Stuck in Editing and Album Hell? Try This Workflow.

It’s your day off and the last thing on your mind is having fun… because you are stuck in editing hell.

Yeah, we’ve been there too. It’s time for an editing intervention.

Those weddings that were so fun to shoot over the last few weeks are coming back to haunt you, as you spend 10-12 hours behind the computer, editing photos one at a time by hand in Lightroom and designing albums in outdated and confusing album programs.

Get your life back NOW. Here’s how:

First, you will need Photo Mechanic. This program does one thing and one thing only: it allows you to cull a set of images in seconds without waiting for anything to render.

Second, purchase Mastin Labs and learn our easy 3 click processto getting a consistent true-to-film look. Your work will look clean and consistent, with beautiful skin tones.

Third, to design your albums, you’ll need SmartAlbums 2. If you want to try it out, they offer a 30-day trial.

Follow this Workflow:

1. Dump all of your images into a program called Photo Mechanic. Cull your images quickly by only selecting the keepers. Don’t do it the other way by slowly taking images out, or rating them on a scale. Your first instinct with keeper photos is right. Trust it.

2. Import your culled raw photos into Lightroom with your chosen Mastin Labs preset applied at import.

3. Edit an image with the Mastin 3-Step Workflow.

4. Sync the settings for that image to the all similar images after it. Do this by selecting all the images after your edited image by holding down the shift key. Then click on ‘Sync Settings.’ (You may have to further adjust exposure on some images if you were shooting on an auto setting rather than manual.)

5. Export your photos and upload them to your online client gallery of choice, or send them directly to your lab to make proof prints etc.

Follow this workflow in SmartAlbums 2 to design your albums:

1. Organize your edited photos into individual folders on your desktop in the following categories: Getting Ready, Ceremony, Bride and Groom, Formal Photos, Dancing, and Reception. Feel free to add more folders, but these example folders will create a nice structure for what follows.

2. Open SmartAlbums 2 and select the album company and size to begin your album.

3. Import all of the folders you created above by dragging them onto the SmartAlbums library screen. This will create categories with the correct images inside to make album design a breeze.

4. Follow the SmartAlbums 2 intuitive design system to make a complete album in literally 15 minutes. Yes, 15 minutes. And it will look perfect:

5. Upload your finished album to SmartAlbums 2 Cloud Proofing and send the album design to your client for feedback.

What Used To Take Several Days Can Now Be Accomplished in a Half a Day or Less

Personally, by following the system above I went from spending an average of 3 days of editing per wedding to editing and getting an album draft online for clients in 3 hours.

Looking back, my only regret is that I didn’t find SmartAlbums 2 sooner.