Comments on: Are You a Push-Button Photographer?

By: Libby

Libby — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:15:48 +0000

I just got an email today from a rookie wedding shooter asking me what presets I use in Lightroom for wedding photos. Now there’s a question for ya! Apparently his shoot from Saturday didn’t turn out too well.

I find that as my shooting skills improve, except for some basic raw tweaks, I use Photoshop less and less.

By: Phoneotograpy – Cell Phone Photography | Microstockgroup Blog

Phoneotograpy – Cell Phone Photography | Microstockgroup Blog — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:33:01 +0000

[...] art. Editing programs like this are fun toys – and perhaps only toys (an Rasmus Rasmussen so finely blogged about) and reduce your creative input to a simple button clicks. In other words they don’t [...]

By: Rasmus

Rasmus — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 22:02:17 +0000

Kelly, you are a true purist, old school and totally hardcore. You always amaze me, even if I sometimes give you shit for refusing to automate anything. At all.

Jeff & Ian: And I certainly agree that presets are good (no, great!) for maintaining consistency, but as you said, only as a starting point.

Gmosher: You make a very important point – the vision and craftmanship is exactly what the client is paying you for. There is definitely a certain amount of professional pride involved as well.

By: GMosher

GMosher — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 21:56:35 +0000

Nice to see other folks that feel the same way I do when I’m drowning in a network of shooters I’ve know for a long time that do nothing but preach lightroom and presets and try to send me preset packages etc. I never used them, they never ever look ‘right’ to me. A lot of wedding shooters in my area are BIG on them and they fly through a wedding entirely in lightroom in a couple hours, and criticize me for going slow and processing each file individually. IMO that’s what the client is hiring me for…my vision while I’m shooting and processing-not to just press the button when I’m taking their picture, or just press a button and load someone else’s work onto their images. Same reason I haven’t brought myself to outsource my bulk processing…it wouldn’t be ‘me’(LOL who knows if that’s good or bad, ha!) I’d like to think that my pictures have a bit of ’soul’ to them…and IMO that can’t be found in an app or in a preset.

By: Ian Harding

Ian Harding — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 21:48:27 +0000

I’m with you. I’m way too picky to let a simple preset do all the work for my images. If I have a series that were shot in the same situation (like a studio shoot) I will apply a general action, that I have created, but will then go through every photo and tweak as necessary.

No two images are the same, ever, regardless of shoot conditions, so presets are a good starting point, but should never been the end-all-be-all.

By: Jeff Shaw

Jeff Shaw — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 20:55:20 +0000

Interesting post and sounds a little like the photo critique I watched this morning by Zach Arias. I find that presets can usually help my photos have a consistent look and feel but in no way should the preset ever come before the photo. I know I have a tendency to shoot a certain way and most people do but shouldn’t we always be looking to grow and become better than a button or action, or preset? At least that’s what I challenge myself with and hopefully it keeps working. Thanks for the post.

By: Kelly

Kelly — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 20:43:34 +0000

I never use actions. I don’t have any saved presets for anything I shoot. Everything I do, I do it by hand on each and every one of my photos. I believe that each one calls for me to hand touch it from beginning to end, otherwise it is just cookie cutter. I don’t do cookie cutter… although I’d take a picture of a cookie cutter I won’t process like one.