What tools/workflow do you use in Photoshop? (1 Viewer)

This post really has two parts to it, firstly do I really need Photoshop to complete my post processing (considering its high cost) and secondly if it were beneficial, what tools or operations would be used on a regular basis?

A bit of background first: I have been the proud owner of a 7D now for about 6 months and shooting in raw format, having moved up after many years of shooting with a super zoom compact straight to jpeg with little post processing.

I have developed a workflow using just Canon’s DPP that gets me reasonably good results. I start off adjusting white balance, then noise reduction (which seems to give as good a result as my stand-alone copy of NI on low noise images), then adjustments to tone and colour, followed by sharpening via the new USM and finally cropping and conversion from raw to jpeg.

However, I’m just wondering if I am missing something here. I know maybe two tasks that I could use PS for on occasions, firstly to select out the bird and its perch and superimpose back onto a less cluttered neutral background and secondly the use of the clone (stamp) tool to remove offending twigs, leaves etc. However, at around £400 that seems a lot of money for “tarting up” an image. I have downloaded a 30-day trial of PS but as I have never used it before it’s a steep learning curve to try and assess its potential. Reading reviews about Topaz Denoise this might give me better results on NR than DPP which I find worsens sharpness of detail on 3200 ISO images to the point that I’d rather keep a little noise to retain the detail. Also I’m not sure how good the sharpening in DPP is compared to other products either.

I think what I am trying to ask here to people with far more post processing experience than me is how can my workflow be improved/tweaked and are there any alternatives to full-blown PS that can get the best out of my images.

Cheers,
Nick

There are plenty of alternatives if like you say all you want is to use a few simple tools, try http://pixlr.com an online editor and see if it helps then you can decide if it is something you want to use more etc.

To be honest there are a huge number of bits of editing software, some free (GIMP etc) some really expensive (Lightroom, photoshop etc) which one suits you is dependant on how you work.

My advice read/watch as many tutorials on each one and see which you lik ethe look of.

I have a pretty comprehensive list of manufacturers of editing software at: http://www.fatphotographer.net/links/facts/software.html (hope the link is allowed) as you will see there are so many there is almost certainly something to suit needs and budget for everyone!

IMO Photoshop is overkill as far as the amateur is concerned. I use Photoshop Elements--which is a lot cheaper than the full-fledged program--& has everything I need (including a very nice organizer). I do a little background blurring via masking, but the clone stamp is the tool I use most & one that I would definitely not want to be without..

Full Photoshop is not necessary for what you are describing.

Photoshop Elements has the tools that you need. Camera Raw which is part of elements can handle all the tasks that you have described you use in DPP and then the Edit module can handle the cloning and the trickier stuff.

Personally I use Lightroom 3 for 90-95% of my processing I like the presets features and find that I can get most of my adjustment done on import with additional tweaks for the best pictures. To handle cloning and layers, I export to Elements as its just easier to apply local edits in PSE than Lightroom.

Elements 9 mostly and Lightroom 1.0 occasionally, thinking about getting the latter in version 3 via my student daughter

Thanks for the above replies. Jim, have you used DPP and therefore just prefer Lightroom?

It seems a lot of people that are into bird photography have purchased Lightroom who probably, if their camera is a Canon, also have a copy of DPP. To me (and please correct me if I'm wrong) DPP appears to have the same functionality. As DPP came free with my camera and possibly works better with Canon's own raw format than Lightroom, the latter possibly wouldn't add any benefit to my workflow.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has (and uses) both, for their opinion on the merits of these two products and whether they use both or just one.

I'm coming to the conclusion that if I'm going to purchase one photo-editing s/w it will probably make financial sense to go for PSE over the full PS program. Can PSE accommodate the Denoise plug-in?

Thanks,
Nick

I'm still in the dark ages with my version of Photoshop 7 and even that is way too bigger program for my needs, I agree with the other replies, Elements would suit the majority of photographers and probably yourself.

My PS7 mainly gets used for cropping, levels, sharpening etc, occasionally I may do a bit of cloning and even more rarely I go beyond that and pratt about with selections and masks, bottom line really is theres no substitute for getting it right in camera, my motto is "snap it, crop it, sharpen it, print it" Lifes too short to be stuck behind a keyboard.

Whilst I would firmly agree that "theres no substitute for getting it right in camera", it is rare for an image to need the same amount of sharpening, levels adjustment and other adjustments across the entire image. Using masks to selectively apply corrections to an image is skill that it is defiantly worth putting the time in to learn.

It was briefly mentioned above but I think it is worth to point it out again for those that are unaware of it.
Adobe ( and many other softwareakers) offer academic licences for many of their products. As far as Adobe is concerned these are the full, functionally unrestricted versions of Lightroom, Photoshop ..........., just for a fraction of the list price. Just google something like "academic prices adobe" to find local pricing, sources, and rules. Students, teachers, and staff of most academic institutions (schools, colleges, universities) can take advantage of this discount. So if you belong to this group this is an option, if you don't think creative ....

Ulli

Mono said:

Whilst I would firmly agree that "theres no substitute for getting it right in camera"

Click to expand...

Yep, it's an admirable aspiration, and one which is doubtless easily-enough achievable in some genres of photography.

Not bird photography though. I honestly can't really think of another photographic discipline where the photographer has less control over his subjects or the light he is shooting in and which carries such high de facto IQ standards and where the subjects themselves are so challenging, so - like it or not - good conversion and PP skills go with the territority.