Editing Product Still-Life Images in Lightroom

Name: Editing Product Still-Life Images in Lightroom
Author: Jeff Shaffer

In these lessons, you will learn to adjust images used to show off products, and how to edit them to look better for consumers. You will understand color…

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Hello. In today's lesson I will explain a detailed process for ensuring color accuracy and product still photography. Employing the X-Rite ColorChecker Passport and it's accompanying camera calibration app. Color accuracy and product photography's very important. As many products use carefully chosen colors based on consumer trends. Consumer's often make their purchasing decisions at least in part on the product's colors. In some cases, product colors are even trademarked. Like Coca Cola's well know red cans. Which must be reproduced as accurately as possible. Every camera model has a slightly different color response at the sensor. And this requires calibration to map it's color response accurately and standardize it in the process. To set up this calibration, I first photographed the ColorChecker Passport shown here. In the same light source and general lighting I intend to use for the product. It must be shot as straight on as possible. Properly exposed and evenly lit. Use the calibrator as it reads the color patches to build a necessary profile. Here you can see the software reading the color patches. The image must be captured in the raw format. And then converted to DNG to use the app. This can be done in Light Room by choosing Export, Custom Settings and choosing DNG from the pull down menu. Using different lenses can result in different color results. Due to the specific lens coatings and other characteristics. So ideally you create different profiles for different lenses, different cameras, different light sources. The app is very easy to use. Simply launch it. As you see here this is the launch window. And drag and drop the DNG in to the window. If the above procedure is I described is as follows it can target all the color patches and gray patches. And build the necessary profile by clicking the Create Profile button, at the lower right. Save the profile where desired. I've created a file called Camera Calibration to store it. Moving on to Light Room now I click on an image that I shot as an example for this exercise. I'll click on the edit panel. And click on the icon for profiles. And it reveals a set of ellipses to the right of the word profile. Using the pull down menu I choose Import profiles. And it will bring in the profile that I shot. Produced using the app. And then new custom profiles are stored in the profiles twirl down menu. As you can see I've already created a number of profiles. For different lenses and different lighting conditions. Choosing an image I shot in Strobe. Or flash lighting. You can see the different color rendition with a different lens. Different lighting condition. As I mouse over it. It's particularly apparent in the purplish background color. I'll make sure I choose the Strobe one because this image was shot in Strobe. By mousing over that profile and clicking on it to apply. When I click the back button you can see that that profile has been applied. You've learned in this lesson a method for color calibrating your camera under controlled lighting conditions for different light sources and even different lenses. This ensures your product photos will be as accurate to the product as possible when shooting. Thanks for watching. Stay tuned for the next lesson where we will explore making color changes and other creative adjustments in a still life photo. So let's go check it out.

Advanced Provider : Jeff Shaffer 3 Lessons · 16m in Arabic, German, English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Chinese

Course Description

In these lessons, you will learn to adjust images used to show off products, and how to edit them to look better for consumers. You will understand color accuracy and how important it is for your colors to pop to viewers, as well as making adjustments in Photoshop.

What You'll Learn

Color-correct a product still-life image to ensure color accuracy
Apply creative color-grading effects to product images
Enhance and adjust color backgrounds to make colors pop for viewers
Use Photoshop to adjust an image's color
Edit product still-life images in Lightroom to look better for consumers

Key Takeaways

Color accuracy is important so that colors pop for viewers of product images.
Product still-life images can be color-corrected and given creative color-grading effects.
Photoshop can be used to adjust an image's color.
The course covers ensuring color accuracy, working with color backgrounds and enhancing color, and making Photoshop color adjustments.

Frequently Asked Questions

What will I learn in this course?

You will learn to adjust images used to show off products and edit them to look better for consumers, including how to color-correct a product still-life image, apply creative color-grading effects, and use Photoshop to adjust your image's color.

Which lessons does this course include?

The course includes three lessons: Ensuring Color Accuracy, Color Background and Enhancing Color, and Photoshop Color Adjustments.

What skills does this course cover?

It covers Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, Color Correction, Darkroom, Image Editing, Photo Editing, and Product Photography.

What software is used in this course?

The course uses Lightroom for editing product still-life images and Photoshop for adjusting an image's color.

Why does the course emphasize color accuracy?

Color accuracy is emphasized because it is important for your colors to pop to viewers of product images shown to consumers.