Pixel Training

New Lightroom 4 Features - Local Adjustments

One of the cool new features in Lightroom 4 (LR4) is the added control to the Adjustment Brush and Graduated Filter. The more features and controls Adobe adds to this tool the better it gets. Now in LR4 Adobe has added a local White Balance control which is a huge benefit for photographs shooting in mixed light sources. A new HIghlights and Shadows control is also added. The third set of new controls added are Noise and Moiré sliders which are a welcome addition for those who want to remove noise in selected areas of your photo when its not needed in the entire image.

Truly the biggest addition here in my opinion is the added White Balance control. The Noise and Moiré controls are great too but I've had too many photos that were taken indoors and contaminated by the outside light from a window. Previously in LR3 you could only balance for one light and that presents a problem. Also, if you're photographing a wedding there is no control over light and you're at the mercy of what is falling on your subjects. This is not going to be a local adjustment you apply to a hundred photos but for the real important ones, you can make the fix when needed.

Tutorial: How to Reset a Photoshop Tool

Many times while working in Photoshop I grab a tool and it doesn't do what its supposed to do. It can be frustrating and 99% of the time the cause is a setting in the Tool Options that was changed earlier when working with the tool and is still active. It’s a great disruption to the flow of creativity and can just make you angry.

When you encounter this problem the simplest method to get back on track and continue working again is to reset the Tool to its default setting. You could spend a minute or two trying to figure out what's causing the problem but why spend that time searching when you can simply reset the tool with one click? 

The Backup Strategy

Many things can cause a drive failure. Power interrupt, drive enclosure failure, drive mechanisms and even outside elements like fire or water damage can all cause us to lose our data. The first thing you have to do is get your head around the fact that all drives fail at sometime no matter what the cause. It can be a low cost single desktop enclosure or a very expensive sophisticated RAID system. Its not a matter of IF they fail, its WHEN they fail.