More on Sharpening in Adobe Lightroom 3

More on Sharpening in Adobe Lightroom 3

In the theory of sharpening, the process can be broken down into three phases: capture sharpening, creative sharpening, and output sharpening. Last week I covered sharpening in the Develop module which is the primary tool for sharpening and can handle all three phases, but Lightroom also has dedicated tools for sharpening in the Import dialog of the Library module for capture sharpening, as well as in the Print and Web modules for output sharpening.

Sharpening During Import

Import sharpening

Print sharpening

Web sharpening

Digital image capture is an inherently lossy process. Reality has to be forced to fit within the confines of your pixels and how they see the world. And since each photosite on your camera's sensor only sees one primary color rather than all three there is even more loss. Fully two-thirds of your eventual image has to be guessed, or "interpolated" based on data that was captured. If a given photosite is sensitive to red light, the green and blue values that will be used to render that pixel have to be approximated from neighboring pixels. The algorithms used to do this are quite sophisticated, but still involve a lot of guess work, even if these could be legitimately described as educated guesses. Capture sharpening aims to restore some of the softness caused by inherent limitations of this technology.

To get new images into the Library module in Lightroom, you have to import them. When you do, the dialog gives you the opportunity to apply a set of pre-saved Develop settings. These settings can include color correction, black and white conversion, adding film grain, vignetting, or just about anything you might want. If Lightroom doesn't come with a preset to do what you want you can save new presets. In my opinion, most of these sorts of edits are better made directly in the Develop module, but one type of change worth considering during import is sharpening. Specifically, I'm referring to capture sharpening.

Lightroom comes with two presets for sharpening: "Sharpening ? Narrow Edges (Scenics)" and "Sharpening ? Wide Edges (Faces)." In an unusual twist, these names are actually fairly descriptive. If you are importing a batch of images (such as scenics) that contains a lot of detail you want to render clearly, choose the former. If you have a batch of images (such as facial portraits) that should clearly show major edges but might yield unflattering results if every imperfection shows, choose the latter. If over time you don't find either of these to your liking tweak one or the other and save it as your own Develop preset.

Regardless of how you sharpen a batch of images during import, keep in mind that Lightroom never actually changes your actual image data. Whatever choices you make at this stage remain freely editable later on when you optimize each image in the Develop module. Think of sharpening during import as a time saver to get you in the ballpark. You're not locked into anything.

Sharpening in the Print and Web Modules

After you spend time making an image look its best in the Develop module, you have to print it or export it to some format that allows you to share it with others. Unfortunately, both of these are inherently lossy processes, just like image capture. There is a degree of softening that happens during printing or saving a file to jpeg or other similar formats. Output sharpening aims to mitigate this loss, and Lightroom helps you do this with tools provided in both the Print and Web modules.

Sharpening in the Print module takes a different approach from the way sharpening works in Develop. Gone are the sliders for such abstract variables as "Amount" and "Detail." In their place are settings for Media Type as "Glossy" or "Matte" and whether you want "Low," "Standard," or "High" sharpening. Together with the selected Print Resolution in pixels per inch, Lightroom can then use these choices to calculate the sharpening needed. Note that your choice of paper type here is independent from the paper type selection in your printer driver, but generally both should be set the same. If you select "Draft Mode Printing" print sharpening is disabled.

One thing that is missing from Print module sharpening is the ability to preview what you will end up with. It would be nice if Adobe provided a window to see how your choices will affect the results, but this would be difficult since so much depends on your particular printer and paper choices. You will need to figure out what works best for your own needs. One way to do this would be to put together a test file that represents the variety of what you normally print and print it with various choices. You can use one of the print package templates to easily print a selection of images at the same time. After printing, you can set the resulting pages side by side for comparison in detail.

Lightroom also lets you "print" to a jpeg file via the "Print To:" drop-down box at the top of the Print Job settings. Media Type isn't relevant in this case so Lightroom disables that selection.

Sharpening in the Web module is even simpler. Under Output Settings, all you get is a dropdown selection for "Low," "Standard," or "High." Lightroom handles the rest for you.

Keep in mind that you don't have to apply any sharpening in Print or Web. In fact, if you sharpen in the Develop module with your target output media in mind, you probably don't want to duplicate that in Print or Web. The choice of what you use is up to you.

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Lightroom Panel Tips and Tricks

Lightroom Panel Tips and Tricks

The user interface in Adobe Lightroom is made up of panels that are highly configurable for various needs. Sometimes they seem to configure themselves accidentally too. Here are some tips and tricks to help you understand how they work.

The basics of panels are fairly straightforward. Individual panels are arranged into groups, one on the left and one on the right hand side of the screen. There's also the Module Picker across the top and the Filmstrip along the bottom. The display of each of these four main groupings can be turned on and off individually to provide more screen real estate for your actual image and what you are working on. To do so, go to Window >> Panels and check or uncheck the last four options for "Show Module Picker (F5)," "Show Filmstrip (F6)," "Show Left Modules Panel (F7)," or "Show Right Modules Panel (F8)" as desired. After you've done it this way a few times though, you will probably learn the keyboard shortcut equivalents for each. Press the F5 key and the Modules Picker will disappear. Press it again and it's back. The function key shortcuts for the others work the same way. Having one of these panels mysteriously disappear and not knowing how to get it back again is a problem experienced at some point by most new Lightroom users. Hit the wrong key on the keyboard in an application with this many keyboard shortcuts and there's no telling what might happen.

To hide both side panels, you can use Window >> Panels >> Toggle Side Panels, or simply hit the Tab key. Indeed, this is one of the easiest ways to accidentally lose your panels and be in a position where you need to find them again if you're a new user. There's also Window >> Panels >> Toggle All Panels, or its keyboard equivalent Shift-Tab to hide or show all four main panel groups.

Within the left and right modules panels are the controls for the various tools built into Lightroom. Even with that much space devoted to them, not everything will be visible unless you have a very large monitor. Window >> Panels will also give you access to hiding any or all of these including the Navigator, Histogram and other individual screen components. There are keyboard shortcuts for each but most aren't likely to be hit accidentally so I won't go into details here.

Each individual side group panel has a header where the title for that tool appears. If you click on the header of an open panel, that panel will be closed so that all that will show is the header with no actual controls beneath it. Click on the header again and the panel will expand back open. It's not necessary to click on the triangle icon to the right of the title to do this; you can click anywhere on the panel header. If you hold down the Control key (Command key on Mac OS) while clicking all the panels in that group will be closed or open as determined by the state of the one you click on. Control-click on one that's open and it will close along with everything else on that side of your screen.

If you right-click on the header for an individual tool panel you'll get a context menu giving you the ability to completely remove each of the panels in that group (left or right) if you don't or rarely need specific tools. Simply uncheck a module and it will vanish, header and all. To get it back again, just turn on the checkmark next to it on this same context menu. There's also "Show All" and "Hide All" to do the same thing for everything in that group all at once. Yes, "Hide All" will indeed leave you with a completely empty but still visible panel group. The Navigator on the left will remain as will the Histogram on the right since they are controlled separately but everything else will be gone. Right-click on the gaping blank space that remains and you'll thankfully still get the same menu so you get your panels back. At the bottom of the same menu are options for "Expand All" and "Collapse All" to let you keep the panel headers but collapse all of their contents.

On the outermost edge of both side panel groups you'll find a vertical strip with a small triangle icon. Click on this stripe with your mouse and the corresponding panel group will be hidden the same as if you had hit F7 or F8. If you hold down the Alt key (Option key on Mac OS) while clicking on this vertical stripe, you'll get a context menu with even more options. "Manual" is the way things start out. Panels only change visibility when you click on the vertical strip with the show/hide triangle icon. Selecting "Auto Hide" will hide the panel when you move your mouse away from it. "Auto Hide and Show" will do the same but will also cause the panel to automatically reappear when you move your mouse back over the show/hide control strip so you don't have to click on it. "Auto Hide and Show" appears to be the default option but in fact this is not the case. By default, showing and hiding the side panels is set to Manual yet the checkbox curiously shows in the wrong place until you have adjusted this yourself. There's also "Sync With Opposite Panel" which will cause Lightroom to use the same behavior to both left and right module group panels.

You can set the same automatic hide and show behavior with the top and bottom panels (the Module Picker and Filmstrip) using similar hide/show icon strips on the very top and bottom of the Lightroom application window.

You can also make the left and right panel groups wider or narrower by clicking on their inner edge (the divider closest to the main central image display area) with your mouse and dragging as needed. Combining options, you can drag the side panels as wide as needed but set them to auto hide so they get out of your way when you aren't using them.

It's also possible to temporarily get rid of the menu bar in Lightroom by switching to full screen mode via Window >> Screen Mode >> Full Screen. Together with the ability to hide the four main panel groups when not needed you can really get down to business and avoid clutter when working on an image. By pressing the "F" key by itself you can toggle full screen mode on and off. This is another way that new users sometimes inadvertently find themselves needing advice like what I'm covering here. As I said, press the wrong key in an application with this many keyboard shortcuts and there's no telling what might happen.

There's also a small toolbar strip directly below the main image area in the Develop module that can be gotten rid of either on purpose or accidentally by pressing the "T" key. Press it once and this toolbar will disappear. Press it again and it's back.

Another way to get rid of panel clutter in Lightroom is to use the "Lights Out" mode via the choices under Window >> Lights Out. You can dim everything other than the image you are working on, or blacken everything else out completely. The easiest way to cycle through these modes, and yet another keyboard accident waiting to get new users into trouble, is by pressing the "L" key on the keyboard. Press it once and the panels dim. Press it again and they go completely black. Press "L" one more time and things are back where you started as visible. Edit >> Preferences >> Interface gives you the ability to control just how dimmed "dim" is and what color Lights Out leaves you with. By default, the screen will go black but you can change it to other shades of gray or even white if you prefer. Sorry, no neon green.

There are even more ways to customize the Lightroom interface that I'll cover next week.

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Sharpening in Adobe Lightroom 3

Sharpening in Adobe Lightroom 3

I've written a number of articles on how best to sharpen images in Adobe Photoshop but Lightroom can do an outstanding job of sharpening as well. If you're used to sharpening in Photoshop, the technique is similar in Lightroom, but much better. Here's the basic rundown.

First, as with all things in Lightroom, sharpening is processed non-destructively. It never actually changes the underlying pixels of your image. Everything it does exists solely as a list of instructions to be applied on-the-fly to your image preview. These instructions are stored along with all your other adjustments when you save your image. When you open it next time, everything is right where you left it. All your adjustments look like they are part of your image, but the really aren't. If you subsequently make more changes, nothing has been lost or degraded as a result of your earlier choices. You can tweak things as much as you want until you are satisfied, with no more loss than if you had made those same choices in the beginning. None of those edits actually get baked into your image until you print it or export it from Lightroom.

It's also worth pointing out that sharpening in Lightroom only ever affects the luminance channel of the image, not the color. As such, problems of fringing and color shifts are far less likely than when working in RGB mode in Photoshop.

Before you start sharpening, open your image in the Develop module and create a virtual copy by right clicking on the image in the main window and selecting "create virtual copy." This will let you use View >> "Before / After" to easily see the net effect of your sharpening. Making a virtual copy isn't required, but it can be helpful and there's little reason not to. Lightroom virtual copies don't take any real space since they exist just as a second set of adjustment instructions rather than a second copy of the image pixels themselves. Remember, Lightroom never changes your actual image pixels.

The controls for Sharpening in Lightroom are located in the Detail panel of the Develop module. The interface looks straightforward enough. At the top of the section is a small detail zoom preview window. Underneath that you'll find four sliders. But before you just start pushing those sliders around, let's take a look at what each of these does.

By default, the zoom preview shows you a 1:1 view but the scale can be changed in much the same way as the main image view window. If you click on it with your left mouse button, the zoom will toggle between this close-up view and an overall view of your image. Click again and it goes back to the zoom view. If instead you right mouse click the zoom preview you can change to close-up to be a full 2:1 view. This larger-than-life view can lead to a mistaken impression of what your image looks like unless you are careful so I'd suggest leaving the zoom preview at the standard 1:1 view for most situations.

Amount

Radius

Detail

Masking

What I generally do is to set the zoom preview to 1:1 and adjust the main Develop view panel to 1:2. The fifty-percent view, or 1:2, works well to gauge the degree of sharpening and the 1:1 zoom preview helps check detail areas when needed. With this configuration, checking the overall view of the image requires just a single mouse click on the main image to toggle it to the "fit" view so you can see the whole thing. Click again and I'm back to the 1:2 view.

To move the zoom window around the image, either click on it and drag, or click on the small cross-hairs icon to the upper left of the zoom preview and then move your cursor over the main image. As you do, the zoom preview will track your mouse movements. Clicking on the main image will end the tracking and lock the zoom preview where you clicked.

There's also a down-arrow icon to the upper right of the zoom preview that will let you collapse the Detail panel to get rid of the zoom preview, although I honestly don't know why you would want to do that.

Now on to the sliders.

As befits its position as the topmost slider in the Sharpening dialog, the Amount slider controls the overall amount of sharpening to be applied and is likely the one that will have the greatest affect on the appearance of the image you are working on. The farther to the right you position it the more affect it will have. If the Amount slider is left at its default value of zero, none of the other sliders can be used and will appear grayed out. You can take this as a clue that you are intended to use the Amount slider first when sharpening.

If you hold down the Alt key (Option key on Mac OS) as you move the Amount slider you can temporarily view your image purely as grayscale. In full color, your eye can easily be fooled into thinking your image is sharper than it is if the subject has a strong color contrast compared to the background. Sharpening works by adjusting contrast along edges and working in grayscale makes it easier to accurately gauge contrast. Don't worry — as soon as you release the Alt key the color will return.

The Radius slider determines how close to detected edges detail needs to be to be included in the sharpening affect. It also helps determine just where those edges are. As you move the slider further to the right Lightroom will find ever more details in your image that qualify as edges.

Just as with the Amount slider, you can hold down the Alt (Option) key while adjust the Radius slider to gain insight into how your changes will affect the image. When you do, the image will turn to a grayscale version but this time the view will be based just on the edges that Lightroom finds. Where no edges are detected the image will appear as featureless medium-toned gray. Edges will stand out as increased contrast areas in that field of gray. The view will be familiar if you have ever made use of the high-pass sharpening technique in Photoshop. Generally, you should move the slider until only major edges start to appear in the zoom preview but this will vary somewhat based on what sort of detail you want to emphasize. Remember, all your adjustments here are lossless so you can feel comfortable playing with the sliders to optimize your results for the particular image you are working on.

The Detail slider functions similarly to the Radius slider but looks only at fine detail rather than at all edges. You can safely set the Detail slider to a higher value if the Radius slider is set lower, and vice versa. The two work hand in hand. If both are set too high, watch out. If you want to accentuate only major edges, set the Radius high and the Detail low. If you are working on an image with fine detail that you want to see clearly, set the Radius more moderately and raise the Detail slider. Holding down the Alt (Option) key works the same way for the Detail slider as it does for Amount.

The Masking slider is a welcome addition to Lightroom that makes it easy to limit your sharpening to edges and keep areas that don't need sharpening unchanged. There's nothing more frustrating than sharpening digital noise that may happen to exist in what is supposed to be a clear blue sky. Masking lets you avoid this. If you are familiar with edge sharpening techniques in Photoshop, you probably already understand the intent of the Masking slider. As you move the slider to the right, only areas that truly should be considered edges will be affected with everything else masked out. If you hold down the Alt (Option) key while adjusting Masking you can see the traditional grayscale display of the mask. Areas that are black will be blocked completely from the affects of sharpening. Areas that aren't will be affected proportionally to how bright they appear in the mask display. With the slider all the way down at zero, the sharpening will be applied equally across the image. With it moved all the way up to 100 only the most obvious of edges will qualify. With the Mask slider set appropriately for an image you can more safely boost the values of the other sliders without fear of halos and other artifacts.

I really like the way Lightroom implements sharpening. Sharpening has long been problematic in Photoshop due both from a lack of good tools as well as the fact that the process is inherently destructive in Photoshop since it requires actual pixels to be modified. And since it works only on the luminance channel it is generally much easier to sharpen in Lightroom than in Photoshop without fear of ending up with something that ends up looking like you sharpened it.

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More Lightroom Panel Tips and Tricks

More Lightroom Panel Tips and Tricks

The panels of Adobe Lightroom can be customized and configured in quite a few ways, some obvious and some less so, some useful some just simply for fun. I covered the basics last week, now it's time for some of the more "interesting" panel tips and tricks.

Font Size
You can change the font size used in Lightroom's panels to either "Small" or "Large" using a dropdown in the Edit >> Preferences >> Interface dialog. The default is to let Lightroom decide which is best based on your monitor resolution. You have to exit out of Lightroom and restart the program for the change to take effect.

Pinstripes
Go to Edit >> Preferences >> Interface. Not only can you change the shade of gray here that Lightroom will use as the fill color behind whatever is displayed in the main image area as well as the secondary display window, you can fill the area with a very fine pinstripe pattern. An odd touch to be sure, but I am unclear as to what use it actually serves. Indeed, if your monitor has a high enough resolution, the stripes that make up the pinstripe pattern are themselves barely perceptible with the result appearing nearly as just another shade of gray. Still, it's thoughtful of Adobe to provide a touch of class like this.

Panel End Marks
Here's another touch of elegant class that Adobe added to the Lightroom user interface for some unknown reason. Take a look at either side panel group and scroll all the way to the bottom. What you will find is a flourish curlycue thingy that looks like it belongs more at the top of a Roman column than it does in a photo editing program. One might cynically assume that Adobe placed these at the ends of the panel groups so even the most inexperienced users would know when they were at the bottom and stop dragging on the scroll bar handles. I just know there had to have been a more practical reason, I just can't come up with it.

Anyway, since they are there and we're on the subject of tips and tricks for Lightroom's panels, why not change them to something other than the default so you can show that you have even more class than Adobe's engineers? No problem. Either go back to the Edit >> Preferences >> Interface panel and try out some of the entries in the End Marks dropdown list, or right click on the current end mark at the bottom of a panel and do likewise. Here you will find a variety of ornaments, flourishes, and clip art to choose from. Whatever you pick will replace both left and right panel group end marks.

After you work your way to the end of the available choices you'll run into the "Go to Panel End Marks Folder" that will display an empty folder on your hard drive. Since you've just looked at a selection of end marks you might have been expecting the folder to filled with the files used to render what youv'e just seen but the built-in end marks live elsewhere. But if you put your own file here you can indeed use it as an additional end mark choice.

Adobe doesn't do a very good job of describing how to make your own end marks, but the process is actually quite straightforward. Indeed, just about any image you put in this folder will add itself to the End Marks dropdown list and will indeed display at the bottom of both panel groups if you select it. But before you go hog wild, you might consider what would actually work. Your artwork should be about the same size as the default samples as anything too big could cause problems. And while you can use a color image, I'd recommend sticking with grayscale if you want your new end mark to look like it belongs as part of the Lightroom user interface. The width of your creation should be no bigger than about 150 pixels, with 100 pixels probably being the maximum practical height. I created a PNG image with a transparent background from the Earthbound Light logo and added it to my Panel End Marks folder and it actually looks quite smart at the bottom of my Lightroom panel marks. There may be no practical reason for doing this, but it was fun and I like it.

Oh, the irony that it takes Photoshop to create a new Lightroom panel end mark. You can't feasibly do so in Lightroom.

So there you have it: a roundup of some of the less common tricks and tips for Lightroom panels. If you have your own favorite, let me know and if I like it, I'll add it here.

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Cropping and Rotating Images in Adobe Lightroom

Cropping and Rotating Images in Adobe Lightroom

Even though everything in Lightroom is nondestructive, you aren't limited to just basic tonal corrections and contrast. While there are limits to what you can do, they lie far beyond just this. I've written already about sharpening in Lightroom, but you can also do such tasks as cropping an image or straightening a horizon. There are some great choices in how Adobe implemented this, but there are also some awkward ones.

First, Lightroom is a modular program with different modules designed to handle different kinds of tasks generally associated with different phases of working on an image. There's the Library module for importing and organizing images, the Develop module for doing the heavy lifting of optimizing the appearance of selected images, and the Slideshow, Print and Web modules for sharing the results of those optimizations via different media. Everything I'm going to describe here is part of the Develop module.

To crop an image, open it in the Develop module and click on the Crop Overlay tool in the toolbar. In the standard window configuration, you'll find it as the far left icon in the first row underneath the histogram. Lightroom lets users reconfigure panels quite a bit so you may have moved things around in your copy. It looks like a dashed white rectangle. When you click on it, the image you are working on will be outlined with a thin white border with somewhat thicker adjustment handles on each corner and in the middle of each side. The area to be cropped is what is defined by this border so by default your entire image is selected. You can select a smaller area either by grabbing the adjustment handles and dragging them inward as needed, or by clicking with your mouse anywhere on the image and dragging to open up a new selection border replacing the current one. Either way, you can fine tune your crop selection until you are satisfied by means of the adjustment handles. You can also click and drag on the overlay with your mouse to reposition things, but rather than moving the selection border over the image, this will move the image itself underneath the stationary selection border. To me this seems somewhat counterintuitive as it requires you to drag to the right in order to reposition the selection border closer to the left hand side of the image and so on. You must drag in the opposite direction than it seems (at least to me) like you should since you are not moving what (at least to me) you think you will be moving. Remember, even though you must click inside the selection border to do this, the image moves, not the crop border.

Everything outside your selection will appear slightly dimmed. So far as I am aware, you can't control the degree of dimming as is possible with the Crop tool in Photoshop. You might be tempted to think the Dim Level for the Lights Out mode on the Interface tab of the Lightroom Preferences would affect this but it doesn't. While I'd love to be able to darken the color somewhat, the opacity Lightroom does use is still quite workable. Note that the Navigator image will show the cropped version even before the crop has been completed so you can see the image without the distraction of what lies outside the selection this way too.

You may be pleased to find that Lightroom provides a grid overlay on your crop area. This can help you recompose your image, aligning things with the rule of thirds or other preferred divisions of the frame such as the Golden Ratio made famous by the ancient Greeks and medieval painters. To change to the overlay, choose Tools >> Crop Guide Overlay from the menus. There's also a selection for Tool Overlay on the bar underneath the image when the Crop Overlay tool is active. Hitting the letter "o" on your keyboard will cycle through the overlays. You can turn the overlay off completely via Tools >> Tool Overlay >> Never Show. Curiously, hitting the "o" key will still cycle through even if set to Never Show. If you do, you will find your menu will change to "Always Show."

The Crop Overlay tool also has tool options that normally appear in the toolbar directly below the bar with the icon for Crop Overlay when the tool is active. Here you can lock the selection to a standard aspect ratio and control other options. There's also a "Lock" icon that when clicked on will tell Lightroom to keep the current aspect ratio no matter how else you manipulate things with the Crop Overlay tool.

There's an apparent bug in the aspect ratio crop capability of Lightroom that you will at some point run into. While the Aspect ratio choice in the Crop Overlay options allows you to enter any ratio you want, there's no way to tell it to rotate that crop relative to the image. It always aligns the same direction the image does in terms of portrait versus landscape orientation. To elaborate, entering a custom crop aspect ratio of 3 x 10 will have the same effect as entering 10 x 3. Rather than one giving you a wider image and the other one a tall one, both will do the identical thing for any given image. Hopefully Adobe will fix this at some point.

There is a way to trick the aspect selection in the Crop Overlay tool into changing the orientation it thinks you want by dragging the handles in a specific way. The method works by taking advantage of the fact that the overlay will resize itself to stay within the image as you drag any of its corners. Once the overlay is small enough, you can reposition it and convince it to "flip" orientations by employing an odd sequence of mouse gestures. First, grab the upper left corner adjustment handle. Drag it into the center of the image. The crop selection will shrink to accommodate. With your mouse still held down, drag that handle to the left hand edge of the frame. As you do, the now smaller crop selection overlay will magically turn itself ninety degrees. Presto. You're basically drawing a "V"-like motion with your mouse cursor. Weird, but it does work. You may need to try this trick yourself to really understand it. Matt Kloskowski has a video on Adobe's site that shows him doing it. He doesn't really describe the aspect orientation flip, he just does it while talking about cropping in general, so watch closely. Note that this orientation "flip" can also occur if the aspect ratio is locked. So while the Lock icon will keep the same aspect ratio, it won't necessarily keep the same orientation.

Once you get the crop you desire, just hit the Enter key or click on the "Done" button on the bar below the image and the crop will be executed. Given that Lightroom is indeed fully nondestructive, while you may now only see the portion you selected to crop, rest assured that the entire original image is still there. All you have done is to tell Lightroom you don't want to see what lies outside your crop. Think of this as being at least somewhat like changing the Canvas size in Photoshop. You can select the Crop Overlay tool again to see the entire image again and adjust your crop if desired. There's also a "Reset" button at the bottom of the Crop Overlay options that will remove a previous crop entirely.

The Crop Overlay tool can also be used to rotate an image. With the tool active, click just outside any of the corner adjustment handles and drag in a rotating motion and the image will spin with the selection outline remaining stationary. I like the way Adobe implemented this feature. The Crop tool in Photoshop turns the selection boundary with the image standing still, forcing you to turn your head to see what things look like. Lightroom thankfully rotates the image and keeps the selection still so you don't end up with a crick in your neck after rotating a few images. There's also a slider in Lightroom with an accompanying numeric input box for the rotation angle in the Crop Overlay options area that works the same way.

An even better way to straighten an image in Lightroom though is to use the Straighten tool found in the Crop Overlay options area. It looks somewhat like a small carpenter's level and can be found just to the left of the rotation Angle slider. If you click on the Straighten tool and then drag over your image to draw a line the image will be rotated to make that line horizontal or vertical (whichever is closer) when you let go of the mouse. If you hold down the Alt key (Option key on OS X) Lightroom will kindly display a grid overlay aligned with your Straighten line to help you make sure you have the angle as you want it.

This article wouldn't be complete without mention of one more rotation option that doesn't entail the Crop Overlay tool at all. From the menu you can use Photo >> Rotate Left (CCW) or Rotate Right (CW) to easily rotate the image by ninety degrees in the selected direction.

Again, no matter what you do in terms of cropping or rotating your images in Lightroom, the underlying image data remains unchanged so feel free to experiment.

Update 6/27/2011 - Wow. Loyal reader CB wrote in to let me know something I never knew. Turns out you can quite easily change the orientation of the crop selection box by simply pressing the "x" key on the keyboard. What could be easier? Many thanks!

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Earthbound Light - Nature photography from the Pacific Northwest and beyond

Welcome to Earthbound Light, where you will find some of the results of my passion for nature photography. I hope you enjoy what you find, but please be considerate of the work it took to do all this. The entire site contents including all images and articles are copyrighted. I would ask that you honor this and not copy them. If you are interested in publishing any of my images or articles or using them in other ways, please contact me so we can discuss your needs.

Thanks,

Earthbound Light Comes to Facebook and Twitter!

After listening to friends incessantly extoll the wonders of Facebook, I finally joined and also set up a page for Earthbound Light. I'm still figuring out how best to make use of Facebook, but I've already connected with friends I haven't talked to in years. If you're a Facebook member, drop by the Earthbound Light page and become a Fan.

The NetworkedBlogs application on Facebook also gives readers one more way to follow my weekly PhotoTip articles. Read them on the Facebook Earthbound Light page or add them to your own Wall.

And now, you can follow me on Twitter as well, to get access to my occasional thoughts and observations that fit well in 140 characters or less.

This week's Photo Tip:
Waiting for the Shot

Pacific Northwest weather is always somewhat unpredictable. Many of you could probably say the same thing about the weather where you live. Sometimes everything just works to get the shot you are after. Sometimes there's just no way to get the shot unless you are willing to wait for it. ... (more)

Book Recommendations

Over the years, I've accumulated a lot of books on photography. Click here for some of the better ones that may be of interest to site visitors. New titles are being added all the time. Buying through links on Earthbound Light helps support the site and is greatly appreciated.

Earthbound Light Featured in New Audubon Society Book

The new National Audubon Society Guide to Landscape Photography by Tim Fitzharris has just been published. Along with a lot of great information and Tim?s outstanding photos, the book features a list of resources as an appendix. Along with a selection of newsletters and organizations, books, and equipment providers, there are seven websites recommended as good starting places for further exploration. The first one is the website of Popular Photography Magazine. The second one is Earthbound Light, described as "Bob Johnson's informational website with nature, landscape, and digital photography tips." Sounds good to me.

You can find Tim?s new book at Amazon.com, and booksellers everywhere.

Earthbound Light and Northwest Magazine

In an agreement with Northwest, a bimonthly magazine dedicated to celebrating the Spirit of the Pacific Northwest, images from Earthbound Light were featured frequently in their pages and on their covers.

Northwest is a high-quality magazine that I am proud to be affiliated with.

2007 Environmental Photography Invitational

The winners of the 2007 Environmental Photography Invitational have been announced, and one of my photographs is among the one hundred selected images. The Environmental Photography Invitational, or EPI, is a premier North American photography event. The annual juried photo competition was created by Art Wolfe as "an event for the advancement of photography as a unique medium, capable of bringing awareness and preservation to our environment through art."

You can see the complete 2007 Environmental Photography Invitational gallery by clicking on this page.

2007 NANPA Member Showcase

As with last year, the North American Nature Photography Association has selected approximately 100 photos for their Members' Showcase gallery. They represent some truly excellent talent. And as with last year, one of mine was chosen to be among this elite group as part of the 2007 Member Showcase. A special "NANPA's Expressions 2007" showcase journal has been printed and distributed to all members including these 100 together with 150 additional selected images. All together, four of my images are included. A different photo will be selected each day from the Showcase to appear on the front page of NANPA's website.

Earthbound Light Effects for Photoshop Elements

Users of Adobe Photoshop Elements version 4 and above who are looking for looking for a way to add Curves now have an answer! I've explored a number possible ways of solving this problem and the one that stands out from all the others is the free easy.Filter SmartCurve plug-in by Alois Zingl. Click here to learn about it.

If you are using an Adobe Photoshop Elements version earlier than 4 and long for tools such as Curves to optimize image contrast and the Channel Mixer for black and white conversion, you can add them for free by downloading the Earthbound Light effects for Photoshop Elements. Don't let a silly little thing like Adobe not including them in the box stop you from getting the most out of your images. Works with Elements 1, 2 and 3 on both Windows and Mac OS. If you are running Elements 4 or above, you want SmartCurve instead.

2006 NANPA Member Showcase and Fine Art Galleries

Each year, approximately 100 photos are juried and selected by the North American Nature Photography Association for their Members' Showcase gallery. These represent some of the best work NANPA members produce. For the 2006 Member Showcase, one of mine was chosen among the top 10. These images plus an additional 150 runners-up were printed in a special "Impressions NANPA Showcase 2006" journal distributed to all members. All together, four of my images are included. A different photo will be selected each day from the Showcase to appear on the front page of NANPA's website.

The Summit also featured the first annual NANPA Fine Art Print Exhibit in cooperation with the Colorado Mountain Club. The 100 winning images jurried from those submitted including two of mine.

Earthbound Light Among Top 10 Coolest Sites of the Year!

Earthbound Light was selected by Cool Site of the Day as their choice for Saturday, May 7, 2005. The oldest and still the best, Cool Site of the Day has been picking cool sites they deem worthy of bringing to the attention of a wider audience since 1994. Thanks to everyone who took time to vote for the site.

Here's how Cool Site of the Day announced Earthbound Light to their mailing list: "Dynamic landscape photography by award-winning photographer, easy to understand weekly instructional tips on digital and traditional photography, extensive links and book recommendations. Extremely flattering feedback from visitors the world over. GORGEOUS stuff with some insight to each photo from the photographer. Very cool!"

Update: 2005 is now over and Earthbound Light has finished out the year among the top 10 coolest sites of the year. My thanks to everyone who has visited my site during the year and my congratulations to all the other really cool sites oout there.

Selected Nikonian of the Year 2004 - The Americas

Nikonians is a worldwide community of over 30,000 Nikon users.

In recognition of the team and their membership, they select three members to honor as Nikonian of the Year, one from the Americas, one from Europe, and one from the Asia Pacific Region. For 2004, I was privileged to be selected for the Americas.

"Bob Johnson: Nikonian of the Year 2004 - The Americas. In recognition of his outstanding commitment to the Nikonians community, his outstanding skills as a photographer, and his prolific contributions to the Nikonians forums. For his devotion to teaching and sharing his knowledge and skills with all members of the Nikonians community."

I am truly honored.

Better Photography Magazine

Published in Mumbai, Better Photography is the by far the largest selling photography magazine in India and South Asia. They carry a wide range of articles covering photography techniques, equipment reviews and tests, photo features, and interviews with amateur and professional photographers, along with the latest news in the industry.

The February 2005 issue features an extended interview with me under the title "Bob Johnson: Photographer Par Excellence." Spanning six pages, the interview includes thirteen of my images in full color. I think the article came out quite nice indeed and I?m flattered to be featured in their pages.

For those of you who (like me) live in countries where Better Photography is generally not available, you can download an Adobe Acrobat reprint of the article here (800KB pdf file). Those of you who do live in India and South Asia should pick up a copy, not just for the article covering my work, but also for the rest of their excellent content.

The Mountaineers is a great organization for those interested in the outdoors. If you live in Washington sate, click here to find more information.

See Earthbound Light on on these other fine websites!

Work is available for licensing as stock
and for sale as fine-art digital prints.

Entire site contents* copyright © 2000 - 2011 Bob Johnson, all rights reserved worldwide. No form of reproduction, including copying or saving of digital image files or articles, or the alteration or manipulation of said content is permitted.

* The extremely fine print: Logos and other images used for support to other sites are copyright by their respective owners. This entire domain and all associated e-mail addresses are located in the State of Washington (as are Mt. Rainier, Mt. Baker and the North Cascades and the Olympic Peninsula which are my primary focus). Sending unsolicited mail to addresses at this domain is subject to the provisions of the Revised Code of Washington.

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Food Photography – An Introduction

Interested in learning about Food Photography? Read on for some introductory tips.

Visit any bookshop and head for the cook book section and you’ll be overwhelmed by the array of books filled with scrumptious recipes accompanied by wonderful photography of the meals being written about.

Colorful stacks of vegetables drizzled with rich sauces on a clean white plate with glistening table settings – you know the shots. Sometimes the photography is almost the true focus of the book with the recipes taking a secondary role.

But how do you photograph food and get such great results?

Treat the food you’re photographing as you would any other still life subject and ensure that it is well lit. Many of the poor examples of food photography that I’ve come across in the research for this article could have been drastically improved with adequate lighting. One of the best places to photograph food is by a window where there is plenty of natural light – perhaps supported with flash bounced off a ceiling or wall to give more balanced lighting that cuts out the shadows. This daylight helps to keep the food looking much more natural.

Pay attention not only to the arrangement of the food itself but to the context that you put it in including the plate or bowl and any table settings around it. Don’t clutter the photo with a full table setting but consider one or two extra elements such as a glass, fork, flower or napkin. These elements can often be placed in secondary positions in the foreground or background of your shot.

Food doesn’t keep it’s appetizing looks for long so as a photographer you’ll need to be well prepared and able to shoot quickly after it’s been cooked before it melts, collapses, wilts and/or changes color. This means being prepared and knowing what you want to achieve before the food arrives. One strategy that some use is to have the shot completely set up with props before the food is ready and then to substitute a stand-in plate to get your exposure right. Then when the food is ready you just switch the stand-in plate with the real thing and you’re ready to start shooting.

The way food is set out on the plate is as important as the way you photograph it. Pay attention to the balance of food in a shot (color, shapes etc) and leave a way into the shot (using leading lines and the rule of thirds to help guide your viewer’s eye into the dish). One of the best ways to learn is to get some cook books to see how the pros do it.

One tip that a photographer gave me last week when I said I was writing this was to have some vegetable oil on hand and to brush it over food to make it glisten in your shots.

A mistake that many beginner food photographers make is taking shots that look down on a plate from directly above. While this can work in some circumstances – in most cases you’ll get a more better shot by shooting from down close to plate level (or slightly above it).

Really focusing in upon just one part of the dish can be an effective way of highlighting the different elements of it.

Having steam rising off your food can give it a ‘just cooked’ feel which some food photographers like. Of course this can be difficult to achieve naturally. I spoke with one food stylist a few years back who told me that they added steam with a number of artificial strategies including microwaving water soaked cotton balls and placing them behind food. This is probably a little advance for most of us – however it was an interesting trick so I thought I’d include it.

I’m certain that DPS readers will have plenty more tips on photographing food – feel free to add your tips in comments below!

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