Zero Local Adjustments

<p>Just curious, how many pro photographers do no local adjustments in their PP? Who never goes into Photoshop at all? </p>

<p>Well, I never go into Photoshop. Don't use it. I do 98% of my post work in Lightroom. (I'm now using beta 3b with good success.) On rare occasions I use Photoshop Elements or ACDSee Pro 3.</p>

<p>From your question, I'm guessing that you feel you spend too much time fiddling with photos after capture. Me, too.</p>

<p>If you shoot jpeg (or raw + jpeg), you may be able to accept the camera's interpretation of the photo, at least for the purpose of proofing. I can't bring myself to shoot raw + jpeg, though. I just end up with way too many files to deal with and it drives me nuts. So I just shoot raw.</p>

<p>And if you shoot raw, it's more or less inevitable that some post-processing be required. If you expose to the right (as you should), you'll often want to pull down the exposure a bit in post. I often goose the black setting and increase clarity (mid-range contrast and USM) in Lightroom.</p>

<p>For me the key thing is cutting down on the amount of time I spend on a photo before I'm willing to share it with clients simply as a proof. As my skill as a photographer increases and my confidence increases with it, I'm getting better at getting proofs ready more quickly than I used to. But it's an ongoing struggle.</p>

<p>Hi Matthew ...<br>

I would venture to say that if you do not do any PP in a photo editor of your choice that you are letting your camera determine the quality of your deliverables to your customer.</p>

<p>Most of us have shot film and we remember either using labs or doing our own darkroom work with our negatives. The point is that work (aka, processing) needed to be done to our negatives. And it didn't matter if you were shooting with MF Hasselblad, Pentax or Mamyia, etc ... or 35mm Canon, Nikon, etc ...</p>

<p>In today's digital world, the <strong>lab is us</strong> in the form of Photoshop, Lightroom, whatever ... and so we either have to let someone do the PP for us or we do it ourselves. And in the same way that work had to be done on our negatives, now work has to be done on our jpeg or RAW captures.</p>

<p>It's my personal opinion that once you've worked in RAW and seen how so much easier it is to work in RAW rather than jpeg captures, you'll never shoot jpeg again.</p>

<p>Ray</p>

<p>I spend a lot of time in PS PP - I figure I'm going to spend at least 4 hours processing for every hour I shoot and I price accordingly. I'd love to reduce that time but haven't made much progress. Shooting RAW does help the process but mostly by making the images more beautiful or interesting, not in cutting the time down. It's worth it to me to enhance the images and give the client the best, most "popping" photos I can even if it takes time.<br>

If I can get the exposure exactly right in the camera, every time, I can reduce my PP time but, I'd rather keep my eye on unfolding events and be there for the action than spend too much time worrying about my settings.<br>

PP is part of the gig and if you don't love it, hire someone else to do it.<br>

Like you, if there are photographers out there who are are processing, I'd like to know their secrets too!</p>

<p>For clarification, what I meant by "local adjustments" was anything that is typically done in Photoshop, rather than Lightroom (or equivelant).  This would be things like dodging, burning, cloning, healing, etc.</p>

<p>For clarification; you can do all of that in LightRoom. One can easily say they spend no time in PS yet do everything you describe.<br>

Really the question isn't really a very valid one.<br>

<br />If you're asking how much one spends dodging, burning, cloning, etc... that's another story...<br>

...I typically do very little of this for wedding photography. Too many images to nit pick. Try to do it right in camera at the moment.</p>

<p>Yes, LR does have some very basic tools of this nature, though not sophisticated enough to, say, clean up a bad complexion on a groom or remove large unwanted elements from the background. You definitely can't do anything with layers. I guess the question is, how much time people spend in Photoshop?<br>

I think I'm like William in that I do 95-98% of my work in LR, and only go into PS for a select number of very important shots if needed. I do know some photographers who don't spend any time at all processing, other than culling. Unfortunately, they they're not the kind that can nail everything in camera either, but that's a different discussion. </p>

<p>Yes, The healing and cloning brushes in LR2 really suck IMO. But the other brushes and masking abilities pretty much negate the need to use layering in PS. (At least for me anyway).</p>

<p>The more I use LR the less I delve into PS.</p>

<p>mmm, I try to shoot as correct as possible and do minimal adjusting. Not always possible with mixed lighting. I guess that is from shooting a million rolls of film,,,you know that roll stuff that goes in the back of a camera,,,,</p>

<p>I am with RT on the clone/healing brushes. Having said that, I rarely use PS now... though I probably should now and then.</p>

<p>Yeah, it's too bad. Adobe doesn't want you to stop buying Photoshop, so the local tools in LR are intentionally sucky</p>