Some more reading!

Shot at Bombay Beach in the Salton Sea. More from this day later this week

Some more interesting links from around the web for you to enjoy. And details for a (weather permitting) opportunity for us to get together, shoot some Christmas lights, and revel in the holiday spirit!

First up, the links:

Lightroom Video Tutorial: Portrait Sharpening

Have a new video tutorial on how to do portrait sharpening in Lightroom, which sometimes requires a different process than just a general image sharpening, because you may not want the effect to be global.

Watch it and let me know what you think. As always, if there is something specific you would like me to cover in Lightroom, let me know in the comments.

My first Lightroom video tutorial!

In my last Event Workflow Class, I showed the students how to create photo collages in Lightroom. As it was my very last class, I ran through this rather quickly, as I had a lot of ground I wanted to cover. So I made a video tutorial. I really had no idea I could even do this, so consider this first one a "proof of concept" for me. Yes, it's kinda weak, rough around the edges, and there are some slip-ups. But hey, it's my first, and I got it done, and they will get better. Besides, would you really have it any other way?

In this first tutorial, I show you how to make a several image overlay in Lightroom like I did here. It's almost like working with layers in Lightroom. This seemed to be a big hit in my class, but perhaps I went through it to quickly, so here it is, available to you to watch, pause, and play along. Tell me what you thought below. Video after the jump

Layers in Lightroom?!?

For my very last "Event Workflow Class", I wanted to show my students something cool that they may not know they can do. I will teach them how to fake "layers" in Lightroom. If your interested, stop by to learn how I did these Wednesday night. Great for making print packages, album pages, or poster collages. All 3 of these were done completely in Lightroom, no Photoshop required.

Lightroom Reading & Links

In my Event Workflow class, we are currently going through the Lightroom workflow. We have many students that are really seeing Lightroom for the first time. I mentioned last night in class several books that can be helpful in learning Lightroom. Here they are:

Rami & Khrys

I worked with Rami & Khrys this past weekend on their engagement shoot. I will be shooting their wedding next month, and I am so looking forward to that event. They are an amazing couple to work with, and their love for each other shines through.

For those of you that are in my wedding classes, I gave some Lightroom classes last week using these images, so I wanted to show you the finished products. (Read more after the jump)

Welcome to Lightroom!

Hey everyone!

In Monday nights class, we spent a lot of time covering Lightroom. There are a lot of resources on the web for tutorials and presets, but you can start here: Preset Heaven

Another great resource is Lightroom Killer Tips

And of corse you can always Google "Free Presets"

Death Punch!

For those of you in my Lighting on Location class, you should recognize these guys. I had the opportunity last night to shoot a live performance of the Punk Rock band Death Punch. What you see here was all shot with my old 5D (just in case there was any melee's or spilt beer), and it was all shot with only 2 lenses, the 50 f1.4 and the 35 f1.4L. And all shot on the same settings, ISO 1600 at f1.4. No flash, all available light, using only the AV mode, so the camera was picking my shutter speeds.

I have never shot a live music performance before, so I was excited about the possibilities. Most venues don't allow flash, so I didn't bring one. Of course, this venue probably would have let me bring in studio strobes on stands if I wanted. Live and learn. But, I am happy with the way these turned out.

These were all processed in Lightroom. I haven't done any cropping even. Prior to giving them to the band, I will clean some of these up, and I have about 100 more I am really happy with. I ran the new Default settings we have been discussing so much in my Wedding classes, and it really tweaked the colors. I loved it, so for this set, I left it. Shot them last night, posting them today.

The effect that Lightroom gave them is kinda gritty (aided by the ISO 1600) and the colors are saturated. This is Punk, it ain't pretty...

The band was awesome, I had a great time, and I had a couple of fellow friends shooting with me, they were in definite need of a diversion, and a live Punk show was just the answer. I am excited to see what they got, as they were using flash, and much lower ISO's. But for a 4 year old camera that has been banged around for years, and is normally used to quieter, much more reflective and intimate wedding shoots, I think it performed admirably. After all, ISO 1600 at f1.4 is Canon country. (sorry, couldn't resist) You can see a lot more of my images here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/frankwise/sets/72157622001083244/

As I edit some more I will add them there.

This is the last week of the summer session at Tri, so here is what's going on this week.

Monday night we will review the semester, answer any questions you might have, and relax with some inspiration from Mike Colon

Tuesday night we will be shooting

Wednesday night we will be gaining more inspiration from Jerry Ghionis' work.

Feel free to bring food on Monday or Wednesday, pot luck is welcome!

See you all soon,

Frank