Sooner or later you’re going to have to bite the bullet and organize your Lightroom mess, whether you’re an experienced photographer or a beginner. If you haven’t already done so in a thoughtful manner, today is the day to get the job done once and for all. The good news is that you’ll be able to clean everything up by following the straightforward and highly recommend process in the video below.
This tutorial come from Amateur Photography TV, a very popular British YouTube channel and a great source of gear reviews, photo how-tos, and much more. This seven-minute episode begins with a question: “Do you know where all your photos are or are they scattered across multiple external disk drives, flash drives, and memory cards?” Your answer determines whether or not you have a problem that needs to be fixed now.
A well-organized photo library is not only a valuable timesaver it’s also a necessity for pursuing our craft with efficiency and creativity. Cleaning up your mess isn’t as odious a chore as you may think, and once you complete the task it’s super simple to maintain. In other words, you’ll have everything at your fingertips and frantic searches for misplaced photos will be a thing of the past.
This episode walks you through a number of organizational “best practices” for photographers of all skill levels—everything from importing and tagging images to creating collections and using keywords. Not only will these tips help you locate images quickly, but your Lightroom workflow will be far more streamlined too.
Instructor Rod Lawton recommends starting off with “a one-time gathering up of all your images, wherever they are, into a single location and a single Lightroom catalogue.” This initial step lets you see all photos at once, thereby making backups and searches much easier. And as you’ll see, Lightroom can handle both tasks at the same time.
Once the foregoing is accomplished you’ll be ready refine your approach to organization, and the method you employ will depend upon how many photos you have. The next step is separating your images by date, genre, destination, or other criteria into new discrete catalogues that make future searches as easy as can be.
Lawton describes several additional tricks for mastering the use of folders, implementing metadata along with keywords, and utilizing Smart Collections for what he calls “dynamic organization.” He also discusses what he says is the best way to new images. By taking his advice you’ll end up with clutter-free Lightroom Library that greatly simplifies your workflow.
Whether you own a new mirrorless camera or shoot with a long-time friend, choosing the best settings for your style of photography is one key to achieving optimum results. If you’re thinking to yourself, “I’ve already configured my camera properly,” think again because there may be a few oft-ignored camera settings that you should at least try out.
Instructor James Feaver is a professional freelance photographer and post-processing expert whose “Two-Minute Tips” are a favorite among Shutterbug readers. The settings discussed in today’s three-minute episode fall into two categories: those you ignore because you think they’re too complicated, and others that may be totally unfamiliar.
Choosing a camera’s Raw file format falls into the first category and you’ve no doubt heard that from others in the past. Today Feaver attempts to change your mind by demystifying perceived difficulties and explaining why and how Raw images provides superior quality, greater dynamic range, and enhanced color depth.
Another advantage to shooting in Raw is the far greater control this provide s during the image-editing process. If you’re still not convinced, how about taking Feaver’s suggestion and set the camera to capture both Jpegs and Raw photos at once? Doing so should alleviate you fears and enable you to experiment until you decide which approach best meets your needs.
Feaver’s second tip is to turn off a camera’s automatic Image Review function—a default settings he finds “extremely frustrating.” He says that’s because every time you take a photo is appears on the rear LCD for two-four seconds, and that’s really annoying when capturing multiple images in succession.” In fact, even a two-second distraction can keep you from capturing a fleeting moment.
Third on the list is to make sure to set the correct time and date—a simple task that’s the first thing many photographers do when pulling a new camera out of the box. Many of us, however, consider time and dates settings useless, but Feaver just might change your mind with several important reasons you may not have considered.
There are two more camera settings that Feaver strongly recommends and we suggest following his advice. By doing so you’ll likely work faster and capture better photographs. Once you’re finished watching head over to Feaver’s instructional YouTube channel where you’ll find many more very helpful two- and three-minute tips.
Qatar Airways’ destination management company, Discover Qatar, unveils its latest offering, ‘Discover Doha by Air’, providing travelers with an exclusive opportunity to explore Qatar’s stunning landscapes and iconic landmarks from the comfort of a light aircraft. Designed for discerning adventurers seeking bespoke experiences, the air tour promises a fusion of adventure, thrill-seeking, and exploration.
Planner 5D is one of the easiest to use and best looking interior design rendering software around – it’s amateur friendly, making it an excellent starting point.
The kitchen is the heart of the home so when redesigning this space a great deal of care and attention is needed. Whether you’re looking at designing your kitchen yourself or are an interior designer or builder who wants to offer clients their dream kitchen, the best place to start when planning this room is with a kitchen design software program.
Kitchen design software programs will let you map out the floor plan then add cupboards, worktops and appliances to build the ideal kitchen layout for the space. Many of these programs will also let you play with different finishes and fixtures to give you an in depth look at your final kitchen design.
But which kitchen design software should you use? There are numerous options to choose from ranging from clean and simple free versions to paid versions with all the bells and whistles to splurge on. What you need will probably depend on what you need it for.
If you’re designing your own kitchen you might not need an all singing all dancing software for multiple projects, however professionals who will be working on many projects at once might want to choose software aimed at interior designers.
To help you work out which kitchen design software is the best for your kitchen design, we’ve found 20 free and paid tools that are the best in the business…
Cost: free for basic features, need to pay to access all features
Described as ‘created for amateurs’ Planner 5D is an excellent first port of call for novice designers and is a great tool for teaching you how to start planning your kitchen. Easy to use across iOS and Android devices and with a handy app too, this kitchen design software lets you create 2D renderings for free however for realistic 3D renderings you’ll have to upgrade to the paid version.
An excellent choice for those on the more professional side of kitchen remodeling spectrum, the Cedreo software lets you create a beautiful 3D rendered kitchen design in minutes. A great planning tool if you’re an interior designer or home builder, the real draw of this software is it’s not just limited to kitchen design and you can design the whole house with it.
This online kitchen planner lets you start the kitchen design process from scratch or you can choose one of their many templates. It’s available online so you don’t need to download anything and is a fully interactive 3D visualisation tool for all your kitchen design needs. It also includes many elements you might forget when designing your dream kitchen including sockets and vents.
This no strings attached, browser-based kitchen design software is one of the best free options available. Simple to use, it’s anything but basic with dozens of flooring and countertop options to choose from and over 100 cabinet designs to suit any taste and interior design style.
Free and relatively easy to use, this kitchen design software is more for homeowners looking to design their own kitchen rather than professional designers. Starting with the dimensions of your kitchen layout, you can see both 2D and 3D renderings of your design and if you want more help, you can also schedule a consultation with a Lowe’s design specialist to start working on making your kitchen design a reality.
As its name suggests, this is one of the best tools for designing your dream backsplash and matching them to a wide range of kitchen cabinets. Their backsplash library contains hundreds of designs, colours, and pattern combinations and you can also buy backsplashes from popular brands once you’ve made your selection. It might not look the best in terms of graphics but it’s a great free option.
With the capability to create both a 2D and 3D floor plan of your kitchen layout, Homestyler is an intuitive, user friendly tool for amateurs and professionals alike. With hundreds of kitchen furniture pieces and furnishings available from well-respected brands, it’s easy to track what your need to buy after you’ve perfected your kitchen plan to help smooth out the entire design process.
An entry-level online kitchen planner, Prodboard is a fantastic option for those without a high-resolution graphics card on their computer. Whilst the floor plan might not turn out as crisp as some of the more professional programs, it’s perfect for individuals and there’s also a more in-depth licensed version for businesses.
One of the best kitchen design software options to splurge on if you have the funds is Home Designer Pro. With a full suite of industry-grade tools it can have a steep learning curve when you first start using it, but there’s a library of tutorials to help get you quickly acquainted with the advanced features of this software. It will help you to create the most detailed kitchen design possible.
A floor plan-centered software program, SmartDraw lets you quickly and easily plan out your dream kitchen in minutes and most importantly, work out what will and won’t fit. The interactive floor plan will let you add doors, windows, furniture, and even kitchen appliances, for a full overview of what your finished kitchen will look like.
ProKitchen Software lets you create real-life 3D models of products which can then be bought and installed in the finished design through the 500 appliance and fixture catalogues. It has an intuitive user interface which offers superb visualisation capabilities and they also offer a 7-day free trial before you need to take the plunge with the paid version.
With two speed options HomeByMe is a cool program with ‘go fast’ and ‘be precise’ modes. The fast mode gets you stuck in with your kitchen layout by using pre-made blocks, whilst the more precise mode lets you build the room from scratch using exact measurements. You can then modify your new floor plan in 2D and 3D views so you get an in-depth overall look at your kitchen design.
A paid for program, but much cheaper than many others on this list, the HGTV kitchen design software is great for both professional designers and individual customers. It has a drag and drop layout that allows you to create a kitchen design using a wide range of materials, cabinets, countertops, appliances, and more, and the free technical support is another handy feature for new users.
A must for building your perfect kitchen floor plan, Floorplanner lets you create interactive 2D and 3D renderings. You get your first plan free and are allowed to make unlimited edits to the kitchen design, so that free plan could last longer than you’d think which more than makes up for the less realistic finish of this online kitchen planner.
One of the best free kitchen design planners out there (especially if you’re looking to buy your new kitchen from them) is the IKEA 3D Kitchen Planner. Easy to use, the layout of this kitchen design software doesn’t require the user to have any architectural expertise. You can simply input the measurements for your floor plan and the program will get started with building the best kitchen layout for the space which you can then edit as needed.
Foyr Neo is a cloud-based and highly feature-rich interior design software. It has a variety of tools dedicated to different interior designing processes like mood boarding, building floor plans, selecting and organizing design elements and visualizing the final output in 3D.
The efficiency and effectiveness with which Foyr Neo’s various tools perform complex tasks like rendering designs and creating 3D walkthroughs will enable you to direct all your attention to the client-facing aspects of your business, thereby helping you delight existing clients and acquire new ones. In a nutshell, you can focus on growing your business with Foyr Neo helping you manage your administrative, day-to-day operations.
Fantastic for interior design in general, Roomtodo software is simple but powerful. Letting you create walls with ease and even draw over existing floor plans, this software will help you with your kitchen planning with both 2D and 3D rendering and you can also go on a walkthrough view when you’re done. Whilst not a realistic as some of the more professional software options out there, it’s an excellent free program that caters to individuals looking to take charge of their own kitchen design and smaller businesses too.
A powerhouse of a kitchen design tool, SketchUp helps you to create your dream kitchen from the floor plan up. With a library of designs from fellow users to look through, you can adjust and customise the existing designs to suit your own space. It does have a bit of a learning curve which is often the standard with these more in-depth programs but peer support is on hand to help with any teething issues. They do have a basic free version, but the magic is of course in the pro software.
Cost: basic version for free, paid personalised version on consultation
A great start for interior design businesses, this program lets you share designs and ideas with customers through its cloud-based interface and you can even add your logo and other touches thanks to the personalised branding options available. Allowing you to create detailed designs from scratch, you can plan, visualise and configure rooms throughout the home, not just the kitchen design and the shopping cart integration will lead you seamlessly into the building stage.
One of the leading kitchen design programs, Virtual Architects is one of the most popular for a reason. With options to upload photos of your existing kitchen design or create a whole new space, it has a clever drag and drop function and a large library full of cabinets, lighting, appliances, and more to fill your remodel with. Add in the quick 3D rendering and panoramic walkthrough function which can be downloaded and shared with iOS and Android devices. it’s a very handy tool to have in your interior design arsenal.
