Comments on: Digital Image Editing Workflow

By: John Deir

John Deir — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 01:12:58 +0000

I’m new to all this and could see that managing a photo library could get intense so I got a book from library: “The DAM Book” by Peter Krogh. WOW, so much more explained than what is touched here. I was more interested in metadata query and discovered much more in how workflow develops with photography.

Though much of the book is over my head, I am going to start out better prepared to develop, backup, save, catalog, and tag and name as well as how to find and query photos in the future. Didn’t realize how in-depth this is.
Have others read this book or know of “digital Asset Management?” Would like to know more about such.

By: Michael Swanson

Michael Swanson — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 19:41:25 +0000

Why is photoshop so damn good, I use a free Paintnet site. Same tools, but no one ever gives tips or advice.

By: Russell Featherstone

Russell Featherstone — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 10:57:46 +0000

Simply visit http://www.cbrush.com. It changed the way I edit photo’s forever with a simple 17 step workflow. Good luck

By: Ric

Ric — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 22:32:58 +0000

Over the years I have collected and tried out processing tips and read or watched dozens of tutorials. This culminates in my current workflow for Adobe Photoshop CS4. The asterisk at the start of a section indicates where I have created an Action or a Script to speed up common and repetitive tasks.

BRIDGE: Load images and delete all less than perfect files. Add Key Words.

RAW: Process and then open selected images.

If for PRINT: Edit/Convert to (Printing) Profile.

SAVE AS: Save in ‘Ric’s Doodles CURRENT’ / [FOLDER] / [FILE NAME]. (The original remains untouched.)

STRAIGHTEN: Use Measure tool across current horizon/vertical. Image/Canvass Rotate/Arbitrary = Auto Align.

ADD SPECIAL EFECTS: B/W, etc.

*CUSTOM SHAPES: Rule of Thirds Grid – position to get most effective image. Crop.

DUST: Use Spot Heal tool to remove dust and scratches.

DETAILED EDITING: If Required.

NOISE: Filter/Noise/Reduce Noise.

*ADJUSTMENTS: Image/Adjustments/Match/Neutralise. Curves – Adjust per channel. Layer/Flatten Image (or not). Filter/Smart Sharpen. Add Stroke (Border).

*ACTION: Add Signature.

*CTRL S: Save – adds Copyright metadata and creates JPEG at 20% of .PSD file.

By: BIll Pearl

BIll Pearl — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 21:01:01 +0000

Basic Pixel Changing Edits (PSP X2)

1. Colour Balance. Also known as white balance or light source adjustment. Adjust > Automatic Color Balance

2. Brightness and Contrast: Adjust > Brightness and Contrast > Brightness/Contrast or Histogram > Gamma for more control

3. Crop and Compose: Choose the desired print proportion from the Presets menu in the Tool Options palette or do a manual cropping. (Turn on Tool Options: View > Palettes > Tool Options)

4. Sharpen the Image: Adjust > Sharpness > Unsharp Mark Try using Paint Shop Pro’s default values a try first: radius, 2; strength, 100; clipping, 5. If the result is noisy or ragged, undo the sharpening. You may need to zoom in a little to see the effect.
(Sharpening with High Pass Filter has less chance of creating the unwanted contrast halo often associated with unsharp mask (or similar))

5. Noise Reduction: Don’t bother if the picture was taken in normal lighting with a low ISO setting. But for night shots, long exposures, or ISO above 400, then there might be noisy pixels in your image. Adjust > One Step Noise Removal or Digital Camera Noise Removal for more control
Download for free from Imagenomic “Noiseware Community Edition Standalone 2.6″

After you’ve taken these initial steps, you can always make other changes, such as boosting the saturation or adjusting the colors. You might also want to add filters, perform special effects, or do some composite work by adding layers, etc.

6. Metadata: After editing and saving photos, load the files into a photo organizer and add some keywords so they’ll be easy to find. (Palettes > Organizer – Ctrl+b)

By: harold

harold — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 16:51:36 +0000

Should cropping, cloning, and resizing come before anything else? Don’t adjustments like contrast, etc.. affect sharpening on their own.
Where should noise reduction come in the order of process.
Do you think you should have the final composition and final size ready before actually starting any other editing due to the opposite functions working based on what the compositions is to start with instead of what it will be in the end.
harold

By: Pranav Yaddanapudi

Pranav Yaddanapudi — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 04:00:49 +0000

I always use freeware or open source software like PhotoScape/Paint.NET/Gimp. My workflow usually goes like this:

- set white balance if needed
- duplicating layer and blend in Multiply/Overlay mode and flatten
- duplicate layer and blend in Soft Light mode and flatten (optional)
- Apply any filters for special effects like glow/lomo/mute colors etc. (optional)
- Crop & Resize as needed and Save

I use Windows Live Photo Gallery and Picasa to organize my pictures and upload them to my favorite online services (Flickr/PicasaWeb).

By: AikenDrum105

AikenDrum105 — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:45:04 +0000

I use Bibble under linux as well (it is also avail for windows), but leave the images in raw (NEF) and only convert to jpg to email or give a copy to someone. Bibble is really good at batch converting / printing etc. Love it It’s a tasty price too..
Also worth noting – Bibble leaves the raw files unchanged, but stores a little bibble ref file alongside them with all the changes you’ve made ala WB, curves, crops etc. It means you can always go back to the original shot, and don’t have to have duplication on your HD.

By: FFred

FFred — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 11:46:03 +0000

My workflow is fully in Linux but the basics work with pretty much anything :
1 : Dump the PEF (RAW) files in a directory named with the date in ISO format
2 : make a blind run on the directory with Bibble to create JPEG files. Those go to a sub directory called JPEG.
3 : review the JPEGs to see which file need (or are worthy) of working on
4 : The interesting files get corrected / balanced / cropped in Bibble and go to a second directory called Export.
5 : If needed, further retouching is done with the Gimp or with the digiKam editor.
6 : Files are indexed with comments and keywords in digiKam.

By: Clifford Newton

Clifford Newton — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 13:24:18 +0000

I have subscribed to Digital Photo mag from the offset and find it invaluable and now I have discovered Digital-photography-School things could not be better! What a great site.