Alright lets face it, presets are amazing when they work and they are USELESS when they don’t work…. However, here i am as a preset creator of 6+ years to drop some cold hard truth bombs and break the preset hating narrative. It isn’t that some presets do not work. Nope. Its actually that we do not know how to make some presets work. OUCH.

Raise your hand if you have ever been personally victimized by a preset creator? *raises hand quickly because you just read my last sentence*

Okay friends I promise promise that last truth bomb was out of love. It is not that you do not know what you are doing or you arent talented- nah! Quite the opposite. However, presets are tricky sometimes and they have also become something they were never intended to be. A bandaid. Instead of being used as a starting point and a helpful hand we have become reliant on a preset to do all the work for us and it just is not possible. Its true that sometimes presets are nearly one click and you apply one and think WOAHHH!!! I have found the holy grail in my editing. That is an amazing feeling and I am not knocking that value, at all. Chances are- the preset creator has lived and learned a few tricks to help it apply easier one click AND they likely created it with similar gear as you, and similar locations as you. Lets chat about when that is not the case.

Was this preset meant to be giving off “oompa loompa” vibes or is it just me??

Alright lets get down to it. Have you ever applied a preset and been mortified. Like EWWW. Lets just be honest, you click it and you think EWWW. That can not be right. These are popular presets, I have heard so many amazing things about them but they actually STINK. HAHA! You might try them again, but chances are if you do not find “love at first click” you will just discard them and chalk it up to money lost yet again. Sound familiar? If so, then I urge you to STOP THAT! I mean it, we can fix what feels like a problem. 9/10 it is a simple white balance adjustment that needs to be made in order for you to see the preset’s full potential. Two sliders, if that, is all you need to adjust to get your new base. Keep that word “base” in mind too, because we will go back over that shortly.

Above you see an example of One Click of my preset “Look Up Child” from my Be the Light Presets, on the left. Kinda ewww, right? On the right you see the same presets with ONE button changed. Yep, one.

So what magic button was it? White Balance dropper!

I grabbed the handy dandy white balance color picker and clicked on the neutral colors in the photos and voila.

The proof is in the pudding! Look at what this changed so we can see the actual numbers-

That helped us get a better white balance without guessing and moving the temp and tint around. Work smarter not harder, babe. If that doesnt yield the WB results of your dreams- you can also change the WB from “custom” to “as shot” or “auto”. I tend to be a pretty warm SOOC photographer since I use kelvin so i find “auto” to get me closer to where I want to be. However, all of these methods arent perfect as each artist has a different style and white balance is subjective. They just help you get over the blindness that a really off WB can cast over your artistic eye when first starting out. I recommend to apply the preset, tweak the WB with one of these shortcuts and then finalize the WB by making your own adjustments to the temp and tint until it matches your vision.

Hidden places you can adjust your white balance –

The obvious place to start to adjust your white balance is up in the basic panel where we just were, using WP panel area labeled temp and tint. Did you know that other panels in Lightroom have a lot of sway and pull on your image colors as well? Specifically –

• RGB Tone Curve
• Color Grading
• Calibration
• Saturation/Vibrance

All of these are covered in great detail (ALL OF LIGHTROOM IS ACTUALLY) in my amazing editing mini course called “Foundations; Editing Mini Course” in my Flourish Library. Check it out if you would love to dive deeper into what you can accomplish in Lightroom. Even established photographers who thought they had nothing new to learn- have said they learn so much and have so many lightbulb moments.

Start treating presets as a base and your post processing will be a breeze-

Presets are amazing tools and help us speed up our workflows and I am so very thankful they exist and you are able create, save and purchase new ones anytime you’d like! Just make sure to remember that they are a base and that jump scare you get on first application is nothing to be worried about. A little orange overlay nightmare might be all that is standing between you and your new dream preset base. So be brave, and power through…. and adjust that WB before you cast another one out.

XO,

Your Friend, Amanda of White Pine Photography