One of the most controversial topics in photography is editing, and using presets to edit your photos. Hopefully this article will give you a little insight into whether Lightroom Presets are right for you or not.
Firstly, we need to talk about what Lightroom Presets or presets in general are. A preset is a pre determined filter with a certain aesthetic or colour profile which can be applied to a photo to change the overall theme/look.
So, let’s find out, should you be using Lightroom Presets to edit your photos?
Pros
1) Saves time
Using a Lightroom preset can mean that you can finish editing a photo with the click of a button. Presets are downloaded right into your Lightroom application and rather than editing each and every photo from beginning to end, you can apply a preset to every photo in a collection and spend less time editing and more time taking pictures.
2) Explore new styles
With presets, you are exposed to many different styles of editing and colour themes. This allows you to expand your creativity and open your eyes to new aesthetics and ways of editing that you may not have seen before.
3) Consistency in your edits
When you use presets, often there is one or two presets that grabs your attention and you gravitate towards when editing photos. When creating a portfolio or posting on social media, it is always good to keep a consistent style of shooting and especially editing. That way your portfolio has one cohesive look and shows potential clients exactly what they can expect from your work without any uncertainty. With presets, you can edit every photo with the same preset to maintain a similar look/styler throughout your work.
4) Learning how to edit
Presets are just a group of adjustments that have been made and applied to a photo. After applying a preset, you can go through and see what adjustments were made to the photo to achieve that look. This helps you learn what each adjustment does and how to achieve a certain style on your own without using presets.
5) Creating your own presets
You can also create your own presets within Lightroom. If you are editing all of your photos similarly, you can create a preset with the adjustments you make to your photos and save that preset. This way, you have your own custom preset that you can apply to your photos to save you time in editing and also to create a consistent style.
Cons
1) Lack of control
Presets often have so many adjustments that give an edit a certain look that it can be hard to change the edit and tweak it to how you like it.
2) Presets font work for every photo
Not all presets favour every photo. Some presets are created to drastically change a photo. If you were to try and put this preset on a photo that wouldn’t work well with the adjustments, the edit won’t turn out too good. That being said, with some tweaks and adjustments, you can probably save the edit and make the preset work.
3) Presets are a quick solution
Presets are a great option if you really don’t care about learning how to edit and just want to achieve a certain style of editing quickly. If you really want to learn, the best idea is to really study Lightroom and learn how to edit through trial and error.
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If you would like to purchase my preset pack, you can do so by visiting my preset page