summer presets coming in hot!

Confession- I rarely take my "fancy camera" on vacation with me. 2 adults + 3 kids + all our baggage- I just simply don't have room! So, most of my vacation photos are taken with my iPhone, and I'm totally great with that.

There's nothing worse than traveling to an amazing place and having photos that don't reflect the beauty, though. So I created my Summer collection with that in mind. They're formulated for the beach, the pool, the snow cone stand, or a mountain hike. I know you'll love making magic with your photos and my Summer presets!

The Summer Collection screams warm sun and adventure. Geared toward enhancing the bright colors we see during summertime, I’ve also formulated these presets to fit your agenda.

Breeze works amazingly in indoor situations, adding a little pop of color, Snow Cone adds a fun punch to your greens and purples for a technicolor dream, Happy Camper is for all your outdoor mountain adventures, Mint Mojito is kind to greenery and will enhance the natural flora around you, Sand + Sea was made for the beach, and will give you a little tan, too! And Tropic is perfectly warm and bright, like you’re patio sitting with a frosted drink in hand.

announcing Lissa Anglin presets!

Have you ever have a goal that keeps getting put on the backburner again and again…and then finally one day you just sit up and DO THE THING? This is that thing for me.

For years- literally- I have wanted to develop (haha, pun intended!) some presets for Lightroom:

Tried-and-true presets for photographers like myself,

AND

Fun, trendy presets for moms, bloggers, and photographers like myself. :)

Ya’ll, I couldn’t be more excited to share with you

my new line of presets!

The first collection I’m calling the Essentials Collection.

This preset pack contains two tried-and-true presets- my signature COLOR and BLACK AND WHITE. I use these presets to edit my own work and have tweaked and tweaked them over the years to get them juuuuuust the way I like them.

My COLOR preset adds just enough POP and saturation to make your image stand out without being overly edited. My BLACK AND WHITE preset keeps it LIGHT and BRIGHT with plenty of CONTRAST.

Check out some before-and-afters:

The second preset pack I’ve made is called The Autumn Collection.

These presets were inspired by all things autumn and give your images that warm, cozy feeling! There are 7 presets included in this preset pack:

Cinnamon Sugar, Crisp Air, Maple Leaf, Apple Cider, Cozy Sweater, Harvest Ale and Pumpkin Spice.

These presets are great for bloggers or anyone who wants to give all of their images a similar vibe.

Here are some before-and-afters:

SOME F.A.Qs ABOUT PRESETS:

• These presets can be used on a computer running Lightroom OR Lightroom mobile (the app for your phone). The computer app costs $10 a month, BUT the mobile app is FREE!

• If you are wondering how everyone gets their Instagram feed to look so great, THIS IS HOW. THEY ARE USING PRESETS ;). Really, though- presets are easy to use, and make your editing time much faster.

• I have a handy-how to that you will receive if you’ve never used Lightroom before! It’s not that scary! We also have a great Facebook group called Moms Who Snap where you can ask questions/learn.

I have SO ENJOYED seeing the #lissaanglinpresets photos floating around the internet and can’t wait to see more! If you have any questions about the presets, feel free to contact me.

coffee, lighting, and flying ice

A bright spot in the cold, dreary weather of last week was hanging out with Caitlin and D'Anna. These two girls came down from Plainview to talk a little shop with me. We sipped some coffee and then went out into the cold to experiment a bit. 

Caitlin has such drive and passion that I know great things are in store for her future! Here she is shooting D'Anna:

D'Anna's fun, up-for-anything personality was totally refreshing. P.S. I'm still playing with my new Lightroom presets, so no Photoshop on any of these images, either.

We talked a lot about lighting, and busted out my super-fancy reflector (purchased in the auto department at Wal-Mart) for these images. Ten points if you can guess what it was- and no cheating if you already know!

About five seconds after this image was shot we realized that ice (left over from the terrible weather) was being hurled in our direction. Seriously-- it was coming at a 90 degree angle from somewhere to our right! I thought it was kind of funny and bizarre (albeit a bit creepy too)...but we were never able to track down the culprit. They must have been watching us because when we went to the other side of the building it stopped, and once we came back around, the ice started to fly! Thank goodness we never got hit! 

They're still cute when they're cold!

I look a bit Mad-Hatter-ish in this one...maybe I should ditch the green scarf. Regardless, I'm excited about this.

Thanks, girls! It was fun!

scott + martha • engagement • lubbock, texas

Scott and Martha are so much fun. Really. I totally enjoyed getting to hang out and talk with them while we shot their Engagement Session. Scott lives in Maryland and Martha is in Plainview, so they have really tackled the long-distance relationship and have made it work. Getting to see how they love and respect each other was so refreshing. 

I got ridiculously excited to use my new Totally Rad presets for Lightroom yesterday, so these images were processed using some of those and some of my own. No Photoshop whatsoever, though! 

post processing

First of all, how are you guys liking the new look? I've been having lots of fun playing with my website (which I'm sure you're aware of if you've visited my site within the past few days). One of the things I'm MOST excited about is my new wedding and senior portfolio pages. You've got to check them out!

Today I thought it would be helpful to give a run-down of the post processing I give my images. Work isn't finished for me when the photoshoot is over! I've had many people ask what software/editing I use, and this should answer those questions and more.

After a session is finished, I upload the images to my computer and backup sources, and then it's time to get to processing.

I'll first cull the images down to the best of the best. Then it's time to work on the individual images. Let's start with an image straight out of the camera:

To prep the images for proofing in an online gallery, I'll make a few quick adjustments within Adobe Lightroom. Typically I am tweaking exposure, white balance, toning, sharpening and clarity. The wonderful thing about Lightroom is the ability to use presets. I've made a few of my own, but you can also purchase some- I would recommend these from Presetopia. After batch processing the images in Lightroom, I'll upload them to the online proofing gallery. So, here is the image after Lightroom tweaks.

Before an image gets to print form, I'll do a full edit on it. During this process, I'm using Adobe Photoshop with various actions- here, I used Totally Rad Actions.

First, I'll take out any blemishes/stray hairs with the clone tool or healing brush. With this image I also took out the distracting sun spot/shadow in the foreground.

Then I'll make local adjustments on the exposure (Yin/Yang), sharpness (Select-O-Sharp), and contrast (Select-O-Pop). 

Here I also used the Shadow Separator since it fit the mood of the image. 

That's pretty much it! Here's the finished image:

 

So, was that helpful? Want me to post more like this? Let me know what YOU would like to see here!