Peter Krogh, author af the DAM Book, has released a software product called RapidFixer that enables basic raw conversion adjustments directly within Bridge CS3, including

• Temperature
• Tint
• Split Tone Presets
• Vibrance
• Saturation
• Blue HSL (Hue, Saturation, Luminance)
• Orange HSL
• Exposure
• Highlight Recovery
• Fill Light
• Contrast
• Clarity
• Vignette
• Parametric curves
Check it out here 

Photograph made last weekend at the Grottos area on Independence Pass, near Aspen, Colorado. Shot in color on Canon 30D, Tamron 18-200 XR Di II. Converted to BW in Lightroom, PhotoKit sharpening and minor dodging/burning in Photoshop CS3.

Lead Lightroom developer Mark Hamburg has posted an interesting explanation of the team’s goals in developing Lightroom. For people who wonder how the software engineers make decisions, this may provide some insight, without going too deep…

Read the Article on LightroomJournal

Every photograph is unique and each image will require different enhancements to make the photograph look its best. However, there are common criteria to use when evaluating your image to determine what enhancements should be made.

Many of these decisions are subjective and the choices you make should reflect your creative vision of how the image should look. Some enhancements, such as noise reduction and sharpening, are less subjective as there are established standards of technical quality to be considered. For example: in most cases people would agree that digital noise is undesirable. Also, most people would agree that the main subject of the photo should have sharp, crisp edges. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule and the creative decisions you make should be guided by your personal preferences.

When evaluating your image and making creative decisions, start with the biggest changes first and work your way to the smaller “fine-tuning” adjustments. Global edits are changes made to the entire image; Local (or selective) edits are changes made only to specific areas of the image.

Think about the editing to be done and make a plan before starting work. Keep in mind that every step of the workflow affects–and is affected by–every other step. For example, sharpening the image may increase noise; adjusting color may affect apparent contrast, etc. So it may be necessary to go back and forth between steps to perfect the image. Read more…

1. Hide panels you don’t frequently need to make more room for the photo.
2. Make the right panel wide to provide more precision on the sliders.
3. When your mouse is over a slider you can use the up and down arrow keys to change the slider value.
4. When making editing decisions, consider Tone requirements (lights to darks) independently from Color decisions.
5. In general, you will want to work your way from top to bottom in the sections on the right panel in the Develop Module, but you will also need to go back and forth between the individual panels.
6. Often its best to set the White Balance first. Other times, you may want to make some quick tonal adjustments before setting the white balance.
7. In the Histogram you can drag left and right to adjust the image directly in the Histogram.
8. Start by adjusting the white point and black point (Exposure and Blacks sliders).
9. Then adjust contrast using the Tone Curve. (Avoid the Brightness and Contrast sliders if possible; they are too crude for accurate adjustments.)
10. After adjusting Tone Curve you may need to fine-tune Recovery and Fill Light. Recovery brings back detail lost in the highlights. Fill Light opens up deep shadows (but not blacks).
11. Adjust Clarity, Vibrance and Saturation after making tonal adjustments.
12. Clarity – increases contrast in the mid-tones
13. Vibrance – similar to Saturation but not as strong – will not-oversaturate colors that are already saturated and will not increase saturation in skin tones.
14. Saturation – pushes color values toward full purity (away from neutral gray)
15. Use the Targeted Adjustment Tool in the Tone Curve and HSL panels. You can drag the mouse up or down or use the up and down arrow keys to make adjustments directly on the image.
16. Use the HSL sliders to adjust specific color ranges with great precision.
17. Sharpness controls – be VERY conservative in applying sharpening in Lightroom. It’s best to do this in Photoshop whenever possible.
18. Use Virtual Copies to create variations in processing an image.
19. Save Develop Presets with settings you use commonly.
20. Make snapshots of different stages of processing.
21. When done editing remember to Save the Metadata to the file (under the Metadata menu; use Command or Control S)

I’m off to Grand Junction, Colorado this weekend to teach a full-day Lightroom class on Saturday Sep 15 at 13photo.

I’ll be back to blogging next week…. have a great weekend!

Many of my students ask about additional resources and recommended reading. Below are some books I’ve found very helpful.

Photographing the World Around You – Freeman Patterson
The Tao of Photography – Gross & Shapiro
Learning to See Creatively – Bryan F. Peterson
Creative Nature and Outdoor Photography – Brenda Tharpe
Photography and the Art of Seeing – Freeman Patterson
The A-Z of Creative Photography – Lee Frost