You can buy this course by itself for $29.99 or watch it as part of a KelbyOne Pro Membership, where you can watch all our Lightroom courses (I don’t think there’s anyone out there with nearly as many full-length courses on every aspect of Lightroom and Photoshop)as we do).

Here’s a link to the course.

Have a great Monday, everybody, and here’s to finally getting really organized, backed up, and loving your Lightroom experience.

-Scott

P.S. If you use Lightroom ‘cloud’ edition, I have a separate version of the SLIM system just for you folks. Here’s the link to the cloud version.

The post New Course: My Simplified Lightroom Image Management System (the “SLIM” system) appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

STEP ONE: The nameplate I’m going to create uses your signature, and there are a couple of ways to get your signature into Photoshop:

(1) Take a nice blank ink pen and sign your name on a fairly large piece of paper, then take a photo of your signature with your phone. Open that photo in Photoshop; take the Magic Wand tool, click it anywhere on the background (to select everything but your signature), then

(2) if you’re lucky enough to have a graphics tablet, then go to Photoshop, open a new document, 6”x3” with a resolution of 240, and then set your foreground color to black, choose a small hard-edged brush from the Brush Picker, and sign your name and save the file. Easy enough.

STEP TWO: Open a new document that is 6”x3” at a resolution of 240, then open up your signature file and drag it onto this document. In the Layers palette, lower the Opacity of this layer to 20% (as shown here), so your signature looks light gray.

STEP THREE: Go ahead and hide that signature layer by clicking on the eye icon next to Layer 1. Now, get the Type tool and type in your studio’s name. In my case, I typed in “Scott Kelby Photography” (I know — how original). The font I chose is Trajan Pro, which, if you don’t already have it installed, you can download it from Adobe’s Creative Cloud app. Add lots of space between the letters. In my example in class, I set the Tracking (space between letters) in the Character palette to 600.

STEP FOUR: Make your signature layer visible once your text is in place. Now, select all three layers (the Background, Layer 1, and your Type layer), go up to the Options Bar, and click on the Center Alignment icon (as shown above) to perfectly center your elements within your image area. Flatten your image layers, and now save your file as a JPEG.

STEP FIVE: Now go to the Lightroom, to the Print Module, and in the Page panel, turn on the Identity Plate checkbox. Then, in the Identity Plate preview, click on the little down-facing arrow in the bottom right corner to bring up a pop-up menu. From that menu, choose Edit to bring up the “Identity Plate Editor” dialog shown above. Click on the “Use a graphical identity plate” button (as shown above), then navigate to your newly saved signature file and choose it. Now, it will appear on your printed page, and you can drag to position it where you want it. That’s all there is to it.

Above: here’s how the nameplate looks at the bottom of a print. As I mentioned at the top, you can also import this nameplate into the slideshow module as well.

There you have it.

UNRELATED NOTE: It’s a BIG divisional playoff weekend for my Bucs. We’re playing the Detroit Lions up in Detriot at Ford Field (a very nice dome stadium – I shot a Bears/Lions there a few years back). However, although of course I want the Bucs to win, I do like the Lions. They are a super tough team this year, and I’ve been rooting for them all season, so if the Bucs lose to them (which is likely – the Lions are favored to win), at least it’s to the Lions, which haven’t been this far in the playoffs in 30+ years, so they definitely earned it. However, if the Bucs do win…OMG!!!! Hey, like I said last Friday…it could happen.

Have a great divisional playoff weekend!

-Scott

The post How To Use Lightroom’s Identity Plate to Add a Fine Art Signature Nameplate appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

The real news is that we gained the Point Color panel that allows for much finer control over a customizable range of color. The HSL panel remains unchanged and is still quite useful. So, what does Point Color do that the HSL panel cannot? There are two key functions of Point Color that differentiate it from HSL, first being that Point Color allows us to fine tune the range of affected colors with a high degree of control, whereas each specified color in the HSL panel affects an unchangeable range of similar colors.

We’ll look at some example photos to show why that is important. The second key difference is that Point Color is available as a global adjustment (affecting all selected colors in the entire photo at once) and as a local adjustment in the Masking panel. Taken together it means that while HSL can be quite useful when you are happy with adjusting the predetermined range of colors affected by each slider, we now have a tool that gives us far more control to narrow in on a very specific range of colors and make desired adjustments both globally and locally. Let’s look at some examples to see how this works.

Getting Oriented

When you first view the Point Color panel there is not much to see, but as soon as you grab the Sample Spot Color (Eyedropper) tool and click on the color you want to sample it comes to life. Note, I have expanded all the disclosure triangles in the panel to reveal all the options.

Next to the eyedropper you’ll see a color swatch representing the selected color (note, as you adjust the color this swatch will change to show both the original selected color and the adjusted color). Below that is a large color field displaying the selected color (indicated with a black pin) within the range of hues that will be affected. Below the color field is a color bar displaying a larger view of the selected color (this also changes to show the original and adjusted color). To the right of the color field is a color rectangle that shows the selected color within a range of luminance values.

With the color selected you can now adjust that color’s hue, saturation, and luminance as desired by dragging within the color field or color rectangle or by moving the Hue Shift, Saturation Shift, or Luminance Shift sliders. Dragging left or right within the color field adjusts the Hue Shift. Dragging up or down in the color field adjusts the Sat. Shift. Dragging up or down in the color rectangle adjusts the Lum. Shift. As you make adjustments by dragging in the color field, you’ll see how the corresponding sliders move in concert. Likewise, moving any of the sliders results in seeing a white circle move in the corresponding color field to represent the resulting change.

Putting in Practice

Let’s say I wanted to shift the color of this young woman’s dress from a very saturated red to a less saturated pink. If I were to use the Targeted Adjustment tool in the Mixer tab I could try to shift the hue, saturation, and luminance towards a more pink color, but because the original color was so similar in hue to her skin tone, the end result is less than desirable. There’s no way to constrain the range of affected hues with this tool or use it with Masking.

Let’s reset those adjustments and switch to the Point Color tool. I’ve used the eyedropper to sample the color of the dress. Looking at the colors in the color field I can tell I’m going to run into the same issue I had before, so let’s use the Range controls to see if I can limit the range of affected color to avoid affecting her skin and lips. The Range slider can be shifted right to expand the range of affected color or shifted left to decrease the range. With the Range disclosure triangle expanded we can access more granular controls for fine tuning the hue, saturation, and luminance range I want to adjust. In a case like this it can be helpful to check the Visualize Range box, which changes the unaffected colors to grayscale and leaves only the affected range in color.

Now we can clearly see areas of her arms and face that will be affected if I don’t constrain the range of affected colors.

With the range dialed in to just affect the dress I can now make the desired shifts in hue, saturation, and luminance to change the color of the dress without affecting her skin.

That type of adjustment was just not possible before using HSL alone since we had no way to customize the range of hues being affected by the adjustment. As close as the color in the dress was to some of the color in her skin tone, I was able to limit the affected range of hues narrowly enough to effectively isolate the dress from her skin, but there’s even more power in Point Color than in just limiting the range.

Point Color in Masking

In that example I was just (barely) able to isolate the color I wanted to adjust from the subject’s skin tones, but what if limiting the range of colors wasn’t possible, or the same color existed in more than one place within the photo, and you only wanted to adjust one location? That’s where Point Color’s other difference over the Mixer (HSL/Color) can be found, which is in Masking. I’m going to reset/remove the global Point Color adjustment by double-clicking the Point Color label at the top of the panel. Alternatively, you can right-click a color swatch and choose to delete the swatch (or all swatches) from the contextual menu, which does the same thing.

Next, click the Masking icon to enter that tool. Since I have a person in this photo I can leverage the AI-based masking ability to select just her dress with a single click on the Clothes checkbox under Person Mask Options, then click Create Mask.

With her dress masked, I can expand the Point Color panel and use the eyedropper to sample the color of her dress as I did before. With Masking, you’ll likely see the overlay by default at first, but as soon as you select the eyedropper the mask is hidden so you can see what you are sampling. Thanks to the mask I don’t need to worry about constraining the color range as this adjustment (and any other adjustment I decide to apply to this mask) will only affect her dress. That means I can just focus on adjusting the color of the dress right away.

There’s often more than one way to achieve an adjustment, and the right way will depend on the photo and what you are trying to achieve. With Point Color you have such a fine level of control that just wasn’t possible in Lightroom before, and we still can utilize the HSL/Color controls too. This opens wonderful possibilities for fine tuning skin tones, removing color casts from shadows, adjusting product photography to better match the desired color, and so much more.

The post Get to Know Point Color in Lightroom Classic appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

On Thursday, I’m creating a brand new course just on Importing for Lightroom Classic users. It should be out in just a few weeks, but again – this is a topic I get asked about a lot, and I had recorded a course previously on this, but it’s time for an update using the latest version, so that’s what’s up next.

My Budapest Workshop is Sold Out!

It sold out in just one day, and it’s going to be awesome! (everybody going is a photographer who has been to one of my previous workshops, which is so fun – it’s like a family reunion). Iceland with Erik Kuna and me, the Lofoten Islands with Dave Williams, and one more with Mimo this fall are all still coming up. More on those as we get closer (though Iceland will be open for tickets soon).

I hope y’all have a kick-butt Monday. The Bucs have a Playoff game tonight, so….well…we’ll see how it goes. hey, ya never know, right?

-Scott

The post Check Out: “How to Organize & Backup Your Images When You Travel” appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

If, like me, you like to embed your copyright and contact info directly into your images (handy in case you share images on Instagram, FB, X [formerly Twitter], etc.), then it’s time to update your Lightroom Classic copyright info template for 2023 for the new images you take and import this year. It’s really simple but not super obvious, so here we go:

STEP ONE: Go to the Library Module; go under the Metadata menu up top and choose Edit Metadata Presets as shown above (NOTE: if you don’t already have an existing Copyright template in place, you use this same menu to create one from scratch, so either way you would choose this Edit Metadata Presets to get started).

STEP TWO: When the Edit Metadata Presets window appears (shown above), choose the name of the preset you want to edit, and it will display your copyright template info (as seen). In my case, I’m editing last year’s Copyright preset, but if you don’t already have one, scroll down to the IPTC Copyright section and start typing your info there and the IPTC Creator section below it, as I have above.

STEP THREE: Go to the IPTC Copyright section, click on the field to the right of Copyright (as shown above), then just type in 2024 right over where it previously said 2023. If you’re creating your first Copyright template, just go ahead and type in 2024 and your name in the Copyright field, and then under Copyright Status, choose “Copyrighted” from the pop-up menu.

STEP FOUR: Once you’ve updated the date, it’s time to save your new preset by going to the Preset pop-up menu at the top of the window and choosing “Save Current Settings as New Preset,” as shown above.

STEP FIVE: This brings up a small dialog where you can enter the name for your New Preset (as seen above).

STEP SIX: If you don’t have any old 2022 images you haven’t yet imported into Lightroom, you can choose to delete last year’s preset if you want (you won’t be using it again if you’ve already imported all your images from last year), so if you want to delete it (totally up to you  — you don’t have to – you can keep multiple year’s templates, no sweat), first choose the old 2022 Preset from the pop-up menu; then go to the same pop-up menu again but this time choose Delete Preset “Scott’s Copyright 2022” (or whatever you named it), then click the Done button.

STEP SEVEN: APPLYING YOUR NEW COPYRIGHT PRESET: There are two ways (OK, probably more) to apply these presets. However, my favorite is to embed this copyright data into your images right during the Import process. In Lightroom Classic’s Import window, in the “Apply During Import” panel (seen above right), where it says “Metadata,” choose your Copyright preset from that pop-up menu. As your images are imported, your copyright status and contact info are automatically embedded into each photo. The second method is for images you’ve taken this year and already imported into Lightroom.

STEP EIGHT: If you have images taken in 2024 and they’re already imported into Lightroom, then select all those images, and then, in the Library module of Classic, go to the Metadata panel, and right near the top, you’ll see “Preset.” Click on that pop-up menu (as shown above) and choose your Copyright preset, and it will be applied to all those photos you selected at once.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Embedding this info into your image does not provide you with official copyright protection. I am not an attorney, so this is not legal advice, but what embedding this info does is let people who download your image know that:

a) This is a copyrighted image and is NOT free for you to use.

b) it gives them your contact info if they want to buy or license your image.

But just to be clear, doing all this DOES NOT actually copyright your images — that is done separately (at least here in the US) by the govt. copyright office. If you want to learn how to actually copyright and protect your images (so important if you’re going to be sharing your images online), then check out this fantastic (and actually fun) course from Intellectual Property attorney Ed Greenberg and Photographer’s Rights Advocate Jack Reznicki over at KelbyOne.com (here’s the direct link to their course).

OK, we’re off and running in a new year, and here’s wishing you a safe, happy, healthy New Year – one with lots of lightrooming and Photoshopshopping and photography, and football (#GoBucs!), and lots of other fun stuff. 

-Scott

The post It’s Time To Update Your Copyright Info Inside Lightroom For 2024 appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

[Editor’s note: It seemed fitting that my last blog post of the year should be my last column in Photoshop User magazine, which ceased publication with the December issue. I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunity to have written my Under the Loupe column for so many years. – Rob]

When you first expand the panel, you’ll see everything is grayed out until you check the box next to Apply, which brings it to life and applies the settings to the selected photo.

By default, it uses AI to create a depth map of the photo and applies the default blur amount of 50. Having a photo with a clearly distinguishable subject will improve the quality of the depth map it creates. With this photo, I was impressed with how well it detected the subjects and even the default settings helped to separate them from the background. This tool is no replacement for in-camera depth of field blur and won’t replace any of my fast lenses, but in this case the photo was shot with the Canon RF600mm f/11 lens, so I couldn’t open the aperture any wider. My goal is to use Lens Blur to help the owl and squirrel stand out more from the busy background, without it looking too fake (obviously in the eye of the beholder).

Let’s get oriented to the panel. The Blur Amount slider does exactly what it says, and if you take it to 100, you’ll see we’re heading into fake looking blur territory. Below that slider are five different bokeh options, and hovering your cursor over each will reveal a pop-up with its name and description. The first is the most normal looking, but definitely worth clicking each one and exploring how each affects the photo. A photo with out of focus light sources will really show the differences between each option. If your photo does contain out of focus light sources (imagine a string of holiday lights in the background), then the Boost slider can be used to adjust the brightness of those light sources (the effect is very subtle on a photo like this).

For some photos, simply adjusting the desired Blur Amount and Bokeh option may be all you need to get the desired effect. If you want to fine tune things further or if the AI generated depth map doesn’t quite work for your photo, you can manually select what is in focus using the Focal Range controls. At the top of the Focal Range pane are icons for the AI generated depth map and a crosshair icon that allows you to click (or click-drag) over the region of the photo you want to be in focus. I think the AI did a good job of finding the desired subject, but there are some areas I want to refine, so I’ll leave the AI depth map and explore how I can modify what is in focus and what is blurred.

To really see how the depth map is working you’ll want to check the Visualize Depth box, which displays a color-coded depth map overlay on the photo. The warmer the color the nearer to the camera while the cooler the color the further away. You can see these are the colors displayed in the Focal Range pane as well. To visualize what exactly is in focus, keep the checkbox checked, then click on the handle within Focal Range. Dragging left or right will change what is in focus and you’ll see the in-focus area of the photo displayed in white. You can also reduce or increase the size of the rectangle to further refine what is in focus and what is blurred.

For this photo, I tried to reduce the size of the in-focus area as much as possible to ensure the owl and squirrel were in focus along with the branch they are on, but there were still some areas of the owl that remain slightly out of focus, and this is where the Focus and Blur brushes at the bottom of the panel come into play. The Focus brush allows for painting in areas that we want to be in focus, while the Blur brush allows for painting in areas that we want more blurred. The Size, Feather, and Flow sliders work just the same as they do for the brush in the Masking panel. There is even an Auto Mask checkbox that works great when brushing over an object with clear edges between it and the adjacent area. In this case, I’ll select the Focus brush, reduce its size (the left and right bracket keys also adjust brush size here) to fit within the area of the owl not fully in focus, and paint over its back and tail to include those areas in focus.

You can paint with the overlay on or off as desired. Use the Amount slider to blend your adjusted area in with the rest of the photo. Zooming into 100% shows some areas along in focus objects that need help along the edges, such as the branch coming up in front of the owl. Switching to the Blur brush, I can fine tune those edges to clean that up and match the blur along the edge to the background’s level of blur. Just as when brushing in Masking, hold the spacebar and click on the image to zoom in/out, or to click and pan around.

When done brushing with either tool, use the Amount slider to fine tune the look to all the areas you brushed and blend with the rest of the photo. If you want to make a new brush adjustment, click the + sign next to the brushes to begin a new adjustment with a different amount setting. In this case I wanted to ease the transition of blur on the bottom branch as it heads into the background below the animals. Now, I know this is not the same as true lens blur done in-camera, but I do like having the ability to make the subjects stand out of a busy background in a subtle way with quite a bit of control. Be sure to use the eye icon on the Lens Blur panel as you go to see the photo without Lens Blur for comparison.

For a more exaggerated example, I’ll take a photo with a very wide depth of field and give it a strong blur effect to simulate a shallow depth of field. After letting Lightroom create its AI depth map I’ll grab the Point/Area Focus tool to manually click on the car to tighten the area of focus even more.

I’ll turn on Visualize Depth, and further refine the area I want to be in focus around the car.

I’ve got the area dialed in, but due to the car windows we can see into the background, but those areas are still in focus. Grabbing the Blur brush, I can brush over the areas within the windows to match the blur with the background.

With a new Blur brush, using a lower Flow setting to slowly build up the effect, I can paint on the hill behind the car to separate it from the car with a more subtle blur. If you accidentally paint over the wrong area, you can hold the Option (PC: Alt) key to flip the brush to an eraser to erase any errant strokes. By using a lower flow and multiple brush instances, you can build up layers of blur. In an otherworldly image like this, I think the added blur can enhance its look (again, subject to taste), and the Lens Blur tool provides a pretty high degree of control even in its Early Access state. I look forward to seeing how this tool evolves and how it can help us achieve a final look beyond what our cameras and lenses can do alone.

As a final note I’d like to thank Scott Kelby, Chris Main, Kim Doty, Barbara Thompson, Jessica Maldonado, Margie Rosenstien, and Angela Naymick, along with all the rest of the behind-the-scenes team that have made Photoshop User magazine so wonderful for so many years. I’m sorry to see this is the final issue, but it has been an honor and a privilege to have been able to write for it since Lightroom first came on the scene. Thank you to all who have read these issues, and I hope to see you still in the KelbyOne community and LightroomKillerTips.com. – Rob

The post Exploring the New Lens Blur Panel appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

Solo Mode is one of the biggest time-savers and frustration avoiders in all of Lightroom, and it has the power to speed your entire workflow — all you have to do is turn it on. See how it works in this installment of “Lightroom in 60-seconds.” Check it out:

P.S. I’m taking next week off, so the blog is taking the week off, too. Have a safe and happy Holiday!

The post Work Smarter and Faster Using Lightroom’s ‘Solo Mode’ appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

Configure your default catalog

One of the most important ways of ensuring you’re opening the correct catalog each time you launch Lightroom Classic is to configure a specific catalog as the Default Catalog. Go to Lightroom Classic > Preferences > General (PC: Edit > Preferences > General) and click the Default Catalog drop-down menu to choose the catalog file that is currently open and set that as the default. From that point forward you can rest assured that each time you launch Lightroom Classic that catalog will open regardless of what catalog you previously had open.

Create an import preset

A huge time saver and important method for keeping your import process consistent and efficient is to save all the common settings of the Import dialog as a preset. On your next typical import, configure all general settings as desired (excluding any settings that are too specific, like keywords or collection membership), and then click the Import Preset drop-down menu and choose Save Current Settings as New Preset. Give the preset a meaningful name when prompted and click Create. The next time you import a new batch of photos just confirm your preset is selected (or select it yourself) and know all your core settings are ready to go.

Master zooming in Library and Develop

Some time ago Lightroom Classic got an update that changed some of the zoom functionality for the better. The first thing to note is that it replaced the old zoom ratios (1:1) with zoom percentages that I think are easier for people to understand. Additionally, it added a 100% button above the Navigator panel to make it easy to quickly jump to that zoom level as needed. You can still access a range of zoom levels, from 6% to 1600% from the drop-down menu at the top of the Navigator. We also gained two new ways to zoom; Box Zoom and Scrubby Zoom. Box Zoom works in both the Library (Loupe view) and Develop modules by holding the CMD key (PC: Ctrl) while dragging a rectangle (box) the size you want to zoom into. Scrubby Zoom only works in Develop (with GPU acceleration enabled), and involves holding the Shift key while dragging left to zoom out or right to zoom in. Give them a try!

Mark folders and collections as favorite sources

If you have folders that you want to access quickly from anywhere in Lightroom Classic, you can mark them as a favorite. Simply right click any folder in the Folders panel and choose Mark Favorite from the contextual menu that appears. This adds a star icon to that folder and adds the folder to the Favorite Sources list accessible from the Filmstrip panel in any module. You can add a collection or even collection set to the Favorite Sources list by first selecting it in the Collections panel, then click the breadcrumbs menu in the Filmstrip and choose Add to Favorites at the bottom of the list (you can remove sources from the list the same way).

Mark most used presets and profiles as favorites

A quick way to gather your most used Develop presets into one group is to mark them as a favorite. Simply right click a preset and choose Add to Favorites from the contextual menu. That preset will be added to a special Favorites group at the top of the Preset panel.

Similarly, you can open the Profile Browser in the Basic panel, scroll through profile groups, and click the star icon that appears in the upper-right corner of each profile to mark it as a favorite. Favorite profiles will conveniently appear in the Profile drop-down menu in the Basic panel for easy access.

Manage the Presets panel

Lightroom Classic comes pre-installed with many Develop presets, in various groups, within the Preset panel. Some are good, some are not, but once you’ve explored them and possibly marked some as favorites (see previous tip) you can hide any preset groups in the panel you no longer need to see (presets marked as favorites will still be visible in the Favorites group even if you hide its parent preset group). Click the + sign at the top of the Presets panel and choose Manage Presets to open the Manage Presets dialog box. From there, simply uncheck any preset groups you no longer want to see in the Presets panel and click Save. You can always go back to this dialog box and restore any hidden groups.

Sync LrC catalog to Lr

To expand your Lightroom Classic catalog to your mobile devices it all starts with syncing your catalog. Click the cloud icon in the upper-right corner of the interface and click Start to begin the process. I’ve got an entire article if you want to learn more.

Explore Auto Adding photos in Lightroom for mobile

I like to use the Lightroom app on my iPhone to transfer photos taken on that device to my Lightroom Classic library. I have the Photography plan with 1TB of storage, so I don’t worry about filling up the cloud storage, and I like that this can be automated. If you only have the 20GB storage plan, use this tip with caution (or not at all). To set up Auto Add, tap the 3-dot menu next to the album you want to add the photos to automatically and toggle the Auto add from device photos to the on position. From that point on any newly add photos to your device’s camera roll will automatically import into Lr. You can disable by toggling that same switch to the off position. This will not automatically add photos previously sitting on your camera roll.

Access the Lightroom camera faster

I love the camera module within the Lr app on my phone and shoot with it a lot. On iOS (version 9 or later) you can jump right to the camera by doing a long press on the Lr icon to access a contextual menu containing an option for Take Photo or Take Selfie to choose the back or front facing camera respectively. On Android (version 7.1.1 or later) the process is similar. Locate the Lr icon on your home screen and give it a long press to access the Lightroom Camera app shortcut.

Set a Target Collection or Album

A fast way to add photos to a collection in Lightroom Classic or album in Lightroom is to designate a collection or album as the Target. In Lightroom Classic, right-click any regular collection and choose Set as Target Collection from the contextual menu. From that point on, you can select any photo (or group of photos in Grid view) and press the B key to add the selection to the Target Collection. In the Lightroom for desktop app, right-click the desired album and choose Set “[album name]” as the Target Album from the contextual menu. In this app, the T key is the shortcut to add selected photos to that album.

The post 10 Lightroom Classic and Lightroom Tips appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

I told ya it was going to be good!

Insane Deal on my new “How Do I Do That in Photoshop?” Book

Last night, for the launch of my new book, to celebrate we did an online author “Book Chat” where I share a bunch of Photoshop Tips from the book, and we gave away some goodies, and just had a fun Photoshop time. However, when we do these (I do these book chats for all my new book launches), my book publisher, RockyNook, gives a screaming deal to the folks watching. A crazy doesn’t even make sense deal, and they are offering it through the end of the day today.

It retails for $34.95. Amazon discounts it down to $33.37.

RockyNook is offering it direct for $15 until tonight. The print edition. Seriously.

Just $10 for the eBook version, and (get this) only $20 for BOTH! It would make a perfect gift, too!

Here’s the link to get the deal (only good through today, as best as I can tell).

Have a great weekend everybody! #GoBucs (we’re leading our division, which is a miracle unto itself, but we go to GreenBay this Sunday – an incredibly hard place for anyone to win, much less the Bucs, so let’s hope the Falcons and Saints both lose, too).

-Scott

The post Busting Common Myths About Lightroom appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

I am officially declaring today ‘Delete Your Outdated Lightroom Catalog Backups” Monday!

Simply put: Check to see if you’re accumulating a bunch of useless outdated backup catalogs, and throw the ones away you don’t need anymore to free up space

You see that dialog above — the one that appears when you quit Lightroom Classic, asking if you want to make a backup copy of your catalog? Each time you see it, it asks you to make a COPY of your entire catalog. Each time you hit that ‘Back up,’ it makes yet another backup copy. Sure, it compresses that backup quite a bit, but still…those backups can get really big in file size. But worse yet, after a couple of weeks, they’re so outdated that those older ones become useless anyway.

So, go see how many backups you have (you really only need one or two very recent ones).

Look inside your Lightroom folder (the one where your catalog(s) are stored (mine was inside my Pictures folder on my Mac), and look for a folder named ‘Backups.” and inside that folder, see if you don’t have a whole bunch of backups that are way out of date (as seen above), just eating up hard drive space for no reason.

If you don’t see a folder named ‘Backups,’ that’s because you don’t have any backups (ack!), so if disaster strikes (your catalog gets corrupted), you will be starting over from scratch in Lightroom. For more on backing up your catalog, check out this article we did on backing up your catalog (why you should and how to do it), hit this link. 

I still had some old backups hanging around from 2020. If somehow my catalog got corrupted, I would want to use a backup from December of 2023 — not one from April of 2020, and so on, so those outdated backups are doing just one thing — eating up space. Now’s the time to pitch them, seeing as it’s ‘Dump Your Outdated Catalog Backups” Monday!

Hope at the very least it frees up some space for you, and if you looked in your Lightroom folder and didn’t even see a folder named ‘Backups’ maybe it made you go and hit that ‘Make Backup’ button so you at least have one on hand in case disaster strikes.

What a great football weekend! Alabama gets into the National Football Playoffs; The Bucs actually won a game (and the Saints lost, which we needed). It was a rockin’ great weekend. Hope your Monday is just as good.

-Scott

The post It’s “Delete Your Outdated Lightroom Catalog Backups” Monday! appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.