• Free Photoshop Action: Washed Matte

    Published Thursday, May 8th, 2014

    Free Photoshop Action: Washed Matte

    Today we have a free Photoshop action, Washed Matte, that is from our bundle of actions for Photoshop Elements. The action comes in two versions, one for Photoshop Elements 11 and 12, and the other for Photoshop CS4 and newer. The full bundle includes a total of 100 actions for PSE (11 & 12) and the full version of Photoshop.

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  • How to Use the Adjustment Brush in Lightroom

    Published Thursday, May 8th, 2014

    How to Use the Adjustment Brush in Lightroom

    In previous articles we’ve looked at some of Lightroom’s tools including the graduated filter and the radial filter. Both of these tools allow you to make changes to specific parts of a photo without impacting other parts. While both of those tools are extremely useful, they do have some limitations. The graduated filter works in a linear fashion, and if you’re not working with straight lines you may not be able to acomplish what you need with the graduated filter. For example, if you want to increase the exposure to lighten the bottom portion below the horizon of a landscape photo without impacting the sky, you can easily do this with the graduated filter, but you’ll need a relatively straight horizon. The radial filter works by using an ellipse, so it is useful for some situations, like creating vignettes, but certainly not useful in every situation.

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  • Free Photoshop Action: Flashback

    Published Wednesday, May 7th, 2014

    Free Photoshop Action: Flashback

    This Photoshop action, Flashback, is a free sample from our set of Vintage Dream Photoshop Actions. The full set includes 8 different actions that will add fun vintage effects to your photos (see the before and after sample photos below). The action gives a soft vintage feel without being overwhelming. This action is compatible with Photoshop CS4+.

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  • How to Use the Radial Filter in Lightroom

    Published Wednesday, May 7th, 2014

    How to Use the Radial Filter in Lightroom

    In the previous article we covered the topic of the graduated filter tool in Lightroom, and in this article we’ll cover another tool, the radial filter tool. As you go through this article you may notice that the radial filter includes many of the same controls and sliders offered by the graduated filter tool, but it works in a much different way.

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  • How to Use the Graduated Filter Tool in Lightroom

    Published Tuesday, May 6th, 2014

    How to Use the Graduated Filter Tool in Lightroom

    Lightroom’s graduated filter can be an extremely useful tool in the right situation. It allows you to impact one area of the photo without impacting others, and it applies the effect gradually like a gradient. In this article we’ll take a look at how the tool works, and we’ll also use it to make some improvements to a sample photo. In this sample we’ll use the graduated filter tool to lighten the lower portion of a photo, and we’ll also use it to enhance the sky.

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  • How to Fix Red Eyes in Lightroom

    Published Monday, May 5th, 2014

    How to Fix Red Eyes in Lightroom

    Red eyes are a common problem in photos taken with on-camera flash, but fortunately it can be easily fixed in Lightroom’s develop module. Lightroom includes a red eye correction tool that does the difficult work for you. To access the red eye correction tool, click on the icon near the top right of the develop module.

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  • How to Use the Spot Removal Tool in Lightroom

    Published Friday, May 2nd, 2014

    How to Use the Spot Removal Tool in Lightroom

    Most photographers love Lighroom for its ability to help with managing and organizing photos, as well as the tools in the develop module for working with tones, exposure, curves, and other basic adjustments. When it comes to touching up photos, Lightroom often takes a back seat to Photoshop. Although Photoshop does offer plenty of power and potential for editing and manipulating photos, you may find that Lightroom can actually handle most of the things that you need in your every day work as a photographer.

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  • How to Crop Photos in Lightroom

    Published Thursday, May 1st, 2014

    How to Crop Photos in Lightroom

    The crop tool in Lightroom can be extremely helpful, especially when you are going to be printing your photos at a specific size. To access the crop tool, click on the crop tool’s icon just below the histogram, or use the keyboard shortcut “r”.

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  • Free Summer Haze Photoshop Action

    Published Wednesday, April 30th, 2014

    Summer Haze Photoshop Action

    This Photoshop action, Turquoise Haze, is a free sample from our set of Summer Haze Photoshop Actions.

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  • Creating and Using Lightroom Presets

    Published Wednesday, April 30th, 2014

    Creating and Using Lightroom Presets

    So far in this series we’ve covered Lightroom’s library module as well as the basics of editing photos in the develop module. Today we’re going to focus on develop presets and how they can be used to improve your workflow in Lightroom.

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  • Working with Vignettes and Grain in Lightroom

    Published Tuesday, April 29th, 2014

    Working with Vignettes and Grain in Lightroom

    In Lightroom’s develop module under in “effects” section you’ll find the settings to work with vignettes and grain.

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  • Applying Lens Corrections in Lightroom

    Published Monday, April 28th, 2014

    Applying Lens Corrections in Lightroom

    Lightroom includes some settings that allow you to correct common issues introduced by lenses. The lens correction settings can be found on the right side of the develop module just below the detail settings.

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  • Applying Sharpening and Noise Reduction in Lightroom

    Published Friday, April 25th, 2014

    Applying Sharpening and Noise Reduction in Lightroom

    Almost every digital photo can benefit from sharpening and noise reduction. The key is to apply the appropriate amount, but avoid going overboard and creating an unrealistic photo. If you’re not zoomed in to see the photo at 100% it may even be difficult to notice the change made by some subtle sharpening and noise reduction.

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  • Working with Split Toning in Lightroom

    Published Thursday, April 24th, 2014

    Working with Split Toning in Lightroom

    Today we’ll be looking at the split toning functionality in Lightroom. With the split toning settings you can add color to the highlights and shadows of your photo, and you’ll have precise control over the strength of that color. Split toning is typically used for soft and subtle effects, such as warming up or cooling down a photo. It can be used effectively with both color and black and white photos.

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  • Working with HSL,Color, and B&W in Lightroom

    Published Wednesday, April 23rd, 2014

    Working with HSL,Color, and B&W in Lightroom

    In previous articles we’ve talked about how you can use tone curves, tune adjustments, and vibrance and saturation to impact the colors in your photos, and today we’ll look some additional options that Lightroom gives you for working with colors.

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