What is your process?

[NightShadow]

Basically trying to get a feel for editing large amounts of photos after going out to shoot or coming back from a holiday. At the moment my process is:

Import pictures to PC/Mac
Burn RAW files to DVD
Delete any pictures which are beyond help or just plain bad
Go through marking any favourites
Process each picture individually
Export edited pictures as JPG for uploading etc..

What is your process?

 

[Raymond Lin]

Import my local Drive (files are automatically backed up via Wifi to my Drobo, which in turns back itself up)
Sort (pick instead of reject, its more efficient)
Process
Export
Upload

 

[footman]

Sort (pick instead of reject, its more efficient)

hmmm, now that really is food for thought.

 

[bigredshark]

I have a bit of applescript which does the importing basics for me - copy card to drive, backup raw files to NAS, run ACR against the NEF raw files to convert them to DNGs and then import those into Aperture. So I end up with local and remote copies of the original raw files and DNG raws in Aperture.

Then deal with it all in Aperture as normal, I use most of the features like the stackings, tags, ratings etc. It's a rare thing I delete anything at all, storage is cheap. Anything advanced is photoshop and then back into Aperture for library purposes. Exports from Aperture for most things (I have a heap of quality presets) or occasionally direct for web galleries and book printing.

One major advantage of this is if I'm not satisfied I can go back and drag the original NEF into ACR and reprocess it exactly as I want, I like being able to do that but I don't want to bother every time...

As it'll surely get asked - why convert to DNG? Well aperture deals with DNGs or Canon raw files a lot more snappily than it does with NEFs (Nikon raws), it's a sufficient performance benefit to be worth the extra import time for me (and with the applescript I just leave it to it anyway).

 

[ScarySquirrel]

Import my local Drive (files are automatically backed up via Wifi to my Drobo, which in turns back itself up)
Sort (pick instead of reject, its more efficient)
Process
Export
Upload

Same, except my backup process is simply copying the files to another drive. I also do the 'picking', and then go through the picks again and 'unpick', which usually is enough to leave me with my final images.

 

[GSXRMovistar]

Below is my workflow (someone asked me about this a few weeks back so taken from an old email):-

1) Take lots of pics (normally way too many)
2) Import from camera to PC in Lightroom (Under a Category/Date structure, also adding basic meta tags)
3) Remove all the obvious dud/blurred pics (in Lightroom)
4) Go through again and compare duplicates, removing the worst (in Lightroom)
5) Flag any pics I think may be interesting or I can something with (in Lightroom)
6) Process in Lightroom, which will be cropping (making Virtual copies), exposure adjustments (loving the brush tools for this)
7) Then try the various develop presets I have on them (in Lightroom)
• Normally b&w/sepia conversions for overcast pics or anything lacking real colour
• Or Strong contrast/Punchy filters for summer pics or motor shots with lots of shiny bits/chrome
8) On the odd occasion load up an image into Photoshop to edit something not possible with Lightroom (e.g removing someone/something from a shot)
9) Unflag anything I ended up not doing anything with (in Lightroom)
10) Export/process to for web (in Lightroom)
• Export (uncompressed format) at full size
• Run a script from Photoshop that resizes, adds border, inserts meta data and then saves a jpg at @ 70/80% compression (only use photoshop for this as Lightroom can’t really do borders)
• Delete uncompressed exports
13) Upload to various hosting depending on use
• Personal website
• Flickr (Adding geo location and tag info)
• Facebook

 

[p0ss3s3d]

Shoot.
Cards in reader.
Photo mechanic ingest.
Pick.
Caption.
Send.

Back-up when I get home.

 

[Ciphon]

Import my local Drive (files are automatically backed up via Wifi to my Drobo, which in turns back itself up)
Sort (pick instead of reject, its more efficient)
Process
Export
Upload

Just wondered if you still keep the rejects, Raymond? Or do you just flat out delete anything that you don't pick?

 

[Raymond Lin]

Just wondered if you still keep the rejects, Raymond? Or do you just flat out delete anything that you don't pick?

The rejects are kept until the images are delivered, book is done. At which point I deleted the rejects from LR and I then archive the set.

 

[Trick]

Take photos
Copy all shots onto usb hd
View raws in Bridge
Select decent ones
open in acr, tweak, crop etc
import from acr into ps, tweak further, noise reduce if necessary, sharpen
save
upload
link the ones i really like