A quick introduction to Lightroom, how you should be using it, and what we will be doing in this course.

A quick look under the hood, which will really help you make sense of Lightroom as we progress in this course.

How to move around, change the interface, choose pictures, and make edits. And some shortcuts!

Why you need to import pictures, and how to do it properly.

We will delve into the Library module and talk about the best ways to organize your photos.

Now we will talk about the tools Lightroom has in the Library module to help you organize your photos so you can find them when you need them.

A quick overview of the Develop module - which is where we are going to spend most of our time in this course.

Lightroom's powerful tools for making corrections to your photos - tailored to your lens!

Let's whip those photos into shape before we start editing them.

Lightroom's tools for eliminating spots, imperfections, and even unwanted people from your pictures.

Brighten up those dark areas. Tone down those highlights. And everything else in between.

Simple but powerful ways to improve the colors in your photos.

The current version of Lightroom CC as of August 2018.

As you’ll see in the course, Adobe made minor modifications while I was filming the course.  As a result, I created a new video on the upgrades.  I will so that for any additional upgrades going forward, so you can rest easy that your knowledge won’t be out of date any time soon.

Yes.  Lightroom CC is basically “Lightroom Light” designed for mobile devices.  In this course, we’ll be using full Lightroom Classic.  It has every control in Lightroom CC (and then some), so you will learn everything in Lightroom CC.

If this answer doesn’t make sense to you, or if you are trying to figure out which is which, check out this article.

I think so.  The controls are the same.  Lightroom is basically the Adobe Camera Raw screens cleaned up into a better interface, with improved organizational tools added in.

That said, there are some differences.  Lightroom has a few additional controls, and they obviously look much different.  So, while I am sure this course would be useful to you if you are an ACR/Photoshop user, I’m just not sure it will be insanely useful.  That makes me a little uneasy, as I’m all about exceeding expectations.

Read below about my approach, which will give you a better idea of what I’m trying to accomplish for you in this course.  As is set forth there, this course is part software and part technique.  I think that has value to the ACR user as well.  Still I’m a little uneasy about recommending this course when the interfaces aren’t the same.  So I’m going to give it a tepid “yes.”

This course is as much about how I edit and use the tools as it is about the software itself.  I feel like most courses try to show you every nook and cranny of the software, without really having an eye toward accomplishing anything.  At the end, you have a general understanding of the tools available to you, but not really how they are used in common practice.  You don’t know what is important and what is not.  In my case, I just don’t do that.  I’m all about you accomplishing things in photography.  I want you to understand what is important and what is not.  So, for example, instead of saying, “here is every organizational tool Lightroom offers,” and then going through them one by one, I say, “use these tools and ignore the rest.”  And then I try to show you how they are used in action.  In other words, I try to focus on what is important.  And then, to make sure you have everything down, I have start to finish examples, etc.

I recognize that this approach may leave me susceptible to leaving something out that someone wants to know.  That’s why I have created the Bonus Videos.  These will be specific examples, more detail in certain areas, and answers to any questions.  I anticipate creating a lot more of these videos.  If you have questions, or if you want to see something added, I can now create new videos and address it.  The idea is that we can have our cake and eat it too.  We can have a streamlined course focused on using the most important elements of Lightroom in the best ways possible.  At the same time, I can backfill the course with more specifics and examples as the need arises.  That’s not to say there aren’t lots of specific in the core course itself – just that I’m adding more to it.