Just Finished a Brand New eBook

I have written three eBooks on Photoshop Elements and published them on Amazon. But the last one was Photoshop Elements 14 – The Organizer Revisited Again. Photoshop Elements (PSE) has been improved and enhanced significantly since then, and I figured it was time to write another one.

Photoshop Elements 2021 – The Organzer Plus has just been added to my books on Amazon. I have been working on it the last couple of months.

New eBook

The finished eBook has 241 pages and 315 figures. As with my other eBooks, this one essentially only covers the Organizer module of Photoshop Elements. For the most part, I leave the Photo Editor to other authors. Even if you are using a slightly older version PSE, there is still plenty of helpful information for you in this eBook.

If you end up buying it or reading it for free through Kindle Unlimited, let me know what you think.

Until next time…

Adobe’s Photoshop Elements 2021 Released

It has been sometime since I last posted anything. One would think that with COVID-19 running wild, I would have more time to do this. Not so, it seems. I have been actively pursuing my photography to be sure. For one thing I have been busy beta testing the latest version of Photoshop Elements, PSE 2021, which Adobe just announced on Thursday.

Below is a link to where you can learn about this latest version, beyond what I can cover here. It includes several videos.

https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop-elements/whats-new.html?trackingid=XFWLHJ9Z&mv=in-product

As I generally do, I am going to provide a short description of what is in the latest version. It includes performance improvements and some new features as well.

Here are some of the highlights:

In the Organizer there is a new Catalog database only backup command.

Three new Guided Edits, Perfect Landscapes (added a more dramatic sky in this example), Creative Dualtone Effect, and Move and Scale Object.

Moving Photos (2D and 3D camera motion) command in the Photo Editor.

Fix Face Tilt option has been added to the Enhance > Adjust Facial Features command. Note, the animated GIF here is just to give the idea of the results. There is no animation.

New Creation, Quote Graphic, which is accessible from both the Organizer and the Photo Editor, which has numerous templates, including animation.

Option to save photos to the Adobe cloud. You can also edit a photo stored on the cloud.

Use GPU to improve performance when using certain filters in the Photo Editor, for ezample, Liquify filter.

Adobe Camera RAW (ACR) editor was upgraded to the new look of Version 12.4 allowing the film strip of opened photos to be either at the bottom or the left.

In the coming weeks I will be demonstrating these and other improvements to Photoshop Elements 2021, as well as Premiere Elements 2021, which also had significant new features added this round. Stay tuned.

Until next time…

360-Degree Panoramas Webpage

If you have followed my blog, you know that a lot of my posts deal with 360-degree panoramas, either taken with my drone, or more recently my Insta360 One X camera. My posts have often dealt with my efforts to stitch the individual images together and then effectively project them to be able to use the mouse to scroll and zoom.

About a month ago I added a dedicated webpage to focus on both my efforts and some of the results. Currently most of the examples were created using Momento360.com projections. The link to the webpage is shown at the top of this page. Later I will highlight other sites and software.

Stay tuned.

Until next time, stay safe.

Scott Kelby’s Latest Webinar

This morning Scott Kelby presented his latest free webinar on backing up your photos. I tuned in a bit late, but the webinar is still available at the following link.

Scott Kelby Webinar – Backing Up Your Photos

In fact, you can also view previous webinars here as well.

The webinar is focused on those who use Adobe’s Lightroom Classic. For those of you are are Lightroom users, who are familar with Scott Kelby, you may already be familar with his SLIM – Simplified Lightroom Image Management system.

There is a complete updated course on Slim on KelbyOne.com

But even if you do not you will probably get multiple tips by watching the webinar.

Some of the key points discussed in the webinar include:

• Put all of your photos on one external hard drive.

• Backup up your photos to a second external hard drive.

• Also, back up your photos to cloud Storage.

• Put all of your photos on your external drive into a single super folder. Your existing folders are then sub-folders of this super folder.

• In Lightroom Classic, use only one Catalog.

The webinar goes on to discuss additional Lightroom topics. Even if you do not use Lightroom, the above practices are worth doing.

Until next time…

 

How Photoshop Elements has Changed Throughout the Years

As I read the discussions in various forums and Facebook groups, it is apparent that many users continue to use older versions of Photoshop Elements. Many users are even using older versions than PSE 11, released in the Fall of 2012. This version is significant, because Adobe changed the complete look and feel of the program in that version.

One of the most commonly asked questions from users of older versions is whether or not it is worthwhile to upgrade to the then current version. The answer for a given user depends upon their circumstances. It is often driven by changes in the computer they use, its operating system, and/or the camera they use.

Today, we are probably about half way through the product life cycle of PSE 2020. If history repeats itself, PSE 2021 will be released sometime this Fall. So the question many users ask is should I upgrade to the latest version. Adobe has a excellent table that compares PSE 2020 features with previous ones going back to PSE 15. You can access it at the link below:

For several years now I have maintained my own table. It is more detailed than the one in the above link and goes back to PSE 11. The link below is to my current version. It is an Excel spreadsheet. 

Feature Comparison PSE 11 Through PSE 2020

If you have been struggling to decide whether to upgrade or not, I hope you found this information helpful. If so please star-rate it or Like/Share the post. Also, I am always open to comments.

Until next time…

Addendum: Some were not able to open my spreadsheet. I have converted it to a PDF file. The link to it is below.

Photoshop Elements Feature Comparison PSE 11 through PSE 2020 PDF File.

 

Creating High Contrast Landscapes Images Using Photoshop

In this post, I am going to demonstrate how to bring out detail in landscape photos using traditional/legacy commands in Photoshop.

In more recent versions of Photoshop, we have new commands such as Clarity and Texture that essentially do this. But sometimes it is fun to revert to the old way. Besides, there is always that potential to better control the final result.

In this demo, I will be using Photoshop 2020, but the same techniques can be used using Photoshop Elements as well. I learned this technique from Dave Seeram in a magazine article he wrote several years ago.

Click on the figure below to view the tutorial.

If you found this AppTip Sheet to be helpful, please give it a star rating, or click on the Like or Share buttons at the bottom.

Until next time…

Lightroom Classic Can Adjust Tone and Color of Video

Lightroom Classic can be used to edit your video clips. Editing video is not the first thing that comes to mind when using Lightroom. It is its advanced digital image management capabilities and ever expanding photo editing features.

It can also be used to trim your video, as well as removing sections in the middle of the clip.

The tone and color editing features are under Quick Develop in the Library module.

Timeline editing tools are also readily accessible. Using these tools along with those in the Slide Show module, you can assemble a multimedia presentation with simple transitions, text overlays, and background music, all within Lightroom Classic.

I used Lightroom Classic to edit the color and tone of the video I shot recently at the beach from my Mavic Pro drone. I find that it often works better for me. I did choose to use PRE 2020 to do the timeline trimming, since it has a Smart Trim tool that I often use to get started.  For this video, I also chose PRE 2020 to add the title text.

But the fact remains, I could have stayed in Lightroom Classic to do the entire project, including producing the final 1920x1080p video.

The link below shows my final video. By the way, to see the best quality, switch YouTube options to play 1080p HD. Its default is 720p HD.

I plan to use Lightroom Classic more in the future to edit the tone and color of my videos.

If you like this video, please Share it and give it a Like. Thanks.

Until next time…

Quick Video Using Camtasia 2019

I have used Techsmith’s Camtasia and Snagit for several years. For the most part I have used them to produce tutorial screen casts. Over the years, Camtasia has added features that rival consumer level video editors, such as Adobe’s Premiere Elements.

Much of my photography is centered around taking videos and photos of my granddaughters competing in sports. On a recent weekend, I videoed Lucy in one of her soccer games as the goalkeeper.

I decided to use Camtasia 2019 to produce the final video. However, I took multiple steps and programs to create the final short video.

Here is what I did.

Shooting the video Clips

•  For this project I used my Sony AX53 Camcorder to take the 1080p video.

  • This camera is lighter and easier to hold for extended periods than my Canon 7D Mk 2. Since Lucy is a goalkeeper, much of the time the action does not involve her. I keep her roughly in the frame as I watch the game. When she tenses and begins to prepare for action, I begin the video.

  • Doing this I end up with a large number of short video clips by the end of the game.

Post Processing

1. I used Lightroom Classic to Import and then add Keyword tags to all of the video clips.

2. Then using the Picks and Rejects flags I identified those that are not worth retaining. This is the vast majority. I deleted them.

3. Then I used the Star Rating system of Lightroom Classic to identify just those very few clips that I wanted to include in the current project.

4. My camcorder did a pretty good job of recording the raw video. However, for each clip I used Lightroom Classic’s Quick Develop mode within the Library module, and selected Auto Tone. This brightened up each clip. Lightroom Classic is not optimized for video editing, but it does do a nice job here.

   

5. I used Premiere Elements 2020 to convert two of the clips to slow motion, since the action was too fast to follow easily.

6. I saved the edited clips back into the same folder the original clips are stored, but with new names. And then I Imported them into Lightroom Classic and tagged them accordingly.

7. At this point, I would normally finish the project by adding transitions, titles etc using Premiere Elements 2020, but this time,  I chose to use Camtasia 2019 to finish my project.

8. Specifically, I did the following in Camtasia 2019:

   • Imported the four clips to a single track.

   • Added Transitions and adjusted their duration. I used a couple of different transitions.

   • Added  lower thirds title for the video, customizing it a bit from the default.

   • I added a music background and deleted the audio that my camcorder originally recorded, except at the very end of the video, which I thought was cool.  The music I added came from Techsmith’s selection of free music.

   • Finally, I saved the project as an MP4 HD 1080p video file on my hard drive.

So for this project, I used three separate programs. Lightroom Classic is pretty unique here in what it does. However, I could have used Premiere Elements 2020 to do everything that I did in Camtasia 2019. I could have also converted the slow motion clips with in Camtasia 2019 instead of Premiere Elements 2020, but the process would have been harder.

So, I often find in creating a video project, I end up using multiple programs. And remember, the features of Camtasia 2019 for this simple project only scratched the surface of its capabilities. In future projects, I will explore more of what it can do.

CLICK HERE to see the resulting video.

If you liked this post, give it a LIKE, Ok?

Until next time…

 

 

Dipping My Feet into Adobe Portfolio

For some time now Adobe as offered a free website building tool to help you build your own online photo gallery. It is called Adobe Portfolio, and it is free with any subscription to the Creative Cloud. In my case I subscribe to the option that gives me Lightroom Classic, Lightroom, and Photoshop CC for ten dollars a month.

Adobe has added new features since they first introduced it. I played with it a couple of years ago, but never really got into it. So today I began my second venture. I have put up a very basic gallery so far. There are plenty of additional elements I can and will in time.

But my first attempt at least allows the viewer an easy way to view the few pictures I have uploaded so far. It is easy to upload your photos from Lightroom. You just put your photos in a Lightroom Album and upload the pictures from there. If you are a Lightroom Classic user, you must sync the desired Collection with Lightroom where that Collection becomes an Album. You can also just upload pictures directly from your computer.

Here is the URL for Adobe Portfolio https://portfolio.adobe.com/

Here is the link to my first simple gallery.  https://donstouder.myportfolio.com/

There is a lot more customizing that I will be doing as time goes on. As with most everything, there is a bunch of YouTube tutorials that should bring me up to speed pretty quickly.

Until next time…

Screen You Photos in Lightroom Classic

Unless you make a conscientious effort to screen your images and videos, you very quickly end up with so many that even if you have them tagged, it will be difficult to quickly find those few images that are worth further work.

After a photoshoot, you can easily end up with hundreds of images. I take a lot of sports action photos. I generally have my camera set on its burst mode. After photographing two or three softball or soccer games during the weekend, I will come home with about 300-400 images. Amongst these are probably less than 50 that are even worth saving.

In the AppTip Sheet linked in this post, I describe a method that I adopted from an eBook by photographer, Chris Marquardt (https://chrismarquardt.com). It is only one of may ways that can be used to quickly go through your photos to end up with only the very best.

Click on the figure below to view the tutorial.

In the next tutorial in this series, we will begin to cover some basic editing capabilities in Lightroom Classic.

I hope you found this tutorial helpful. I f you did please Star Rate it at the top of the post. Also, comments are always welcome.

Until next time…