One onOne with Mike Wong

Sometimes, when you're trying to solve a problem you learn something new. That is the case for this tip - Solo Mode. When I was trying to solve The Case of the Missing Presets, I discovered this very cool, and as far as I know, undocumented feature (though to be honest, I've never read the Lightroom documentation so maybe it is in there) called Solo Mode.

What is Solo Mode you ask? One of the coolest features in Lightroom you've probably never heard of. Allow me to set this up...

When you have a bunch, and a bunch could be more than one, panel open, finding the contents in one of the panels can be difficult because you have to scroll up or down to get to the panel you want. For example, I like to keep the History panel open so I can glance down and see what I've done to an image. I also have a huge list of presets, including the onOne PhotoPresets and a bunch that I download from Matt Kloskowski's Lightroom Killer Tips blog. So when the Preset panel is open AND the History palette is open, I have to scroll up and down constantly which gets annoying - especially if I'm only working on my MacBook Pro and I don't have my mouse (like now).

So here's the tip, Control-click on any of the names of the panels such as Presets, Snapshots, History or any panel name except the Histogram panel (that one is exempt from Solo Mode) and you'll get a contextual menu that has several items in it. The one we want is about three-quarters of the way down and it says, you guessed it, Solo Mode. Just click on that and you'll notice that the disclosure triangles next to the panel names (except Histogram) change from a solid gray to what looks like a top down view of a set of gray bowling pins.

Now when you click on one of these bowling pin formations, only that panel is opened and the rest are closed. I love it! It really comes in handy on the Develop module for all of the develop settings. And it makes perfect sense because in theory when you finish doing your Basic adjustments you can move on to Tone Curve and you don't need Basic anymore. Brilliant as they say here in England (nobody says Awesome, and I've gotten funny looks when I have so I'm going to stop until next week).

Give it a try, it's my new favorite feature in Lightroom 1.1.

Posted by Mike Wong at 4:51 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

In preparation for my Lightroom presentation tomorrow at Focus on Imaging, I was going through my demo files and making sure that everything was working properly when it dawned on me that I didn't have any of my PhotoPresets for Lightroom anymore.

For this demo, I wanted to show how you create a Lightroom catalog from scratch, so rather than deleting all of my photos in my current (and previously only) Lightroom catalog, I created a new one. Lightroom 1.1 allows you to have more than one catalog and you can pick which one you want to use when you launch Lightroom. I remember checking a box when I created the new catalog to store the Develop presets with the catalog, not reallly knowing what it would do (dumb I know) but I did it anyway.

Okay, so I figured I'd just find the presets folder and copy my old ones in because I knew where they were. Previous versions of Lightroom let you control click on a preset and you'd have an option to say "Show Preset Folder" and it would pop open. No such luck in Lightroom 1.1.

After a few minutes of frantic searching, I realized where Lightroom looks for CATALOG SPECIFIC presets. Are you ready...they are with the catalog! Duh. Okay, I felt pretty dumb, but now you don't have to worry or panic if you do the same thing.

Find where your new catalog is and in there you'll find all of the presets for each of the Lightroom modules. Just copy your old preset files in and relaunch Lightroom and you'll be good to go. Seems simple, and maybe it is, but if you have a brain cramp like me and are looking for them, hopefully this helps.

Posted by Mike Wong at 4:42 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Adobe has posted a Photoshop Lightroom 1.3.1 update that adds additional Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard enhancements.

Mac users can get the download here. Sorry, I don't have the Windows link but if someone sends it to me I'll update the post.

In addition to the additional Leopard improvements several new cameras are now supported including the Canon 1Ds Mark III (why hasn't anyone sent me one of these yet?, the Nikon D3, Nikon D300, the Olympus E-3 and more.

This post also happens to mark a milestone of sorts of this blog - it is the 200th post.

Posted by Mike Wong at 4:26 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Chris Orwig has some new training available for Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 1.1 and 1.2 over at the Lynda.com online training website.

According to Lynda.com, in Photoshop Lightroom 1.1 New Features, instructor and professional photographer Chris Orwig covers the latest additions to both version 1.1 and version 1.2. He explains how to work with each of the application's new features, including the updated interface, database catalogs, and modules. Chris also shares some useful tips and tricks along the way. Exercise files accompany the tutorials.

Topics include:

• Understanding the Lightroom interface


• Defining, importing, and sharing database catalogs


• Working with metadata


• Removing red-eye


• Using the Crop Overlay tool


• Converting to black and white


• Exploring the Slideshow, Develop, and Library modules

Posted by Mike Wong at 10:53 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

For any of you out there using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom who are thinking of upgrading to Mac OS X Leopard, take a second and read this blog post from Lightroom product manager Tom Hogarty.

In the blog post, Tom outlines a few (but not necessarily all) of the known compatibility issues with Lightroom 1.2 and Leopard.

Here's a summary of the issues listed in the blog post.

• The Print module may not load
• The Import dialog and other dialogs can "disappear" below Lightroom's main window. The dialog can be retrieved by switching to another application and then returning to Lightroom.
• Lightroom's web module may not provide a visual update after a setting is changed
• The left-side panels in the Develop module may not display properly. Resizing or closing/opening the panels will correct the issue
• The interaction between Leopard's Time Machine and Lightroom's catalog files is unknown at this time. Running Time Machine backup or restore operations while Lightroom is in use is not recommended until more information can be obtained

Posted by Mike Wong at 2:16 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

For those of you moving to Leopard, please note that we are still testing our plug-ins with the final, shipping version of this new OS from Apple. For more information, you can click here to go to the onOne Software Knowledge Base.

We'll let everybody know when updates are available.

Posted by Mike Wong at 1:55 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

I was reading Scott Kelby's blog this morning (I really like the design of his blog, check it out) and he's got some great new posts including a link back to Adobe's site where they have posted a page that discusses which version of Photoshop is right for you.

I get a lot of emails from customers who have purchased our software or are running a trial of our software and they invariably ask me which version of Photoshop they should upgrade to. I think this quick read from Adobe pretty much sums it up best.

Posted by Mike Wong at 9:22 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Earlier today while I was enjoying my morning coffee, I headed over to Matt Kloskowski's Lightroom Killer Tips blog as I often do. Matt has posted a great video on creating a very popular and cool grunge look to your photos. Be sure to head over to Matt's blog to download the video.

Here's a quick before and after example.

Thanks for the tip Matt!

Posted by Mike Wong at 1:07 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Adobe® Photoshop® Lightroom version 1.2 is now available for download. According to the Adobe site, here's what's new in this 1.2 update.

• Corrections for several issues including XMP auto-write performance, Windows Vistaﾮ grid display errors, and noise reduction for Bayer patterned sensors
• Additional camera support for the Canon EOS 40D, Fuji FinePix IS-1, Olympus EVOLT E-510, Panasonic DMC-FZ18, and more

See the Lightroom Read Me file for more information.

Click here to download the Mac OS X version of the Lightroom 1.2 update.

Click here to download the Windows version of the Lightroom 1.2 update.

Posted by Mike Wong at 6:54 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

I just finished up with my first LIVE radio interview with Howard Lipin and Mike Garcia over at Photo Talk Radio.

In the past, internet radio interviews that I've done were always recorded and turned into podcasts, but this was my first one that was live. I'm glad I didn't tell the guys in the office or my family as I'm sure they would have called in and heckled me.

Thanks again to Howard and Mike for having me on this morning!

Posted by Mike Wong at 8:52 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Okay, so I'm from the West Coast. Oregon to be precise. Portland to be even more precise and let's be honest, Portland is a relatively small city in the grand scheme of cities in the U.S.A. Growing up here, life has always moved along at a relatively easy pace. Not too fast, not too slow.

Now, I've been to New York many times over the years, but it never seems to fail that at least for the first day or two that I'm here, everything seems to move at a very fast pace, faster than I'm used to anyway especially when it comes to crossing streets and watching out for the crazy cab drivers who drive from one intersection to the next as if they are in a qualifying event for the Indy 500 or some other speed event.

So I thought I would try to capture that feeling in the first day or two before it wears off - usually just in time for me to fly home, get in my car and drive home from the airport like a NYC cabbie only to realize that...I'm not a cabbie, I have no fare and I'm definitely not in NYC anymore. Sorry. Here's the photo.

Canon 20D, 24-105 mm f/4 L IS at 1/2 second at f/9, ISO 200

Posted by Mike Wong at 8:15 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

More on Lightroom today...I was over at the CreativePro.com site today and saw this story by Julieanne Kost on getting the most out of importing your photos into Lightroom. Threre's a 17-minute video you can watch that is hosted by Software Cinema. Here's the direct link to the movie - http://www.workshopsondemand.com/lightroom/s04/

Posted by Mike Wong at 11:26 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Before Lightroom came out (even as a beta) I started using Aperture on my MacBook Pro (work machine) and my Dual 2Ghz PowerMac G5 (primary home machine) to manage my photos and do any RAW adjustments on the files I shot with my Canon 20D. Before that, I had used iPhoto to manage and organize my photos including ordering 4x6 or 5x7 prints. In fact, my wife loves using iPhoto (and later Aperture) to order prints because as much as I love printing on my Epson R2400 or my Epson 3800, I don't like printing 80 4x6 prints of 50 different pictures. It's just too time consuming not to mention it somehow feels silly to print a 4x6 on a printer that can handle much larger prints.

Anyway, where I'm going with this is that I really liked (and still do) Aperture's organization features, the Light Table feature the way they handle "virtual" copies of files (one for B&W, one for color, etc) but the thing I liked the most was printing books and ordering prints. Again, it came down (like many things in my house) to what my wife (Chris) liked. However, what I didn't like about Aperture was the performance on my Dual 2Ghz G5. It was slow to do any kind of serious adjustments. Making similar adjustments in ACR or Lightroom are much faster (or at least feel that way - I haven't done any formal time tests).

So when Lightroom came out in beta, I started using both. When Lightroom 1.0 shipped, I started to just put my new photos into Lightroom (I don't want to use 2 apps to manage my photos if I can help it) which was great, but I suddenly lost the easy way to order prints and books. But there's a cool thing you can do with Lightroom and Aperture or iPhoto if you're on a Mac OS X computer.

I created a couple of Automator applications for Aperture and iPhoto that will import any files that show up in one of two folders on my Mac and then import them into either application into a project folder (Aperture) or photo album (iPhoto) and then delete the files that were placed into those temp folders. Next, I set up a couple of Export presets in Lightroom that will export selected photos and copy (that's important) those files to one of those two folders and then run one of the two Automator actions. This makes my life easier now because I can do my organizing and photo developing in Lightroom yet still get my selected photos into either Aperture or iPhoto so I can order books or prints or use them in any one of the iLife apps that I use at home (iWeb for example) or Keynote at work.

If you'd like to do this, first download one (or both) of the Automator actions. Download the one for Aperture here and the one for iPhoto here. Put the file(s) you downloaded into the following folder on your Mac.

~username/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Lightroom/Export Actions

If you use the Automator files I've provided, be sure to have a project or a photo album called "Lightroom" in your app of choice or edit the Automator action to use the album name you want.

Next, launch Lightroom and create a couple (or just one) new Export Presets. To do this, select a photo or photos and then go to the File menu and choose Export... (or press Cmd-Shift-E). In the dialog box that appears, you'll create a new preset. Choose a folder (any folder) where you want the files to be copied to, adjust your settings to your liking and then at the bottom of the dialog, in the Post-Processing section from the drop down menu choose one of the Automator actions. This tells Lightroom to do that action (whatever it is) once all of the files have been copied and processed to the new location. You can save this export preset as well for easier use in the future.

So there you have it. A great way to get any photos out of Lightroom and into Aperture or iPhoto!

Posted by Mike Wong at 9:55 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

I got an email today from a Lightroom user asking how to rotate some of the frames we've made for Lightroom. The frames will by default be applied in a landscape orientation - this may work fine for some of your images, but not at all for those portrait oriented images. So how do you rotate them?

Just to the right of the words "Identity Plate" look for a circular arrow - it starts off with dots and then becomes an arrow pointing in a clockwise fashion. After you've selected a frame/identity plate, just click this circular arrow once and your frame will be rotated clockwise 90 degrees. Click again, another 90 degrees.

Default Setting

Rotate Button

After rotating frame and setting size to 100%

Image copyright Mike Wong 2007

Posted by Mike Wong at 10:29 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Ever since we released our PhotoPresets with One-Click WOW! with Jack Davis, we have started getting more and more requests for taking some of our other plug-ins for Photoshop® over to Photoshop Lightroom™ - specifically Genuine Fractals and PhotoFrame Pro. That makes sense as you might think (or have already been telling us), but right now, there's no official support within Lightroom for plug-ins. But there is a way to get frames around your images when using the Print module within Lightroom.

To get a border or edge effect on your image when printing from Lightroom, you need to add a graphical identity plate. Once you add one (or two or three) you can access them from the Identity Plate section in the Print Module. Here's how to do it.

Step 1
Within Lightroom, go to the Lightroom menu and choose Identity Plate Setup...

Step 2
Make sure the checkbox to Enable the Identity Plate is checked and then choose the radio button to "Use a graphical identity plate".

Click the Locate File button and navigate through the dialog box to find the file you want to use. It's important that you use a PNG file that you have saved with transparency. This is the important part. I've found that a 600 pixel by 400 pixel file works pretty good. If you make the file too big, Lightroom slows down considerably when you try to access the frame in the Print module and can take a while to remove it using the Identity Plate Setup dialog. I've printed several different frames that started out as 600 x 400 pixels on images up to 13 x 19 inches on my Epson R2400 and they look good.

After you've chosen your file, go up to the pop-up menu next to the Enable check box, and choose Save As... at the bottom. Give it a name that will help you remember what it is and then click OK.

Step 3
After you've added the frames you want, select the image you want to print and then go to the Print module. Make any necessary adjustments for print size, sharpening, etc and then click on the checkbox (if it's not already checked) for the Identity Plate.

Look closely in the rectangle below the checkbox and in the lower right hand corner, you'll see an arrow pointing down. Click on it and a menu will appear with all of your custom Identity Plates.

Now, just choose the Identity Plate you want to use and it will show up on your image in the center of the Lightroom window. Use the Scale slider to adjust the size or you can grab a corner or side of the frame and adjust the size directly over the image to be printed. You can position the frame however you want.

I've created a bunch (20 to be precise) of frames using PhotoFrame Pro 3.1 in Photoshop CS3 and saved them out in the Identity Plate-friendly PNG format. You can download them here for free. Feel free to use them however you want within Lightroom.

If you download them and use them, please send me an email and let me know how you like them. I used a combination of frames from the Brush, Camera, Marker, Emulsion, Instant Film (aka Pola frames) and some traditional Vignette frames as well as a couple of simple 2 pixel stroke frames. I hope you enjoy them.

One more thing, if you install them and then want to remove them, that's simple. Go to the Identity Plate Setup dialog, click on the pop-up menu next to the Enable checkbox and click the Remove option. Lightroom will walk you through it from there.

[ Update 05-08-2007 ] See an earlier post from Sean McCormack on this technique with credit given to Andreas Noren as the first person (even before the Adobe engineers!) who discovered this technique.

Posted by Mike Wong at 11:19 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

More news from onOne Software last week...we announced the immediate availability of 85 presets for Adobe Photoshop Lightroom that we're calling PhotoPresets with One-Click Wow! that everybody can download for free.

We worked directly with Photoshop Guru and Hall-of-Famer Jack Davis. The presets are unique from others in that they do not try to be everything to everybody or a one-size fits all. Presets that were developed by someone with some image may not necessarily work on your image (were the white balance corrections the same, what about HSL settings? the list goes on). This doesn't mean that we won't come out with other presets that help you recreate a specific look, but in general for color correction, the feedback we've gotten from most users out there who are over-whelmed and somewhat intimidated by the numerous sliders and curve adjustments available in the Develop module, welcome these kinds of presets with open arms.

As such, the PhotoPresets that Jack developed for us help walk you through the process of fixing and properly adjusting your photos. Start with a White Balance correction, then move into Tone Curve adjustements. Next, HSL (hue, saturation & luminosity) where you can push everything to grayscale except a color (i.e. blue eyes). Next, you can change to black and white, add a custom hand-tint and finally a variety of vignettes can be added. It's really quite simple when you go through the presets. The cool thing is that once you find a look that you like by combining these presets, you can save that preset as your own and in one-click, you're there!

So if you're using Photoshop Lightroom, go download a copy of our PhotoPresets for Lightoom. They're free! In the next few days, we'll be posting several video tutorials that Jack Davis created specifically for these presets.

If you're not a Lightroom expert and don't know where the presets go, don't worry, we've created an installer that puts the presets in the right place. Just run the installer and relaunch Lightroom.

Posted by Mike Wong at 11:24 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Okay, I've got to do this post just to be official...Adobe Photoshop Lightroom is now officially available. I've been using it more and more over the past few months and am really enjoying it. It's much more modal than Aperture, which I also have and was using because it handles RAW much better than iPhoto and integrates well with the iLife apps (which I find myself using less and less each passing month). But Aperture, running on my Dual 2Ghz G5 with 3 GB of RAM, is very slow. Sure, I have the bare minimum in terms of supported video card, but I'm not about to go drop $300 on a new video card to make it faster.

Lightroom on the other hand, runs quite nicely on the same system. I like Aperture's non-modal approach better and I think they've got the whole versioning thing down better than Lightroom currently does, but I just can't get past the performance on my not-that-old system. Someday, I'll upgrade to an Intel-Mac at home, but just yet. I'm spending my money these days on upgrading my lenses (specifically the Canon EF 24-105 f4/L IS and the 70-200 f4/L IS).

Anyway, Photoshop Lightroom is shipping and if you're so inclined, it's available for a $100 discount ($199 intro pricing). Check out the demo if you haven't played with the beta yet.

Posted by Mike Wong at 10:34 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

It's official, Adobe today made the official Lightroom 1.0 announcement. You can see all of the final official details here including the introductory pricing of $199 which seems like a very reasonable price.

Posted by Mike Wong at 10:04 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

From the good people over at NAPP comes a new magazine specifically for Adobe Photoshop Lightoom called Darkroom Magazine. From the site...

"When you look at Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, you're looking at the future of the pro photographer's workflow, and a year or so from now if you're not using Lightroom, you're going to be left behind," said Scott Kelby, editor and publisher of Darkroom, NAPP president and the #1 top selling computer book author worldwide. "The integration between Lightroom and Adobe Photoshop CS2/CS3 creates the seamless, consistent, and efficient workflow that today's professionals need, and we launched Darkroom magazine to help these pros make the most of using these two amazing tools together." - Scott Kelby

Posted by Mike Wong at 9:30 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Adobe announced yesterday that there is a new version of Lightoom available. The "dot 1" release fixes a slew of issues with the 4.0 beta release. For full details of what's new and to download the latest release, go to the Adobe Labs site.

Posted by Mike Wong at 7:37 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)