Know Your Flow.

I’ve been thinking about blogging my work flow for probably about 6 months now. I’m not too sure why I, or anyone for that matter wants to publish their work flow. I guess if you are trying to maximize your time shooting while minimizing your time in front of the computer – reading what other people are doing is a good start.

I guess I have a “light” flow (no pun intended ladies) if you will. I don’t do much in post, but I am very organized. When you are dealing with 15,000+ digital images, I guess you really have no choice. When ever I go out for a shoot somewhere I always double check my crumpler first to make sure that I have everything that I think I will need. There is NOTHING like getting somewhere and forgetting that lens or filter at home. So even though I always put things back where they go, I still always check.

1. Get to the location, and scout the area out. I like to walk around my surroundings and make a mental note of places I want to capture. Most of the time, while walking around – I will stop and take a few shots. I like to feel out the light, and of course my camera settings.
2. Take Photographs (Obviously).

3. Import all images from my camera to my notebook – I keep the standard date windows assigns, and I tag my images with the location of the shot or name.
4. I go through each one of my images in Windows Photogallery at full screen preview and depending on what I’ve shot – I assign my best shots, that I plan on publishing a “star” rating. 5 stars go up, and need minimal adjustment in post. 4 stars are noted for needing color or cropping adjustments. If I have taken shots for an HDR, I rate all of the pics in the sets with a 3 star rating, since there are normally three slides. IF I shot any panoramic images that need to be stitched those are rated with 2 stars. I delete any blurry or “place holder shots” that are good for nothing during this process.

5. Browse WPG for all of my “5 STAR” shots, and copy them to a new folder on my desktop.
6. Create a separate subfolder for HDR & Pano shots.
7. Create Panoramic Images in my company’s Virtual Tour Software.
8. Create & Fine Tune HDR shots in Photomatix Pro
9. Select all .CR2 (RAW) 5 star photos and open in Photoshop CS3 Extended, process RAWs if needed and save on External Backup Drive.
10. Open up any 4 star images, and begin to make adjustments – Save on External.
11. Copy all “Publishable” Images back to my notebook hard drive.
12. Upload to Flickr for viewing.

13. Locate memorable shots, get prints made.
14. Upload desirable shots to Etsy for sale.