Based on BW-Color SOFT (BL – Bottom Left) Another use of the BW-Color in the lower left of a photo. The additional parameters can be fine-tuned to match the photo.

Soft Focus (TR – Top Right) Another example using the Soft Focus preset. You’ll also notice I took advantage of the fact that I already had a couple of adjustment filters in place and darkened up a couple of trouble spots. The net result gives the photo much more appeal.

Isolation (Center) + Enhancer White (+3) Here the Isolation preset brings focus to the middle of the flower while throwing the rest of the photo into a darkened soft focus effect. The Enhancer White preset was stacked on top to achieve the white border.

BW-Color HC (High Contrast) This is definitely one of my favorites! Using the BW-Color HC or High Contrast preset makes for a striking effect. Keep in mind, if you really wanted to punch up the color in the flower you can dial up the Vibrancy and Saturation of the photo. The rest of the photo will maintain the high contrast B&W look.

Alien Hangover I had a lot of fun coming up with this preset. I took the base preset (Focus – Center) and played with the sliders in each quadrant of the preset. I didn’t touch Exposure and Brightness so I wouldn’t get any bright or dark patches. Once parameters were set, I tweaked and fine-tuned, flipped gradients and lots more to come up with this preset. I’ve tested it on a lot of photos and in at least 75% of the ones tested, came up with some amazing results. It’s another example of the wide variety of presets you can dream up with Focus Beauty Builder!

Instructional Videos

In order to get the full benefit of this preset you should watch one or both of the following videos. They will show you how to install the presets (for those who don’t already know) and offer important tips for working with Focus Beauty Builder.

• Installing Presets in Lightroom 2 – this is for those people that haven’t done this before. It also gives you some tips for preset folder management and backing up your presets.
• Advanced Graduated Filter in Lightroom 2 – this video shows advanced tips on using the graduated filter and color picker. I’ve had people comment on this site that they thought they knew everything about the graduated filter – but even they learned a few things. (highly recommended viewing to those wanting to build presets with Focus Beauty Builder)

Tips for using Focus Beauty Builder

Some people are going to be happy just using the sample presets that I’ve built (that’s cool). I will be building more as time permits. For those of you who want to work with the FBB to build new presets – this is the section for you.

The basic premise of this preset is simple – you have a subject in your photograph that you’d like to emphasize in some fashion. For some this means throwing a portion of the photo out of focus, darkening the background/foreground, the possibilities are endless. With the Focus Beauty Presets you can achieve an unlimited number of possibilities to achieve that goal.

Here’s some general usage tips.

• Should you find yourself not able to select a given pin, temporarily select a different pin and then select the pin you want to modify.
• When expanding the range of the gradient, hold down the ALT key so that the center of the pin does not move.
• When modifying a given preset, select the preset that most closely matches the location of the subject in your photo.
• Grab the center of the pin and drag it away or towards your subject.
• When you save your new preset make sure you have only the Graduated Filters box checked (all others should be off)
• I find it works best when you work the corners or the flat edges then switch to the other group – this way you won’t run into pins you can’t select.

Special Limited Time Offer

As you can imagine I have invested a considerable amount of time in developing my concept into the form you see here. I am making the Focus Beauty Builder collection available for download for a limited time – for free!

Two things I ask for in return is that you do not upload this collection to another site offering presets for download. You may freely include this (link) in your own WEB site or Blog that will give others the opportunity to download it here.

I would also ask that anyone who uses this preset (or one of the many samples) comes back and writes a comment here telling us about your experiences with it’s use. If you end up building your own presets based on this one, why not share it with others by providing a link to the new preset. I fully intend on building more sample presets based on the comments I receive here on this site – so don’t be shy, let’s hear your ideas and comments.

Focus Beauty allows you to enhance your photos by bringing Focus to your subject matter.

Download Here

Here’s what’s included in the Focus Beauty Builder collection;

• Core Presets – 5 (Center, Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right)
• Enhancer Presets – 3 each of Black & White in steps of +1,+2,+3
• All Reset Preset – so you can back out all your changes
• Sample Presets – 28 including the following;
1. Isolation Presets (Center, Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right)
2. Soft Focus Presets (Center, Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right)
3. BW-Color Presets (Center, Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right)
4. BW-Color SOFT Presets (Center, Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right)
5. BW-Hi-Contrast Presets (Center, Top Left, Top Right, Bottom Left, Bottom Right)
6. Color Ring (Bottom Left – Sample)
7. Color Stripe (Center – Sample)
8. Alien Hangover – just for fun

Screen Shot of Focus Beauty Presets Here’s a screen shot showing all the presets in Lightroom and another sample photo produced with the BW-Hi-Contrast preset. This shot took less than 2 minutes to complete in Lightroom (position pins, drop exposure down 1.75 stops on ONE slider).

By clicking on the following link you agree that you will not upload this preset to other sites or host it on your own site (a link to this site is however encouraged). Focus Beauty Builder (FBB) collection cannot be sold or offered for sale. Naturally, presets you build with FBB can be freely distributed as you wish. Since it is being offered for free, I do expect you to mention or link to this site!

	Download Focus Beauty Builder Collection
	Collection:	Focus Beauty Collection
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	23. November 2008
	Size:	49.06 KB
	Downloaded:	53,248 times.

Have fun!

I’m starting something new this month! Every week you’ll see a new photo with detailed Lightroom 2 settings on how the photo was developed. There will be a before and after shot as well as screen captures of Metadata and Keywords, Crop Settings, Develop settings and any special notes which may pertain to the photo. Additionally, there will be a small collection of photos taken during the same shoot – a sort of mini-gallery.

What’s the motivation? Simply this, I spend a lot of time researching and producing new videos for this site – which means I don’t get a chance to write something as often as I’d like. With this new column, I can still offer new Lightroom content and have an excuse to get out and take some photos while I’m working on the next video. Eventually, I’m hoping this column will turn into a weekly Photo Contest where photos from visitors to this site will be featured. If this sounds interesting, write me a comment at the end of this article.

Lightroom Develop Settings

This last week, I spend some time in downtown Freising. Naturally, I had my camera along and when the rain started I just happened to be standing around (trying to keep dry) when this chap drove by on his bicycle. The camera was already set for a slow shutter speed, so I panned the camera along with him and captured this week’s photo. So, let’s see how this photo was subsequently developed in Lightroom.

Original Photo (Before)	Develop Settings	Developed Photo (After)
Cropping		Metadata
Keywords

Small Collection of Freising Photos

I hope you enjoy this small sampling of some of the sights in Freising. At some point in the near future I plan to do a more in-depth photo article on our beautiful city.

Well as most know, the final release of Lightroom 2.1 was released yesterday – Oct. 22, 2008.  First impressions are extremely positive and my personal feeling is, that it is much snappier now, which should make all of us happier.  The installation went through without a hitch and the thing that immediately impressed me was that the folders did not take FOREVER to load and populate the photo counts.

Naturally, I took it through it’s paces, importing new photos, switching folders and basically getting a feel for the new girl.  It wasn’t until I tried loading up a couple of Adjustment Brushes that it was clear to me that Adobe must of been working on this area of the program.  Now I’m using an old clunker of a system (by today’s standards) with a single AMD processor and 2 Gigs of Ram, an old ATI Radeon graphics card, etc. but I was able to notice improvements.  Previously, Lightroom 2 would really slow down when I had more than one localized adjustment active on the photo.  As you will see in the accompanying video, it now behaves respectively on my system to the point where I will most likely start using the Adjustment Brush in a few instances where I normally would have skipped it.

Video: Lightroom 2.1 Check Out

In the video, you’ll see the features I was able to confirm that are either much faster, fixed or in my opinion vastly improved.  To highlight, what we show;

• Starting up Lightroom 2.1 and the loading of folders and photo counts,
• The ‘three dot’ indicator in the Grid view doesn’t hang around anymore,
• The ‘Any Searchable Field’ now correctly locates text within captions,
• Lights Out mode does not flicker in Windows when the Details panel is active,
• More fluid behaviour of the Graduated Filter and Adjustment Brush.

Click on the photo below to start the video.

As I said my first impressions are good and I thank Adobe for listening to their customers in quickly bringing out this ‘dot’ release.  I look forward to continued improvements to the localized adjustments that Adobe is still working on.

Links to Download

By clicking the following link, you’ll be directed to Adobe where you’ll find the new Lightroom 2.1 update and the Camera Raw 5.1 update.

• Lightroom 2.1 for Windows
• Lightroom 2.1 for MAC
• Adobe Camera Raw 5.1 for Windows
• Adobe Camera Raw 5.1 for MAC

Please Note:  The Camera Raw updates are for Photoshop – you don’t need this for your Lightroom update.  Have a blast guys.

Nous venons juste de réaliser une nouvelle vidéo de Lightroom 2!  Cette version est une étape importante pour nous puisque nous avons produit, non pas une, mais trois vidéos en trois langues – anglais, français et allemand.  Avec notre précédente vidéo, nous avons réalisé que nos voisins français sont très nombreux et nous leur souhaitons la bienvenue sur ce site.  Nous avons réalisé cette courte vidéo afin d’acquérir davantage d’expérience dans la réalisation d’un contenu de qualité en trois langues.  Nous travaillons actuellement sur un grand article qui portera sur la seconde fonctionnalité la plus appréciée de Lightroom: les presets.

Cette vidéo est un prélude à cet article et vise à fournir des instructions claires et concises pour obtenir des presets dans Lightroom.  Les techniques présentées ici s’appliquent à presque tous les presets dans Lightroom.  Assez parlé, profitez des informations et du plaisir des yeux – c’est juste un petit échantillon des choses à venir …

Traduction française de Paul Baggio (www.photogeek.fr).

This palace has to be one of the most beautiful and historically interesting attractions in Vienna, Austria. (For our Lightroom 2 users, we’re making all the presets we used for the photos in this gallery available for download – see below). Our group spent the better part of a day at Schoenbrunn and still did not see everything. The tour inside the castle was interesting (although you’re not allowed to take photos) and caters to those that love historical information or just want to immerse themselves in the lifestyle of the opulently wealthy from centuries past. I remember looking at some of the paintings in the “summer residence” and couldn’t quite fathom how many servants they would have needed to cater a “small party” with a hundred guests. Simply put, the palace and surrounding gardens are huge.

The Palace

The history of Schönbrunn, and the buildings that previously stood on the site, dates back to the Middle Ages. From the beginning of the 14th century, the whole estate was referred to as “the Katterburg” and belonged to the manor of the monastery at Klosterneuburg. In 1569 the estate came into Habsburg possession through Maximilian II, who was primarily interested in extending the game park. ( … much history passes … )

• a detailed history of the palace can be read here.
• take a virtual tour inside some rooms of the palace by clicking here (requires Flash).

In 1830, Franz Joseph was born in the east wing of the palace and from infancy on, was groomed for his future role as emperor. Franz Joseph spent many of the summers of his childhood and youth at Schönbrunn. When he succeeded to the throne in 1848 the palace was once again to experience a brilliant epoch when he chose Schönbrunn as his primary residence. In 1854, in preparation for his impending marriage to Elisabeth, the Duchess of Bavaria, work had begun on adapting the apartments in the west wing for his future bride. It was this epoch of the palace’s history that was depicted in the ever popular 1950′s trilogy of films known as “Sissi”.

The Gardens

The Baroque layout of the gardens, together with the additions made during the last decade of Maria Theresa’s life, has survived more or less intact. The extensive park is articulated by a system of wide, stelliform avenues forming a symmetrical pattern on either side of the central axis of the palace. Extending from the garden façade of the palace to the Neptune Fountain at the foot of Schönbrunn Hill is the Great Parterre. The individual sections of the parterre are articulated by expanses of lawn and edged with flower beds. The elaborate design for Schönbrunn Hill planned during Maria Theresa’s reign was abandoned, and zigzag paths were constructed leading up to the Gloriette, which forms an impressive termination to the central axis.

The Gloriette

Fischer von Erlach’s designs had included a belvedere for Schönbrunn Hill intended as the crowning touch to the palatial Baroque ensemble, but it was not until Johann Ferdinand Hetzendorf von Hohenberg remodelled the park that this project was finally realized. The Early Classicistic colonnaded Gloriette was built to Hohenberg’s designs on the crest of the hill in 1775. The structure consists of a central section in the form of a triumphal arch, flanked by arcaded wings with lofty semi-circular arches. The central section is crowned with a mighty imperial eagle perching on a globe and surrounded by trophies. The flat roof with its retaining balustrade was already being used as a viewing platform by the beginning of the 19th century. It can be accessed today via a stairway.

More Attractions

I have only touched upon some of the places we visited with our “Classic Pass”. Had we wanted to spend more money we could have also visited the Zoo, Desert Experience, Palm House and Carriage Museum. It was an experience worth the cost of admission and naturally I have these photos as a memory of our time there.

Photo Gallery

Lightroom 2 Presets

As stated above, the presets that we used to “develop” our Palace photo gallery are being made available for download.  The first set of presets, which we’re calling our Palace collection, includes the develop and camera raw settings we used with our Canon profile.  A second set of presets is not camera specific and should be downloaded for those not using the Canon camera raw profiles.

	Download the Palace Collection Presets – Canon Profile
	Collection:	Palace Presets - Canon Profile
	Version:	1.0.1
	Updated:	12. February 2009
	Size:	3.25 KB
	Downloaded:	1,814 times.

	Download the Palace Collection Presets – Adobe Standard
	Collection:	Palace Presets - Adobe Standard
	Version:	1.0.1
	Updated:	12. February 2009
	Size:	3.01 KB
	Downloaded:	1,970 times.

For details on installing the downloaded presets please refer to the installation instructions.  I hope that you will find one or more of these develop presets useful.  Please share your thoughts by sending us a comment using the form below.

Apple Strudel

By the time we visited this show, near the end of our stay, I was pretty hungry.  I thought great, a free sample of Apple Strudel.  What a let down to receive a tiny bite-size morsel of Strudel!  I was still hungry but watched the show anyway (standing room only).  What amazed me was the technique demonstrated where they manage to get the dough so thin that you can read a newspaper through it.  For those that want to try this at home they have a 24 hour WEB site service where you can go to for help.

Nous sommes fiers d’annoncer que la deuxième vidéo sur l’utilisation de Lightroom 2 est maintenant disponible !  Cette fois-ci, nous avons porté notre attention sur le filtre dégradé.  Ainsi, nous avons rassemblé une collection d’astuces avancées pour vous encourager à tirer le meilleur de cet outil.  Vous pouvez voir ici une photo issue de la vidéo qui montre (lorsqu’on la compare avec celle de droite) les subtiles mais néanmoins étonnantes corrections que l’on peut réaliser avec le filtre dégradé de Lightroom 2.

Nous sommes satisfaits du rendu de notre dernière vidéo et nous allons essayer d’en produire beaucoup plus.  Aussi, asseyez-vous, détendez-vous et appréciez la démonstration.

Commentaire éditorial :  nous attendons vos retours !  Nous avons reçu si peu de commentaires qu’il est difficile de savoir si nous vous apportons un contenu utile.  Nous avons bien vu le nombre de personne qui ont regardé notre dernière vidéo ou téléchargé nos récents presets, mais aucun retour !  Aussi, veuillez prendre un peu temps pour nous faire partager votre avis.

Traduction française de Paul Baggio (www.photogeek.fr).

Want to get the most out of your sunset and sunrise photos?  We’ve recently been developing shots featuring sunsets and we’ve put together a graduated filter presets package that is surely a useful addition to Lightroom.  These are not general purpose presets; they are specifically designed to work with sunset (or sunrise) shots where the sky is over exposed and foreground elements are under exposed.  In most cases you’ll be able to use these as a starting point and then make further adjustments to suit the individual photo.

In this collection you’ll find a set of five presets.  The presets contain a Level I, II, III and IV intensities that should cover most shooting situations.  Additionally there’s a sunset fantasy category – well, just for fun.  We’re happy to share these with the photo community and if you find them useful – please tell us about it.  A sample before and after shot using each of the five graduated filter presets follows …

Sample Photos using the Sunset Graduated Filter Presets
Original Photo	Sunset Preset – Level 1	Sunset Preset – Level 2
Sunset Preset – Level 3	Sunset Preset – Level 4	Sunset Fantasy Preset

Installing the Presets

To install the presets, click on the link below to download them.  Then unzip them into a temporary folder on your hard disk.  In Lightroom, right click on the Gradient Presents folder in the Develop module, select import and locate the temporary directory you unzipped the files into in step one.  Double-Click on the profiPhotos folder and then click on the first preset and Shift-click on the last one and finally click on Import.  You can also watch our new video to see the installation process.

Download Here

	Download the Lightroom 2 Sunset Presets Collection
	Collection:	Lightroom 2 Sunset Presets
	Version:	1.0
	Updated:	18. September 2008
	Size:	10.37 KB
	Downloaded:	7,626 times.

Has this ever happened to you?  You’re browsing through your images looking for something that you’d like to upload or send to a client.  If you linger over a photo just a bit too long it becomes hidden by this nasty info tip!  Well that’s how Lightroom 2 ships – but that doesn’t mean you have to leave it like that.  Let’s face it, everyone has their own ideas on what’s useful to see when you’re browsing your photos.  Some want to see a lot of info and others just want to see the shots.  That’s why I’m going to show you how to turn those “info tips” off and present you with two alternatives to configuring your grid view thumbnails.

Since we’re heavily into the production of our next video covering Lightroom 2 workflow speed tips, we’re going to start with the short cut to the configuration menu you’ll need to use …

Grid View Configuration

Using the short cut shown here, bring up the configuration window.  Here you can setup your thumbnail views just the way you like.  Configure your views to show smaller thumbnails with some details or larger thumbnails with lots of relevant information.  You get to choose from a selection of 30 different details to show along side your photos.  I’m going to show you two settings I like so you can get an idea in which direction you’d like to go.

Compact Cells		Expanded Cells
	Compact Cells – (Checked) Show image info tips – (Off) Thumbnail Badges – (Off) Index Number – (Off) Top Label: (On) Exposure Bottom Label: (On) Focal Length Rotation: (On)		Expanded Cells – (Checked) Thumbnail Badges – (On) Show Header with Labels: (On) Exposure and ISO • Focal Length Capture Date/Time • Cropped Dimensions Show Rating Footer: (On) Include Color Label – (On) Include Rotation Buttons – (On)

Speed Tip – Scroll Wheel

I’m sure most of you know that you can use the scroll wheel on your mouse to scroll thumbnails in the grid view, navigation panels and so forth.  But did you know that you can also scroll the filmstrip at the bottom of your screen?  Hover over the filmstrip with your mouse and scroll – the photos will scroll to the right and left.

That’s it for today, we’ve still got work on the video to do.