Basic Photo Editing Programs

[Suburbanmom]

In two weeks, I'm going to the Dominican Republic with a team of high school students to work at an orphanage. I plan to take thousands of pictures since my sole job is to document the trip. I seriously can't wait. I'm making decisions regarding what equipment I should take with me, realizing that I'll pretty much be on my own to carry it around. When we go on vacation, I take the hubby for granted, knowing that he will be my sherpa and carry all my stuff. This time, I'll be on my own.

While I'm sure I'll have other questions for my DIS buddies to help me answer, this particular one is in regard to photo editing programs. I will take my laptop with me and shoot in RAW + jpeg. RAW, becuase I can't stand the thought of having an awesome shot that I can't manipulate when I get home and jpeg because I need the photos to be ready to share quickly. No one on this trip cares about my needs for perfection, they just want to see the photos.

I normally use Lightroom and PSElements to edit. I don't think I want to take those programs with me, I think I need something more basic and doesn't take up as much memory. Does anyone have a receommendation on something cheap (or free!!!) that does a good basic job of editing jpg files? I'll save all the RAW ones for when I get home.

I have always used Adobe programs, so I know nothing about what else is out there. Can you help me?

 

[ThurlFan]

Picasa from Google is nice. Free, small footprint, basic fixes are easy (and do a good job). Don't know if it supports raw though so it might just be good for your JPEGs. I've also used the Gimp open source graphics program, but it's a bit clunkier (though excellent). Good luck with the trip!

 

[GoofyontheHiSeas]

Amy I too would recommend Picasa. It is free and doesn't take up a lot of room. On big advantage is that it will handle Nikon RAW files. You can look at them, print them, upload, and edit them (non-destructive). I only use it now to upload to FB. It has limited editing capabilities (compared to LR) but it is something. Using it may allow you to just shoot in RAW.

 

[Suburbanmom]

I will definately give Picasa a look. Thanks so much for the responses. I'm very interested if I can still edit from my RAW files.

 

[spinetnglr]

I installed Lightroom on my laptop before I went to Sanibel this past summer just because I wanted a program I was a little familiar with to do some basic processing with pics while I was there. It didnt seem to affect the performance of the laptop and I was glad I had a program I kind of knew. I can understand your not wanting to have both LR and PSE but maybe just the Lightroom would be a good answer since you already know the program.

 

[disneyboy2003]

I normally use Lightroom and PSElements to edit. I don't think I want to take those programs with me, I think I need something more basic and doesn't take up as much memory.

Congratulations on your upcoming trip to the Dominican Republic!

Have you tried loading Lightroom onto your laptop? How old is your laptop and how much RAM does it have? My laptop is 2 years old and has 3 GB RAM, and Lightroom seems to do pretty well on it.

I think what also makes Lightroom faster on my laptop is that I only use it for travel photos when I'm away from home. So on my laptop, I'll start a brand new catalog in Lightroom whenever I start a vacation. So during my vacation, my Lightroom catalog is handling only a couple thousand photos, instead of hundreds of thousands of photos.

When I get home, I'll import the laptop catalog into my home computer's main Lightroom catalog (use File > Import from Catalog), essentially merging the 2 catalogs. Many Lightroom books describe this technique of having a temporary Lightroom catalog on a laptop and later importing / merging it into your main Lightroom catalog on your computer at home.

I really like having Lightroom on my laptop for my travel photos. That way, I can get some Lightroom work done & out of the way. For example, adding keywords & captions & GPS coordinates to photos is much easier at the end of the day than doing it a couple weeks later when I've forgotten much of the details. I can also make a quick first-pass through all my photos to select the ones I'll plan on developing / post-processing at a later time.

If your laptop can handle Lightroom, I'd highly recommend it.

 

[dunbarfamily]

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[Suburbanmom]

My laptop is one week old and has 4 GB RAM. It sounds like it should be able to handle Lightroom without problem. I think I'll load it today and see how it does. The more thought I put into it, the better it would be to have a program I'm already familiar with and can do the batch processing. I have no idea what kind of time I'll have to edit while I'm there, or even how often I'll be able to charge the battery. As long as I can clear out my memory cards each day, I should be content.

 

[disneyboy2003]

My laptop is one week old and has 4 GB RAM. It sounds like it should be able to handle Lightroom without problem. I think I'll load it today and see how it does. The more thought I put into it, the better it would be to have a program I'm already familiar with and can do the batch processing. I have no idea what kind of time I'll have to edit while I'm there, or even how often I'll be able to charge the battery. As long as I can clear out my memory cards each day, I should be content.

Well, shoot! If your laptop is only 1 week old, then it should totally be able to handle both Lightroom AND Photoshop Elements! I'd load them both onto your laptop.

I've got Lightroom and regular Photoshop (CS4) both loaded onto my 2-year-old laptop.

I wouldn't worry about doing too much photo editing / processing while you're on vacation. You can always do that when you get home. However, I DO recommend that you at least do your keywords, captioning, geotagging at the end of each day while the info's still fresh in your memory.

 

[mickeysmate65]

Amy - What a great opportunity for you and the team! Enjoy your trip & share pics with us when you return.

 

[VVFF]

I really need to learn more of the advanced features of LR. I use it to edit my RAWs and it still takes me forever to finish vacation pictures. I need to set the defaults for each ISO setting on my camera. I wish they made that easier to do without having to find an image at that ISO setting, make the default adjustments and then save them, then make specific adjustments.

Maybe I'm just crazy but I find I change a lot of color temps(sometimes just a bit) and edit the contrast very differently file to file. Alot of the time I actually lower contrast from the default because it clips highlights and shadow detail too much at its default setting in some conditions.

 

[disneyboy2003]

I'm not sure if you've already invested a lot of time creating & organizing keywords in Lightroom. If you have, then you should export your keywords from Lightroom, and then import them into the new Lightroom catalog on your laptop.

To do this, go to Metadata > Export Keywords. This will create a .txt file with all your Lightroom keywords. Save this .txt file either on a shared network drive or a USB / flash / thumb drive.

If you used the latter option, remove the USB / flash / thumb drive from your computer and plug it into your laptop. On your laptop, go into Lightroom and select Metadata > Import Keywords. This will import all your current Lightroom keywords into your brand new catalog. That way, you don't have to re-invent the wheel and re-create your keywords.

I really need to learn more of the advanced features of LR. I use it to edit my RAWs and it still takes me forever to finish vacation pictures. I need to set the defaults for each ISO setting on my camera. I wish they made that easier to do without having to find an image at that ISO setting, make the default adjustments and then save them, then make specific adjustments.

I'm not quite sure I understand your situation. But I wonder if Lightroom presets are the way to go for your problem. I'll admit, I really haven't used any presets. However, I'll bet you can create presets of your development settings for each ISO (ex. a preset for "ISO 100", a preset for "ISO 200", etc.).

A quick way to find all your photos of a certain ISO is to use the Library Filter. In the Library Module, there should be a "Library Filter" bar at the top. If there isn't, press the "\" key, and it'll appear. In the Library Filter, click "Metadata". Select the top of any of the 4 columns (I'd say select the last column, or create a 5th column). There should be a drop-down list of all the EXIF labels to sort by. Right in the middle is the option to select "ISO Speed". This will allow you to select all photos with a specific ISO.

Once you've got all the photos of a particular ISO, you can then apply the preset for that particular ISO that you created above. You can apply the preset to all those photos all at once, so your development settings are applied to all those photos within seconds!

Will that help?

Maybe I'm just crazy but I find I change a lot of color temps(sometimes just a bit) and edit the contrast very differently file to file. Alot of the time I actually lower contrast from the default because it clips highlights and shadow detail too much at its default setting in some conditions.

I'm always changing the Temperature and Tint for almost every photo. I think the camera often gets us close to the correct white balance, but we're supposed to use the computer to fine-tune the correct white balance in post-processing.

I never touch the Contrast or Brightness sliders...mainly because Scott Kelby's book tell me not to, and I'm one of the fools who always listens to Scott Kelby. However, I always blindly add a little bit of Clarity and a moderate amount of Vibrance to almost all my photos.

For the highlights and shadows, I use the Local Adjustment Brush to dodge & burn (darkening & brightening those parts of the photo, respectively). For clipped highlights & shadows, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

There's so much to learn about Lightroom. There's still tons about Lightroom I have yet to touch. However, once you get the hang of it, it's a deceptively simple program that is actually very very powerful in improving photos.


Edited to add: I know that VVFF knows a lot about Lightroom. I actually tried to tailor my reply to folks who aren't familiar with Lightroom's features.