“Matt, what do you think about Nik Software’s HDR Efex Pro?”

Now, please chime in with a comment if you agree or have seen a demo of HDR Efex Pro, but I swear, I couldn’t walk 50 feet without some one asking that question. Now, maybe this was because I taught 3 HDR classes at Photoshop World so people were coming to me with that specific question. But Nik had some killer demo’s at their booth too, which I’m sure generated a lot of buzz.

Anyway, here’s my thoughts. I predict that HDR Efex Pro will be the best-in-class HDR software on the market. I’ve used it for about 2 weeks now, and I like it a lot.

What I like:
• The Nik interface that I’ve grown accustomed to
• Lots of presets with a decent size preview thumbnail
• Adding Control Points let’s me get much more of my post-HDR work done in one place
• The fact that the word “Gamma” is nowhere to be found
• The “HDR Method” setting rocks! It let’s you get a lot of different HDR styles from one adjustment

What I don’t like:
• Too many presets (you can however switch to Custom view to hide them)
• I wish the HDR method setting showed you a preview before you clicked on it

As I mentioned before, I think this software will end up being one of the favorites out there. When Nik Software creates a product, they make it solid. That said, my advice to people will be similar to my advice to them when it comes to Black and White and Nik’s Silver Efex Pro plug-in. You have to REALLY REALLY like HDR to spend the extra cash on more HDR software. Especially when Photoshop CS5’s HDR is very good and it already comes for free with CS5. If you do the occasional HDR image then you may have a hard time justifying the extra cash. If you’re way into HDR (like I am) then it’ll make a more compelling case. In fact, I’d go ahead and earmark some money now because I’m pretty sure you’ll want to buy it when it comes out. As always, I suggest you download the 30-day trial when it becomes available and give it a try for yourself before you make the decision. See ya!

• Jason D. Moore posted a review of Scott’s new Lightroom 3 Book for Digital Photographers

• Adorama has a channel over on youtube.com. There’s a little bit of everything worth checking out, from training to gear reviews.

• Unique Photo has teamed up with Sigma and Photoshop World instructor Kevin Ames, for some online webinars. Their first one is this evening. It’s definitely worth $20 to get some insight into Kevin’s photography.

• Of personal interest to me, Nikon just announced a new 85mm f/1.4 lens. I know the old version is probably still going to remain a great lens, but I don’t have one. Why you ask? See, I first used the previous 85 f/1.4 about 2 years ago. I personally got caught up in all the rumors that said a new one was coming out “any day now” (stupid rumors!), and held off on buying one even though I LOVED it. I’ve even rented it from Lens Pro To Go because I just couldn’t do without it on some photo shoots. So I’m ready. I’ve had a little (OK, big) chunk of money ear marked for this lens for way too long, so I’m psyched to see it finally out.

Have a great day!

Today’s Guest: Nat Coalson.

Bio/Intro: Nathaniel Coalson is a travel and fine art photographer, teacher and writer based in Denver, Colorado. Nat has worked professionally in photography, imaging and printing since 1987. His work has been exhibited extensively, received numerous awards and is held in private and corporate collections. Nat is is an Adobe Certified Expert in Lightroom and Photoshop, and is a top-rated instructor who has taught digital photography and imaging to photographers at all levels. He is the author of two Lightroom books including Lightroom 3: Streamlining your Digital Photography Process, published by Wiley in 2010. He has written articles on Lightroom for magazines including Photoshop User and Great Output and is a contributing writer at TheLightroomLab.com. For more information and to see Nat’s work visit www.NatCoalson.com.

Q. How many presets do you have in the Develop module?

A. have hundreds of Develop presets installed (downloaded from various sources on the web) but I rarely use any of them, except when doing demos. (For people just starting to use Lightroom, applying Develop presets is a great way to learn what the different adjustments do.)

The six presets I use on a regular basis are specific to the cameras I used for most of the photos in my catalog. My presets include custom settings for:

- Basic adjustments such as Blacks, Brightness, Contrast, Clarity and Vibrance;
- Either a flat Tone Curve, or a parametric curve with +5 Lights and -5 Darks;
- Custom sharpening settings; for example, on photos from my Canon 5D Mark II, my default sharpening settings are Amount 45, Radius 1.0, Detail 45, Masking 15.

Photos from my other cameras use different sharpening (and noise reduction) settings; in each of my default Develop presets, all the settings are fine tuned for that particular camera.

In my standard workflow, I apply these Develop presets during Import, and beyond that I don’t use Develop presets very often. Each photo (or sequence of similar photos) gets processed individually, as needed. I start by envisioning how I want the photo to look, and use the various Develop adjustments to make it that way. If I want to apply the same look to other photos, I use Sync to apply the settings from the active photo to the others.

Q. What’s your favorite panel besides the Basic panel ( Sorry the basic panel is too much of a gimmee)?

A. My favorite panel (besides the Basic panel) is the Toolstrip. I know, I know… it’s not really a panel But I use graduated filters and adjustment brushes on almost every image.

When just beginning to Develop a photo, I visualize how it might be made more appealing by dodging and burning (lightening and darkening) localized areas of the image, and sometimes I do that work first.

I really like the fact that with Lightroom, if I want to apply local adjustments first, any global adjustments made later are blended seamlessly. You can use any of the Lightroom tools, at any time, and the final rendering combines them in the optimal way (which isn’t always the case with Photoshop layers).

Q. What panel/slider/feature do you use the least?

A. I don’t know – I’ve forgotten it even exists!

Hmmm… let me look… I guess I’d have to say I almost never use the Random Order option on the Playback panel in Slideshow. Usually I want the slides to show in a specific order. But the Random Order option could be handy if you don’t want to show any bias in the order, such as with a selection of images made by a group of people.

Otherwise, in my typical workflows, I generally use most of Lightroom’s functions at one point or another.

Q. Do you keyword (All the time/Sometimes/Never)

A. I keyword all my photos, all the time. I have two basic scenarios for my photos: work done for clients, and work done as self-assignments that I offer for licensing and/or as prints. In both cases, adding keywords helps me easily find any photo within the Lightroom catalog. And with photos offered for sale online, having them loaded with keywords dramatically increases their visibility on the web, because search engines index all the keywords embedded in image files.

I always add at least a few keywords (using hierarchies*) during Import. Then I add more keywords and/or hierarchies to batches of photos that make it through my initial rounds of editing. My edited photos typically get a lot of keywords, especially my final selects, for which I individually add detailed keywords (plus captions and titles) specific to each photo.

*About keyword hierarchies: in the Keyword List panel, you can drag and drop to “nest” keywords into parent/child relationships, or “hierarchies”. When you apply a child keyword to one or more photos, you have the option to also automatically apply all the containing keywords to your exported photos. Using hierarchies can be a huge time saver and also helps keep your keyword list tidy and manageable.

Q. Do you use Collections (All the time/Sometimes/Never)

A. I use Collections all the time; they are one of the most important benefits of Lightroom’s catalog (database) architecture. In my standard editing workflow, when I’ve edited down to my final selects I put them into a Collection, after which I rarely return to the Folder source. You can access Collections from within all the modules, so (unlike folders) you can choose different groups of photos to work on without needing to go back to Library.

Historically, I’ve used regular Collections more than Smart Collections, but this is starting to change. I’ve made regular collections for all kinds of purposes: client projects, portfolio selections, gallery or publication submissions, competition entries, web galleries, photos to be printed, etc. These days I’m starting to make more Smart Collections with keywords and/or attributes as criteria.

Q. Favorite Lightroom Plug-in?

A. My favorite Lightroom plug-in changes depending on what I’m doing with my files. Export plug-ins are really useful for batch-uploading photos to the web; these days I’m frequently using the Dossier de Presse (for NextGEN galleries) and Photoshelter plug-ins.

Timothy Armes’ suite of Lightroom plug-ins is also extremely helpful for a wide range of purposes (see Photographers-Toolbox.com.)

Q. If you could add one feature to Lightroom what would it be?

A. That’s a tough one… Lightroom gives me nearly everything I need to process my photos and share them with the world!

One thing I’d really like to see added is soft proofing. This is a key step in my printing workflow, and one for which I still need Photoshop. Soft proofing lets you preview what an image will look like when printed on a selected paper/printer combination; you can then make any necessary adjustments to tone and color, prior to printing.

For example, most canvas media have a relatively narrow color gamut and tend to print dark. With a soft proof preview, I can use adjustment layers to boost saturation, open up the shadows, etc. before I make the print.

Without soft proofing, photos printed on different papers, canvas etc. will come out looking quite different from one another. Soft proofing allows you to make very consistent reproductions of your photos using a wide range of media.

If Lightroom provided soft proofing, prepping files for super-accurate color output would be much easier!

Nat Coalson
www.NatCoalson.com.

• DVD Contest Winner – I had a contest yesterday and the winner of my new Lightroom 3 Power Session DVD is Debi Anderson. Congrats Debi!

• onOne Software is hosting a series of free webinars

• Lightroom 3.2 is now available as a beta on Adobe Labs.

• For the first time ever, Photoshop World (where me and a bunch of other Lightroom pros will be teaching Lightroom) is selling 1-day passes. So if you can’t swing getting out to the full conference just come out for a day.

• Nik Software’s Viveza 2 Plug-in is now 64-bit friendly

• If you’re looking for some inspiration today check out the landscape and nature photography of Saurabh Deoras. Wow!

Have a great day!

They put out a newsletter and feed of articles so I wanted to try and test pulling their feeds through our website to our members.

If you don’t want these emails but want our other emails here’s a quick tutorial on how to change your profile:

At the bottom of your email click “Profile” after the words Manage your subscription.

You’ll be taken to a page with a lot of choices! Emails are put into categories and you can change each category to receive emails by day, week or month or not at all.

It’s that simple just pick what you want and what you don’t want!

The first time we setup a feed there will be about 10 emails but from there forward they only come along one or two a week so don’t worry!

If you have a website you follow with great content you want others to be aware of leave a comment below!

Simply click the link below and answer the survey.

http://linnareaphotoclub.org/rsvp-for-the-august-meeting-and-cookout/

I hope to see you all on Sunday!

As a reminder… we will have our monthly photo contest at the picnic.  The theme is “Anything Goes”.   (except nudes)

So get those “Photoshopped”  photos ready for judging.   Let’s see some creativity.