photo editing software

[spasm3]

Any wedding photographers out there?
I'm transitioning from medium format film to digital, and i know nothing about photo editing. What is the best way to learn, types of software. Photoshop, lightroom etc.

 

[eljefino]

If you extensively edit wedding photos you're doing it wrong. They should be a 'documentary' style and you'll show the bride & groom 200-300 "proofs" for them to choose to print. They'll be confused if they look at the proofs and you promised to "clean them up."

I use gimp for software, and I've shot weddings semi-professionally. I only use gimp for emergency retouches-- redeye, rude people in the background, etc. Also quick and dirty contrast fixes and perspective fixes if people are standing in front of a columnned building etc.

 

[tom slick]

Lightroom is great for adjusting and cataloging photos. Especially if you shoot RAW and "develop" them as your workflow. Lightroom is the digital equivalent of a darkroom for film.

 

[3800Series]

Photoshop is pretty expensive unless your career depends on it (graphics designers and stuff along those lines). Gimp is a good free alternative and Coral PaintShop is also good but not free. Their interface is a little more modern. I've used it before and I enjoyed it but I'm by no means a professional.

While I like Coral I would recommend Gimp, they have a large community that is willing to help people who are new to the program/photo editing.

 

[Truanger]

I am using Photoshop and GIMP

 

[uc50ic4more]

Lightroom is as close to an industry standard as you could want; and should seem pretty intuitive for someone coming from film. For Linux there is Darktable.

For extensive edits or effects Photoshop is the de facto industry standard by a long shot. GIMP is functional as well.

 

[bunnspecial]

I'm a heavy Lightroom user, and can recommend it without reservation.

I don't do events anymore, but it's great to plug an SD card into my computer, suck up all the raw images, and be able to batch process them and export the catalog as a jpeg. If you do your work right in the camera(which I'm sure you do if you've been shooting MF for a while) all you'll probably want to do is crop and then play with the levels and curves a bit. In lightroom, if you're starting with a good photo, you can count on about 30-45 seconds per shot to do it. And, of course, just dump the ones you don't want. When I started shooting film, I was advised to put a garbage can at the end of my light table, and Lightroom makes the digital "garbage can" equally easy.

I still shoot a decent amount of medium format, and it handles scans gracefully as well. It's real strength, though, is IMO in handling raw photos.

 

[tgrudzin]

If by editing, you are taking about reviewing, rating, renaming, deleting. Look into Camera Bits by Photo Mechanic. Stand alone program, maybe $130. Design for intended for news editors, but has great features for the price. I can't say enough good things about it. I have been using it since 1999 with a Kodak DCS 620 digital camera. I like it far better than purchasing Bridge.

If by editing, you are talking about exposure, re-touching, cropping, cloning, Photoshop. But I have also looked into GIMP and plan on using that when I no longer am supplied Photoshop by my employer. I will not rent pay $10 per month forever to Adobe. I paid close to $600 for my original copy and $160 a year for there constant upgrades. I won't pay again. Advantage of Photoshop, since t you don't have and will have to learn, incredible amount of internet and YouTube support.

What's a roll of 120 color negative cost these days, film and film and processing?

 

[bunnspecial]

Originally Posted By: tgrudzin
What's a roll of 120 color negative cost these days, film and film and processing?


I very rarely shoot C-41 MF, but Fuji E-6 is running about $5/roll and processing is $10-12

Buy in bulk from B&H, I can still get a 5 roll box of Tri-X for a little over $20. Of course, D76 remains dirt cheap(about $9 a bag the last time I bought some) and even used straight you can get a fair bit of MF out of it. I usually do D76 at 1:1 since Tri-X is often too contrasty for my taste and D76 at 1:1 does take the edge off that. Unfortunately, developer selection is way down, but at least good old D76 keeps marching on.

I'm still mad at Kodak for discontinuing Plus-X. To my eye, it was the most perfect B&W film made, but apparently not enough people agreed with me. I have a 100 foot roll stuck back in the freezer along with a handful of 120 rolls and even a partial box of 4x5. I guess I should dig into them one of these days, but at the current rate I use film it would take me 10 years to use a 100 ft roll. In fact, I looked at a bulk loader with some TMAX-100 in it the other day that I loaded in 2007... The good news is that the test strip I pulled from it showed minimal base fog, so it's at least useable.

 

[spasm3]

for B+W I used to shoot ilford fp-4 and fp-5. For some wild resolution i shot agfa-pan 25. It was 25 ASA.

For color, especially weddings, i shot Vericolor commercial, it had a bit more contrast for crisp white dresses.

Those films are gone now. And i don't want to risk film in the mail for paid work.


I'm going to shoot with nikon D-610 bodies with only FX lenses.

As a film shooter, i did a lot of my cropping in the camera.

I want to edit for things like stains on a shirt or object removal.

Will lightroom do that? How do i go about learning it? Just play with a lot of practice images?

Thanks

 

[uc50ic4more]

Originally Posted By: tgrudzin
If by editing, you are talking about exposure, re-touching, cropping, cloning, Photoshop. But I have also looked into GIMP and plan on using that when I no longer am supplied Photoshop by my employer.


Caveat: We have been waiting for proper CMYK support in GIMP for, well, forever. If you do anything for print and want to use GIMP professionally you'll need a tool of some sort to properly convert your RGB raster to CMYK and you'll have to remain mindful to remain in CMYK gamut while working in RGB.

 

[Quattro Pete]

nm

 

[bunnspecial]

Originally Posted By: spasm3
for B+W I used to shoot ilford fp-4 and fp-5. For some wild resolution i shot agfa-pan 25. It was 25 ASA.

For color, especially weddings, i shot Vericolor commercial, it had a bit more contrast for crisp white dresses.

Those films are gone now. And i don't want to risk film in the mail for paid work.


I'm going to shoot with nikon D-610 bodies with only FX lenses.

As a film shooter, i did a lot of my cropping in the camera.

I want to edit for things like stains on a shirt or object removal.

Will lightroom do that? How do i go about learning it? Just play with a lot of practice images?

Thanks


The basic mainstays like the spot healing brush and clone tool can be set to be right in your sidebar, so yes things like removing a spot are fast and easy to access.

And, yes, I find that playing with the software is the best way to learn how to do it. There are books on lightroom. Many of the basic principles are the same as Photoshop and function just like in Photoshop-they are just accessed differently.

 

[spasm3]

Thank you bunnspecial!!

 

[bunnspecial]

One thing that I meant to mention earlier...

I think that Adobe still offers a 30 day trial, so you have time to "live with" the software before you commit to buying.

Also be aware that Adobe has gone to a "pay to play" model. I was able to buy Lightroom 6(perpetual license) last summer by calling Adobe, but I don't know if they still do that.

Otherwise, I think it's about $10/month or so for the PS/LR combo. The LR6 perpetual license was around $150, but I've passed the "break even" point on buying vs. subscription. LR6 is now "outdated" but still does everything I need for it to.

Aperture used to be a viable alternative to LR and I really liked it although it's Mac only(not a downside for me). Unfortunately, Apple gave the big middle finger to a lot of their productivity software, and Aperture is no longer available. I wish I'd bought the most current version-since it was only available as a Mac app store download for the most recent versions, there's no way I know of to get it legally without having bought it before they discontinued it.

I have a co-worker who swears by Capture One, and it does seem a good alternative to Lightroom. I played with it(free trial) but ultimately decided I liked Lightroom better.