Once in a while we all get stuck using complex programs such as Lightroom and Photoshop and get confused with the simplest way of doing things. Today I’ll show you a part of my workflow and that’s including importing files into Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, renaming, converting to DNG, folder structure. If your after a super quick & easy tutorial skip to the Import dialog with the portraits.

To start off lets change one preference in Lightroom to show the import dialog when a memory card is detected. On a PC (Edit>Preference) or Mac (Lightroom>Preferences).

From now on every time you attach a memory card or camera to your computer the import dialog will show up (pictured below). There is actually quite a bit in here so we’ll go throughout it step by step.

1. File Handling – Copying the files from the card or camera. My workflow involves converting all raw files too DNG. You can read a great article on the benefits of using DNG by Peter Krough here.
2. Copy to – a location on your hard drive, this gets changed each month to keep a folder hierarchy. e.g. 09-10 folder is 2009-October.
3. Organise – These are folders that get created during the import. It’s a bit minimal on what you can do here so I just create my own.
4. Backup to – Just a safe house if your files corrupt during import or DNG conversion. Keep these for archival files if you like, personally I delete them after a week as I have my own backup in operation.
5. File naming – Hopefully you realise how important file renaming is for future use in preventing duplication, giving structure and recognition to your files. By creating a custom setting we will help resolve these problems from now on, here are the three parts to a file name.
   • Muzza – is my unique id, try not to use something to generic like John, use you initials or business name.
   • 091030 – YYMMDD that’s todays date backwards keeping all the files more hierarchal.
   • File number suffix – this is the numbers out of you cameras filenames
   • Once your done save this as a preset

   

6. Develop settings – Instead of these I apply camera raw profiles in the develop module>calibration
7. Metadata – All the metadata is applied to your photographs in bulk for each import. It is quite extensive, but will help in showing ownership of the files, copyright, location, photographer etc.
8. Keywords – To apply keywords individually you’ll have to wait after import.
9. Initial Previews – Depending on how you preview your files and how soon you need them will require different options.
   • Minimal – When speed is needed or importing a tone of files. (Thumbnails)
   • Embedded & Sidecar – Oftentimes embedded and sidecar previews are inaccurate so skip this one.
   • Standard – I use most of the time (Screen size)
   • 1:1 – For zooming in when fine detail is needed, saves heaps of time latter. (100% size)

After setting all these options up it will make life easier only having to change two steps (3 & 9) for each import. If your really not into reading books don’t read this or that, have a go at a few online video tutorials @ Kelby Training or Lynda.com.

Unsubscribe

Over the last five years of owning a computer, for some reason I have subscribed to hundreds of different newsletters, latest updates, new blog posts, twitters and so on… My mission has been to unsubscribe. Un-cluttering the inbox and freeing up an extra 15 minutes a day, trust me? every minute helps. This is where only a few have squeezed their way through. Check them out you may love them.

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• Michael Clark Photography. A bit of inspiration to keep me going.

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• Scoops, tips and comments published for friends of Scott Kelby
• Freelance Switch if your a freelancer and love business tips, this is the place to be.
• Strobist – Learn how to light

Kayaking Tully River

Last Sunday Andre and I traveled down to Tully river, his goal was to paddle and mine was to photograph the 25 kayakers carving up the rapids. My new camera lens combo (D700, 24-70mm and 70-200mm) has superseded results again in delivering super sharp action photographs. Preview above. I’ll post them online next week with the announcement of Pandora.

How’s Pandora’s Progress

She’s sweetly moving along fine with her nearly final design, you’ll just have to wait and see. All that is left is building in content pages like: fine art prints, sports portraits and outdoor advertising.

Coming soon to a TV near you.. he he

Digital Asset Management

I help out a lot of other photographers both upcoming and experienced professionals (cause I’m a nice guy) in Digital Asset Management (DAM) that’s the organisation of your photographs and also the photographers workflow.

Yesterday a photographer friend Janelle rang with a few questions on DNG’s file renaming and using them in Lightroom. 20 min latter we soothed the sores and she now has a smoother flowing workflow. Next week I’ll explain the process here on my blog.

Lightroom Workflow Explained

My little workshop went off with a blast and full to capacity (of 9). As I promised to all that attended here are a few links which may help in the future.

• Shooting Tethered – Tethering software for a MAC
• The Turning Gate – A heap of awesome galleries.
• LRB Portfolio – Portfolio website created in Lightroom
• Lightroom Killer Tips – Tutorials, tips, shortcuts & presets.
• The DAM Book – Resources, forum and of course a book.

Hi everybody. I have posted every day for a week this week and quite proud I’ve made it thus far. Today’s the day of the surprise post… yes a special post and with this I’m pleased to announce the Unveiling of Pandora my funky new website.

Pandora’s Coming in November.

Featuring a brand new portfolio page with filtering of different galleries, client testimonials, re-worked contact page and a beautifully laid out blog. Of course there is are a heap of other content coming, we are still two weeks away from the final design & testing. So stay tuned in.

Amazingly designing and managing a website has become easier with the advent of free CMS’s (content management systems) like WordPress and customised themes from Theme Forest. I’d like to give my thanks to these organisation in helping me GTD.

Please check out the new page Screenshots of Pandora

After photographing extreme sports, outdoor adventure for the last few years, I kind of felt it was time to re-ignight that burning flame that was hidden away inside. You could almost say the jealousy was painful, the athletes striving towards there personal goals and reaping the rewards, friendship’s a big one for me.

So two years on I have been actively involved in the Adventure Racing community and haven’t looked back since, becoming a better mountain biker, trail runner and have kayaking skills which often get laughed at. But that’s a whole other story. As I’ve said before “this is just the start of my adventure career”.

What I really wanted to share with you is my last race the Quoll Adventuregaine, a long (33hr) or short course (15hr) depending on how fit you are feeling, this race involves a series of hike, bike, canoe stages while navigating. The real explanation from Adventure Sport website.

Like the small native marsupial that the event draws its name from, the Northern Quoll, this event is a cryptic, partly nocturnal event designed to challenge your physical endurance, team work and navigation skills while traversing a wide variety of landscapes. A sequential multiple rogaine or orienteering format allows competitors to re-group throughout the course in a friendly race format that will make the 2009 Quoll Adventuregaine a challenging yet achievable event for athletes of all abilities.

Andre an adventure specialist, outdoor educator and all-round good guy tee’d us up to compete as a team for the 15hr Adventuregaine, settling on ‘The Murray Anderson-Clemence experience featuring Andre Vogel’ for a team name. The race was very challenging with a lack of sleep and a constant burring in my legs (I guess that’s that flame I was trying to re-ignight – bugger!) we traveled on. Being the second time I’ve raced with Andre we pan out to be a relaxed well oiled team and in the future we will race on.

See us in action below, thanks Darren Osmand for theses awesome images.

My trip down to Sydney coincided with the purchase of a new camera, lens, camera bag and a few other bits n pieces like light modifiers, polarisers, compact flash cards, memory card reader. Or in other words it cost me heaps of mulla for some of the latest equipment on the market, but lets see if these business expense’s reaped the rewards for my clients.

Of course.. after photographing my fourth NESA (National Employment Services Association) Conference this time @ the Sydney Hilton I’m glad to say this new gear rocks my world; “Oh Yeh Baby!” If you don’t know already or haven’t been to a conferencing centre for a while, these places are dark enough that our (photographers) cameras have a hard time exposing the available light, without using a tripod, getting grainy images or camera shake. So here’s my new gear.

• Nikon D700 camera body
• Nikkor 24-70mm f2.8 lens
• TC-17E Teleconverter (for 70-200mm my lens)
• 77mm UV & polariser filters
• Lumiquest Softbox III (LQ-119)
• 2 x 8gb Sandisk Extreme IV
• Sandisk SDDRX4 Memory Card Reader
• +5yr waranty on camera & lens

My best year yet is the D700 is able to handle all the conditions of a conferencing with impeccable results. Cleaner files, higher dynamic range, better graduation in tones and the amazing awesome ability of shooting in low light at high ISO’s with very little noise (grain). And the Nikkor 24-70mm f2.8 lens is sharp as ever. All in all we have happy clients and a happy photographer, job well done.

Truly; lets let the images do the talking

Studio Setup

Setup photographs by Marco Trovalusci

Final Images

Another very satisfied client. I’m happy!

It’s kinda funny how you meet friends over and over during your life in different places, this time sport. Back in the early 2002 I (Muzza!) met Kristian at a skydiving boogie, we did several jumps together (approx 20) and had an all round great time. Now seven years on we meet again in this great club: Adventure Sport NQ and hearing of his adventures now as a white water kayaker which is just awesome! He popped the questions.

Undoubtedly it wasn’t “will you marry this handsome man” but went kinda like this.

Kris – Hey Muzza your a photographer right.

Muz – Yeh that’s right I have this little business called Extreme Photography

Kris – Ah cool and how’s that travelling for you.

Muz – Great I’ve moved into the commercial advertising arena for active lifestyle and outdoor adventure photography (that’s my little marketing speal) and loving it.

Kris – Well you know I’d like to take the kayaks up Behanna George and it’s a bit of a mission maybe 8k’s round trip, my rafting guide mate Dale is willing to do a bit of hard yakka. Are you keen to come and to photograph us in the George there’s a lot of walking for a few runs.

Muz – Hell yes, (knowing he works weekdays) I’ve got Sunday week free lets make a half day of it.

Kris – Nice! lets do an early morning run, I have to be back for a BBQ

Sunday week later – I decided on creating a bit of a story line of the events, which is always good to warm you up before the action. See the story line below. Straight up on Dale’s first run I captured a near perfect shot (9.5 out of 10) for Rafting’s next front page or lets say Eskimos next marketing campaign. What are your thoughts?

Ok you may of asked what happened to the Kayaking in winter… well it is winter in Cairns just that it’s not that cold (17 degrease). Raft on!

I’ve defiantly moved leaps and bounds in my business, photography and organisation of photographing this event. I know contract another great photographer (Stu) to capture the action from a helicopter during the main race. Before I get too excited and explain my setup here’s last years blog on the GPR.

Firstly I research all the materials on this years race, meaning the website, banners, have a meetings with the event & race organiser’s just to make sure I know what’s schedule for the day. And call a week before to wrap up all those little details. I have found research has really helped me evolve in preparing my equipment (not just camera’s) for my long day out.

Below is a list I take to most events and what I use them for.

Basic Equipment – This kit travels with me nearly everywhere, it has all the basic bits ‘n’ pieces needed for any shoot. Versatile enough I can still climb trees and run after my subjects.

• Nikon D200
• Nikkor 10.5mm lens
• Nikkor 17-55mm lens (missing in this image)
• Nikkor 70-200mm lens
• SB-800 flash
• SB-900 flash
• 2 x Compact flash cards
• Spare camera batterie
• 16 AA batteries for flashes
• Elastic bungy cord to secure flashes to posts/trees
• Orange ‘n’ green gells

Race Equipment – Including my trusty D200 and 70-200mm lens this is the perfect setup for me on the bike. I have created some really awesome shots with my D2h mounted to the bracket over the back wheel, with a wireless remote taped to the handle bars to fire the shutter release. See the bottom image of me at work. KISS

• Nikon D2h
• Nikkor 10.5mm lens
• Spare CFC & battery
• Cheap Chinese wireless remote from eBay
• Trek Ex9 mountain bike
• Helmet
• Clip in shoes
• Spare tube & pump
• Apple & a bottle of water

Computer Equipment – Always handy for reviewing my creations half way through the day to see where I stand in terms of a storyline of photographs. Backing is very important, by triplicating the files (on CFC, laptop and external hard drive), it leaves less chance of corruption and or loss of data.

• 13″ MacBook laptop
• Adobe Photoshop Lightroom
• 320gb 2.5″ external harddrive
• Card reader + USB cable
• Extension Cord
• Power board

Night & Fireworks – I have found using two camera/tripod setups during the fireworks rewarding, having one camera, tripod, fisheye lens and wireless remote really close (5 – 10m) to the fireworks and the other in hand for that perfect shot. My optimal exposure settings are: ISO 320 2-6 sec f22 Beware of prevailing winds.

• Carbon Gitzo tripod
• RRS BH-55 head
• Manfrotto tripod
• Manfrotto Pistol grip head

Other Equipment – There is always that other stuff that doesn’t fit into any category, of course whatever makes your day easier and conformable. What are your thoughts.

• My Commodore wagon to store all my gear
• Gaffa tape
• 5 in 1 Reflector
• Spare set of cloths towel
• Battery chargers for camera, AA’s (flash), laptop all to plug-in to a cigarette lighter in my car, just in case!

Thanks for reading, I hope you’ve enjoyed peaking into my working kit, see you Monday.