LEARNING
Understanding Photography
Lightroom – Part 5
(Develop module – Lens and WB Corrections)
N
ow it is time to start developing
your image. While various tools
are arranged in Lightroom in
a particular order, I will proceed in
a sequence that will result in a more
logical workflow.Lens Correction tool: This is the one
you must first use in your workflow. It
can do a lot of wonderful things and is
very easy to apply. You can divide this
tool’s usage into – Correcting Lens
Defects, Straighten and Correcting
Perspective. The first is due to
the defects in the lens design and
manufacture. The latter two arise due
to your usage.Correcting Lens Defects: While going
through lens reviews and test reports,
you must have read about several
lens defects like distortion, vignetting
(darkening of corners), chromatic
aberration, etc. All these degrade the
overall quality of the image. Top gradeSmart Photography has been continually receiving requests to start a basic course for beginners. With this in
mind, we have asked a very knowledgeable photographer from Hyderabad to take over writing these articles. We
have also requested him to be as jargon-free as it is possible, so that newcomers to photography feel comfortable
to pursue the hobby.The author, Ashok Kandimalla has been in the photographic field for over three decades and has extensive
experience in both film and digital photography. Being an electronics engineer by profession and a photographer,
he possesses a unique and deep insight into the technical aspects of digital photography and equipment. He has
published several articles on photography and some of his writings have also been published in the well-known
international magazine Popular Photography.An avid collector of photographic books and vintage cameras, Ashok has a keen interest in the history of
photography and a passion for sharing his knowledge on photography through teaching and writing. He is
presently working as a Management and Engineering consultant. You can see his work at http://www.flickr.com/
Ashok Kandimalla photos/ashok_kandimalla. He can be reached at [email protected]The Part 4 of this series published last month introduced
the Develop module. Topics covered were, the concept
of non-destructive development, tools available, History
feature, Display options, Presets, Snapshots, etc.
lenses use designs that reduce these
defects to the minimum but such lenses
cost a great deal. Lightroom reduces or
even eliminates these defects making
your budget lens perform like an
expensive one. Lightroom will find out
from the EXIF data of the image file the
exact make and model of the lens you
have used. Also, Lightroom maintains
a database of important lens data,
called Profiles for virtually all modern
lenses. The appropriate profile is used
to correct the mentioned defects. So,
amazingly your low cost lens that
might have had some defects will now
perform wonderfully.First locate the Lens Correction Tool
on the right panel (Picture 5-1↓1) and
click on the little triangle to the right
(Picture 5-1↓2) to expand the tool.Click on Profile tab (Picture 5-1↓3)
and check (tick) the box named Enable
Profile Corrections (Picture 5-1↓4).Next, choose Default option (Picture
5-1↓5) for Setup.You will now see the Lens Profile
(Picture 5-1↓6) which gives the Make
of the lens, the Model and finally the
Profile that is being used.Now, click on the Basic tab (Picture
5-2↓1) and observe the check-boxes
(Picture 5-2↓2) –- Enable Profile Corrections
- Remove Chromatic Aberration
- Constrain Corp
You will notice that first of these has
already been checked because you
have previously done that. Just check
the remaining two. That is all. You
have now corrected all the lens defects
including chromatic aberration. You
might not have noticed any perceptible
change but be assured that Lightroom
has done the job!96 http://www.smartphotography.in
Smart Photography December 2015