What finally pushed me over the edge was a long look at how I actually use photos. My primary goal is not to make art, but to capture moments and in that, when I do capture a great moment, I want to share that image quickly and widely. I don’t want to share the unedited image, I want to make the image look great still, but sharing is really what photography is all about.
And so, with that in mind I looked at my Lightroom workflow:
- Wait a long time to import images from my camera. (Usually weeks after I took the photos.)
- Never import iPhone shots, where a lot of images reside.
- Once imported, rate images.
- After I rate them I edit them by choosing one of 12 “presets” that I have created.
- Apply cropping to select images.
- Share on Flickr, Studiobrooks.com, or other means like Dropbox, email, etc.
- Close my computer.
Even if I am just editing a handful of pictures, I still will take about 30 minutes to do all of this, between Lightroom being slow with RAW files, or me obsessing over minor tweaks.
What I realized in looking at all of that: it is a big pain in the ass.
I don’t like it, I don’t enjoy it at all.
Further, I don’t have the images in the most important place: my iPhone. What kind of bullshit is that? Not my kind of bullshit. This was at the moment I decided I had to figure out how to do this all faster on my iPad.
I am finding that the further we get from the iOS 8 launch the more capable my iPad is becoming. I have replicated almost every function of my work computer on the iPad, with the exception of multiple monitors. Using Ben’s photo method is just one more step in my journey of shifting my work to iPad.
