Chessysailor Loc: Southport, NC

I am an amateur photographer but will often offer to take photos of events that I am associated with - American Legion, tennis, conservation events, etc. I offer to send my photos to anyone who wants them - ie. the publicity chairman. This person will typically then post them on the group's website. Although I am doing this just as a courtesy (and fun for me) I feel that I am spending too much time post-processing. Here is my current flow.
- Trash the junk pictures.
- Attach a star rating to the remainder.
- Review 4 & 5 star photos and Photoshop as necessary.
- Change file type from RAW to jpeg and reduce file size from 3-4 megs to a few hundred K. (my assumption is that the photos will be used on a website. If I know the picture will be printed I will leave the photo at its maximum size.
- Sort the 4 & 5 star photos from the rest of the collection to a folder and send to the PR persons. (or use a DropBox link).

Does this flow make sense?

Chessysailor

Toment Loc: FL, IL

sounds good to me
have fun!

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Not really.
After rating the photos you say:
"- Review 4 & 5 star photos and Photoshop as necessary."

I read "Photoshop as necessary" to mean you make edit adjustments in Photoshop.

But then your next step is:
"- Change file type from RAW to jpeg..."

That makes no sense since you have to convert RAW files to RGB images first before you can edit them in Photoshop which you said you already did.

Sounds like you need software than can batch process tasks like outputting JPEGs from multiple images while you go get a cup of coffee. That would be Lightroom.

PhotogHobbyist Loc: Bradford, PA

I follow a similar workflow. I open a RAW file in PSE and make some slider adjustments before opening in the editor and making any additional smaller adjustments. I always make a copy of the file in the editior and work on it before saving as a jpg. I then go back and return the adjusted RAW file back to the original (SOOC) version in case I wish to make a different adjustment for any reason. I've never used LR and have been completely content with the results of my PSE adjustments.

Grahame Loc: Fiji

I also do events for which I often have a few hundred images to deal with, here's what I do.

a) Get home and download images (all raw) to a folder, make a backup.

b) Cull and possibly rate images using ViewNx (any suitable viewer can be used)

c) From ViewNx I send 20 at a time to ACR (PS Raw Editor) and crop/PP them if needed.

d) From ACR these 20 images as a batch are downsized and saved to their respective folder as finished jpegs.

e) Move on to next 20.

Note, I keep meaning to use LR to do this same operation but never get around to it.

My philosophy is to shoot in raw just in case a lot of recovery is needed (very rare) but to get things right in camera to minimize the work so everything can be done in the raw editor without using PS. I save the jpegs at around 1800/1920 px wide 300/400kb ideal for social media/websites.

I inform organizers/individuals that if anything is wanted for hard printing to contact me and I will supply full res files.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

I used to do the same thing: take photos of events and send the pics to the PR guy. Events were different sizes: an hour or two up to two days. I usually got between 100 and 1000 shots.

I would download the files through Downloader Pro (Windows only) and change the file name to something descriptive of the event, including date and time. I then dumped the whole lot into Lightroom, where I did triage. Pure junk got an x key (reject flag). Possible keepers got a 6 key (red color label). When I got through the lot, I filtered on the red color label and applied keywords. I then did the editing. If an image wasn't going to work, I just removed the red color label (6 key toggles the label). If it needed Photoshop (things that needed layers, panoramas or group shots that needed head swapping) it got a 9 key (blue color label). When I finished an edit, it got an 8 key (green color label). If I had to take a break within an edit, it got a 7 key (yellow color label). When I got through the red labels, I started working on the blue labels with Photoshop. Finished images from Photoshop got a green label.

At the end of this process I should have no red or yellow labels left. The green labels got exported as jpg to a new folder. The reject flags got deleted from the disk. The unlabelled images got deleted from the LR catalog. I then backed up everything.

I make a web page with the photos and send the URL to the PR guy. He could pass it along to others as needed and they could download the photos they wanted. The keywords were embedded in the IPTC field of the EXIF data for the jpgs.

When all that was done I reformatted the card(s).

More workflow details at https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/user-page?upnum=1584

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

So technically you're not opening a RAW file in PSE. If you hand a RAW file to PSE it passes the file to ACR which is supplied with PSE but is a separate software application. PSE is an RGB image editor. You acknowledge this when you say after some slider adjustments you open the image in the editor. That would be after ACR has converted the RAW data and created the RGB image.

Why the copy before you edit the RGB image?

And why reset ACR? ACR will save your work so that you can re-create the RGB image at any time. Nothing saved by ACR overwrites the RAW data so you always have access to that RAW data in it's original form.

LR could improve your workflow by making it more non-destructive or 100% non-destructive and non-linearly re-editable. If you can use LR without reliance on Photoshop or PSE your RAW workflow becomes 100% non-destructive. Some reliance on a raster editor like PS or PSE can add a destructive element into your workflow. LR can also batch process your images so that faced with a task like the OP's, rather than save 1 image as a JPEG you can save 100 as a single operation.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

You can work faster with less effort in LR rather than PS. Your images should be resized to 2048px on the long side, via a User Export Preset in LR, something that enables 1-click processing of a mass-select of all your images to prepare for sharing. There's a screen capture at the end of this link of the LR settings as a starter for creating your own export preset.

Recommended resizing parameters for digital images

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

You should not use a preset to resize ALL your images on export. Only those you wish to share on the web. There are good reasons to keep full size images.

Paul is obsessed with resizing and has recommended this frequently. I am obsessed with keeping my images full size for maximum utility.

The Aardvark Is Ready

When you say you change the raw to jpeg, I hope you mean you change a copy to jpeg. I see no reason not to keep the full resolution raw file.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Your images are always full sized in LR as the original image is retained in a non-destructive fashion. The LR export simply merges the LR edit instructions against a copy of the original image, creating a new output from the export process. All LR users should have numerous User Export Presets, one for each unique image requirement (printing, digital sharing target-1, target-2, target-x, full-size export, so on, and so forth). The Export Presets assure consistent results, per preset, encoding the parameters so one doesn't have to re-invent the wheel each time they need to repeat an export task.

CliffMcKenzie Loc: Lake Athens Texas

Chessysailor,
First you have a plan and that puts you at the top of the class. What changes would I make:
1. Upload directly from the chip, not camera, to a central folder (i.e. Blue Ridge 2022)
2. Using a number of different software possibilities, I use Photo Mechanic, tag all files that you will process. If you are going to process 4 & 5 star ratings anyway, then simply tag the image. Do not “star rate”. If you are unsure of two almost identical images, tag both and eliminate one during post processing (by not processing it). Huge time saving.
3. Use Lightroom Classic instead of PS. Much faster than PS and yes, ACR is the engine behind LRC.
4. Export (there is no “save as” in LRC) in Jpeg, but 3-4 megs Jpegs are common, I would not reduce.
You have gained considerably more time, more processing firepower and most of all, 3 years from now, you can recall images from fall of 2022, Blue Ridge. Cliff

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

Photoshop will also do batch processing. You can set up actions and run them on folders of photos.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

That is true. But PS is more cumbersome -- you can't for example create an action to work with a raw file. And in a raw workflow PS is likely to become destructive.

nison777 Loc: illinois u.s.a.

You can batch process a whole chosen folder of images to your desired size and file type from bridge...
Giving you a separate folder of them placed wherever you want them...

Or you can batch process all of them... To desired size and file types as in a tiff, or PSD to retain any edits in Photoshop... With a jepg folder as well...
Then proceed to edit or enhance your chosen images placing these choices in a separate apply named folder as in "Finished for publication"...