I wanted to give an update an update on my seminar yesterday. But first, a few news updates. The big one? My taking Strobist’s April Fool’s joke hook, line and sinker. Overclocking your strobe isn’t as possible as his post made it sound (at least without some serious electrical knowledge and the courage to crack open the case of your light)- very nice . Check out his update – the fact that he put effort into it makes me feel a little better for falling for it (I blame it all on the humidity in Orlando – it fogs the brain).

Secondly, and much more importantly, at least 3 different folks are reporting that Lightroom 2 Beta will be formally announced at the Photoshop Keynote this morning. This is GREAT news! I’m very excited to see what will happen. In the meantime, check out some of the new features over at the Lightroom Journal.

In short, the seminar was great and just what I expected. It was Joe McNally (author of the Moment it Clicks) and Moose Peterson providing brain dumps to the 50-person class. We started in the classroom for a few hours with Moose talking lenses and wildlife/landscape and Joe talking flash. After some trouble with the buses and weather, we were able to get out on location and do some shooting in a beautfil garden behind a local art museum (we had full access to the garden and 4 models that came along for the ride). The location was plenty large (several acres) and gorgeous.

I won’t go into all the details now, but it was amazing to shoot the grounds and the models with two of the greatest photographers around. It felt like we were on assignment with them.

We spent nearly 4 hours following them around/self guiding ourselves around the garden. When they were instructing, they would wait for some light (good or bad), adjust for it, shoot it, all the while explaining what they were doing and why. Then, they’d change the scene, the light would change and it would all start again.

I’ll provide a more detailed post about what I learned in the next day or two. I planned on doing it now, but I want to go play around with Lightroom 2 Beta before this morning’s Keynote starts!

After a few days off, I’m back online! I took the days off to prepare for my trip to Orlando, FL for Photoshop World. I’m here now and ready to go. I know that I’m missing one important post from Workflow Week on Lightroom – it is a culminating post and I’d like to spend a little more time on it. Look for it later this week.

In the meantime, check out the following link and some photos.

The link comes from Strobist and is very, very cool. At my heart, I’m still a technical guy, so the article on how to trick one of your Nikon or Canon Speelite flashes into outputting way more power than normal is very enticing. Check out the well-explained story at Strobist here. [Update: Okay, I definately fell for it - didn't even check the calendar and notice the date of April 1. Check out my crow-eating acknowledgement here.]

Now to the photos – it is, after all, Photo of the Week day. This week’s shots come from my beach sight seeing yesterday (there aren’t many good views of the ocean in the Rocky Mountains, so I needed to take in the scenery).

Well, I’m off to my first day of classes. Today is a pre-con; I’m going on a field shoot with Joe McNally, Moose Peterson and about 60 other photographers. Of all the sessions this week, this has been the one I’ve most looked forward to. Moose and Joe are both amazing photographers and effective teachers. It should be great – I’ll post some info on it later tonight or early tomorrow.

Today’s workflow topic is one of the most variable, fluid and changing of all the parts of the whole thing. Editing. Editing can take seconds or days, depending on the effort given to the original capture and the final output. As this post is only a few hundred words long and hundreds of thousands have been written on the topic of editing digital photographs – I’ll keep it basic. I’ll also point toward some resources that have been valuable to me.

Also, with it being Thursday and all – I threw in some Flickr shots that were processed using Scott Kelby’s Seven Point System (yip, it’s such a great process, there’s a Flickr group for it – see the Resources section for me).

My Editing Flow

After importing my photos I perform picture-wide edits in Lightroom. Exposure, contrast, clarity, global saturation, basic cropping and B&W conversion are just a few of the things I’ll update directly in Lightroom. I’ll then select additional photos that need the same adjustments and will click the Sync button, transferring the settings to all the photos immediately.

After those changes are made, I’ll identify that top rated photos and open them in Photoshop. I’ll then make any additional adjustments that only Photoshop can handle. That includes masking, local adjustments, more serious tonal changes, double processing, etc. I won’t go into all the details of what happens in Photoshop – there is so much to do I can’t even hope to scratch the surface. Look for future posts for information on specific techniques, or check out the resources below.

Also, I’ve considered using NIK’s new product, Viveza for local adjustments. I’ve mentioned it previously, but it’s simple user interface and elegant ability to make selections and adjustments to just parts of a photo are truly amazing. PhotoWalkPro.com recently did a great review/thorough explanation of the product. Check out the posts on it here and here. The only downside is that it is $250 – so pulling the trigger is a little tough.

After making Photoshop adjustments, I save the photo as a .psd. Lightroom displays it just as it does the DNG files, allowing me to export it, print it, etc.

Editing Resources

Some of the following resources are free and some are paid. I’d highly recommend each one, though, as they’ve taught me a ton. If you’re interested in more free options, you can search learn photoshop in Google and find even more options.

Scott Kelby’s Seven Point System, by Scott Kelby

The Photoshop CS3 Book for Digital Photographers, by Scott Kelby

PhotoshopUser TV

National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) at PhotoshopUser.com.

Seven Point System Before and After – From Flickr

Click on an image for a larger view/more information in Flickr.

Yesterday, we covered photo and folder naming. It seemed to me that it was worth covering an important topic about the photos themselves – the format I choose to use. I won’t make you read to the end – I prefer DNG. I shoot in RAW and convert all of my RAW files to DNG right upon import to Lightroom (yip, I don’t have any RAW files on my computer, just DNGs). Read on for more information.

Digital SLR cameras can shoot JPEGs. The downside is that they don’t carry all the original information – they become slightly compressed and are only 8 bit. Luckily, digital SLR cameras can also shoot in RAW, a format that stores the photo uncompressed and in 16 bit. While the photos aren’t necessarily twice as good as JPEGs, they do carry important details in highlights, shadows and other areas. That allows potential recovery of all white or ‘blown out’ areas and generally more flexibility in post-processing. (For a more extensive look at JPEG vs RAW, you can go to http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/raw-vs-jpeg/).

RAW Drawbacks

Shooting RAW does come with a few drawbacks, though. One is that each camera has its own RAW format. Personally, that frightens me a little bit. I don’t like thinking that all the pictures I took are stored in a format that only the particular manufacturer (Canon in my case) is privy to.

Second, the files can end up quite a bit larger than a RAW counterpart. When taken with a 10MP camera, a typical JPEG is 3-4 MB and a RAW file is 10MB.

Lastly, non-destructive editing and other metadata can’t be stored directly in a RAW file – they require something called a sidecar file. So, for every RAW file processed with a program like Lightroom or Camera RAW, a second file is created that contains nothing but information about the changes made. If those changes need to be saved, that file always has to be toted around with the RAW file. It can get quite annoying.

Why DNG Rocks

Enter DNG. DNG is a RAW archival format created by Adobe. Adobe created it to address the outbreak of RAW formats, allowing a common, documented format that has a higher chance of being documented for years to come. Don’t forget that Adobe also created PDF and a few other long-lasting file formats. They have a history of getting this sort of thing right more often than most others. For me, benefits of equal size include:

• Smaller File Size: They use a compression that doesn’t sacrifice quality, allowing 50% decrease in file size in some cases.
• Data Stored in the File: Non destructive editing and metadata are stored in the file itself, eliminating the need for sidecar files.

Image Format Comparison

See the following for a summarized comparison of JPEGs, RAW and DNG. Overall, I prefer DNG. It keeps file sizes down, is open format, doesn’t need a sidecar and maintains all the original data. In certain circumstances, JPEG can come in handy. Having sharpening and other settings automatic can reduce processing time.

For complete information on DNG, straight from the source, check out the Adobe page on it here.

I haven’t had a chance for a while to post some news updates and interesting/informative posts I’ve come across recently. Enjoy and have a great weekend!

• Like that popular Dave Hill look? I posted a bit on it several weeks back. He’s received a lot of attention from others as well. Scott Kelby wrote several great posts on trying to recreate his look. Check them out here, here and here. And the Strobist posted an interview with him here.
• If you haven’t seen Joe McNally’s new blog, you should definately check it out. His combination of humor and great tips make it to the top of every photographer’s list. Visit his site here.
• Nik Software recently released a new Photoshop plugin called Viveza. It allows you to control the colors, brightness, saturations and contrast throughout areas in an image. The best thing is that it does it with about the simplest, most elegant user interface I’ve ever seen (I’d say it competes with and beats a lot of Apple’s interfaces, which is quite an accomplishment). You can read more about the plugin here.
• Recently, I’ve been doing some research on DSLR sensor cleaning approaches. I’ve found that while there are lots of reviews out there, I haven’t found as many reviews or thoughts from the folks/sites I really trust. With that in mind, I did find a pretty simple, well described solution from Moose Peterson. Moose is a world-renowned wildlife photographer. If it works for someone who spends that much time in the field, it’s good enough for me to try. Read more about his tools and technique here.
• Curious about how well the new Canon Rebel XSi is peforming? Check out some sample pictures here.
  

After several weeks of preparation, I finally took the Adobe Lightroom ACE exam and good news: I passed! While the experience is still fresh, I wanted to pass along a few thoughts and some tips on my preparation.

First off, as part of taking the test, I also agreed to not share any questions or specific details about it – so you won’t find that here.

But, at a high level the test was easier to take than other Adobe ACE’s I’ve taken. Really, that’s to be expected I suppose. Lightroom, while an awesome tool, has fewer features to remember than the full blown Photoshop or some of the other Adobe applications. Also, a few details I didn’t mention that are publicly available-it was 52 questions long and a 68%+ score is required to pass. I had around an hour to take it and finished well under that (I’ve always been blessed to handle multiple choice questions pretty well). A few of the questions were a bit confusing or worded in a misleading way, as often seems to be the case. But, the majority of the questions were straightforward and had clear answers (as long as you know your stuff). Which brings me to the next part, preparation.

How I Prepared

As with most things, successful execution relies on solid preparation. As I mentioned in my previous post, one of the best benefits to taking an ACE is the added product knowledge it provides.

I used pretty much the same process when preparing for each of the ACE exams I’ve passed. Obviously they worked for me – my disclaimer is that they may not work equally for all. Take each tip for what it’s worth and apply it as needed.

Also, it’s very important to keep in mind that these are just tests. Those that take tests well are going to have a natural advantage, even when it might not mean that they know their stuff any better than another person.

Enough with the disclaimers – onto the tips.

1. Use the Product: My first step is always to become very familiar with the product. I don’t even really consider trying to take the test until I’ve used it for at least 6-12 months (depending on how complex the program is and how often I use it). Nothing beats the real world experience with the program. It puts everything in context. I suppose you could take it without much hands-on use, but it’s exponentially harder without it.
2. Use the Prep Guide as a Reference: I always download the prep guide (you can find Lightroom’s Prep Guide here) and use it to guide the rest of my studying. It lists the various subject areas the test will cover and even provides some sample test questions. It’s true to its word. The questions are based on the subject areas it lists. If a subject isn’t listed, it won’t be on the test.
3. Read a Comprehensive Manual: The exact manual varies. With InDesign I read Real World InDesign. For Lightroom I printed off the 150 page user manual and read that. The key here is to read something (cover to cover) that comprehensively covers the topic. This is where you miss a lot of the small tips/tricks that you might not have picked up anywhere else. It also reminds/reinforces not just how to do certain tasks, but why.
4. Read Blog and Other Resources: Of all the steps, this is probably the most optional. I find, though, that reading regular blogs can also reinforce tips and trics and does a nice job of bridging the how do you do it with the real world (many blogs write how to do something in response to a real world question or problem). InDesignSecrets.com and LightroomKillerTips.com are two great blogs.
5. Memorize the Menus and Other Options: After thoroughly reviewing all the details, I spend a fair amount of time just clicking around and memorizing menus, options, etc. I find that I don’t have a problem doing something in a program, but couldn’t necessarily repeat the steps to do so when I don’t have the program in front of me.

That’s it. That’s my preparation scheme. After my 6-12+ months of using the product, I spend somewhere between 2-6 weeks doing steps 2-5. It all depends on the program’s level of difficulty. Generally, I’d recommend planning 20-60 hours of dedicated prep time.