Lightroom and I have been getting more acquainted over this past year. There are so many features that I enjoy. Today I’m going to share my workflow with you and give you a very fun and easy tip at the end.

First I select the photo I want to edit … silly I know … of course I select my photo, right!

I make sure I have the keywords I want in the section on the right. I have a set that is automatically in for all of my photos I import and add certain ones for specific photos.

Next I go into the Develop module by clicking on ‘Develop’ in the upper right corner.

I pretty much always start with making adjustments in ‘Lens Correction’ and then ‘Transform’. In ‘Lens Correction’ I keep the setting on Profile and click the little box that says Enable Profile Corrections. I keep it on Default and you’ll see in the section below it that your camera and lens you used are filled in.

All depending on how my photo looks, I might go into ‘Transform’ and make some adjustments there. Mine is automatically set to ‘Off’ and I make the adjustments myself by moving the sliders from side to side until the lines in my photo are straight. You can also click on Auto and it automatically adjusts your photo.

You’ll notice that the lines of the window are straight now.

Next I go into the ‘Basic’ section and begin to make changes there, such as exposure, whites, clarity, vibrance … and whatever I feel is necessary to make this photo pop.

Once I’ve made the adjustments I want in ‘Basic’, I go down to ‘Detail’ and make a few adjustments in there. 

Noise Reduction is something I often have to adjust to help with the other settings I’ve changed in ‘Basic’.

I then crop my image.

Before I export … here is the little tip I mentioned …

I go up to the top menu and click on ‘Develop’ and then ‘New Preset’.

This window pops open and you can save all of the adjustments you just made to your photo to use as a preset with one of your future photos. (it makes editing quick … and it’s your very own preset!)

In the window ‘New Develop Preset’ you can change the name of your preset from Untitled to whatever you want to name it and you can create your own folder for your own first set of presets. You can also select which items you want to keep in the preset by clicking or unclicking the box to the left of each. I keep all of them that are automatically selected.

And then click ‘Create’ in the lower right corner.

Now you have your own preset. What I’ve found with presets is that they don’t all look good on every photo. I’ve created several presets for myself and have used them on many photos. With presets, you aren’t stuck with the exact adjustments within the preset. You can still adjust certain areas all depending on the lighting, etc in each particular photo.

Once you’ve created your preset, you then export your photo and you’re done!

Here is my final image.

Thanks for stopping in … see you in a couple of days.