Tip Tuesday – 08/10/2010

Time for another Tip Tuesday! It’s all about image sharpening, and the improvements made to Lightroom 3 & Adobe Camera RAW 6. Check it out:

UPDATE 08/12/2010 – I’ve been getting some questions about sharpening in Lightroom vs sharpening in Photoshop. There is an excellent article over at Brett Edge Photography where Nat Coalson details the differences between “capture sharpening” & “output sharpening”.

RAW vs JPEG – Practical Use for Designers & Photographers

Last week Firgs opened up her Designer Roundtable discussion with the topic RAW vs JPEG and whether it matters to designers. I responded in the comments that designers could simply use the JPEG provided to them or take advantage of what RAW has to offer for more creative post-processing.  She followed up with a question about practical things designers need to know about using RAW vs JPEG. With that here are my Top Five Things to know about RAW vs JPEG:

1. White Balance.
When using Adobe Camera RAW or Lightroom, you have the ability to change the image white balance without affecting image quality. In fact, the white balance settings will reflect the available features in camera, e.g., Daylight, Fluorescent, Tungsten, Flash, etc. You can also choose “As Shot” or let the program Auto white balance. When creating a custom white balance you can read & adjust the color temperature of the RAW file.

When using a JPEG file  you can adjust white balance, but it’s not the same as changing the settings. Adobe Camera RAW & Lightroom only give you three choices–Auto, As Shot or Custom. When creating a custom white balance setting you make a +/- adjustment without seeing the color temperature.

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Announcing Photoshop Tip Tuesday

Welcome to all the KJ fans visiting my humble website today. If you caught the announcement on Kevin’s blog, you know we’re teaming up to bring you a new Photoshop or Lightroom tip on Tuesdays each week. The best part of this series is we’ll be responding to your questions! You can get started by connecting with us:

1. Leave comments on the blog.

2. Follow Kevin and Follow me on Twitter, you can @reply us there.

3. If you missed a video, subscribe to the YouTube channel.

For all the new folks, here’s a primer on why you’d choose Lightroom vs Bridge, my thoughts on Aperture 3 compared to Lightroom 3, and learn how Lightroom manages your image metadata.

I hope you’ll find Photoshop Tip Tuesday to be an essential part of your Internet fare, checkout this week’s episode, and watch next week as I talk about Content-Aware Scaling in Photoshop.