Batch-Editing Photos: Work Faster Not Harder (VIDEO)

Most Lightroom users are always looking for timesaving techniques that will streamline their workflow without any sacrifice in image quality, which is why understanding how to batch-edit multiple images is a great way the streamline the process.

You’ll learn how to do exactly that in this three-minute episode from the Adobe Live channel whose stated mission is “to empower individuals like you to unleash your creative potential.” And we all want to do that, right?

This lesson is another installment of an eight-part series with educator, digital artist and post-processing expert Aaron Nace. In today’s episode he guides you the process of applying the same enhancements to multiple image with a similar look. And the technique works equally well with both basic adjustments and complex masking techniques.

Nace explains the concept like this: “All you have to do is edit an image as you normally would, and at the end just copy and paste the settings to the other images in your filmstrip.” He pulls up five images caprured at the same time and begins with Lightroom’s Crop tool to refine the shot by straightening the horizon and adjusting highlights and shadows.

Then Nace employs Lightroom’s masking tools to accentuate his main subject—a man running along the beach with a nice sky, the sea in the midrange, and the sun peaking above the horizon. The next step is to employ a Radial Gradient for a subtle vignette effect that makes the edges of the frame a darker blue.

The image is now significantly improved and it’s time to copy the aforementioned adjustments and quickly past them to his other four images so that they all have a consistent look without having to edit each of them separately. This is essentially what batch-processing is all about.

Nace demonstrates this final step so quickly and effectively that we won’t bother summarizing the process here, so just take a look and follow his simple instructions. Then you’ll want to update your everyday workflow accordingly so that you can get back out in the field with a camera as soon as possible.

There’s much more to learn about productive post-processing techniques on the Adobe Live YouTube channel, so be sure to pay a visit and explore what’s available.

And don’t miss the tutorial we featured recently with an Australia-based adventure/travel shooter who demonstrates five Lightroom Mobile techniques for editing travel and landscape photographs on the go.