Photoshop CS2 RAW question...

[epoh]

I just upgraded to CS2 few weeks ago, and there is one thing that's bothering me. When I open my RAW format photos, the drop-down at the top will be set to what the camera shot (not auto correct) but all the checkboxes below are checked for 'auto' (exposure, brightness, shadows, etc.) Is there anyway to turn that off? It's a bit irrirating to have to uncheck those boxes every single time I open a RAW photo (well the first time I open each one, at least.)

[johnastovall]

Originally Posted by epoh

I just upgraded to CS2 few weeks ago, and there is one thing that's bothering me. When I open my RAW format photos, the drop-down at the top will be set to what the camera shot (not auto correct) but all the checkboxes below are checked for 'auto' (exposure, brightness, shadows, etc.) Is there anyway to turn that off? It's a bit irrirating to have to uncheck those boxes every single time I open a RAW photo (well the first time I open each one, at least.)

Open your RAW file to get the ACR settings. Deselect the "Auto" boxes, then on the top of the right window below the histogram, locate the arrow in a circle. Click it then the pop down menu appears with "Save New Camera RAW Defaults". Select this and from then on the ACR opens RAW files without auto settings.

Control-U or Command-U will toggle them off and on.

[epoh]

Excellent! Thank you John. I figured there was something simple I was missing.

[TXhummer2]

(oh gosh, that is so wonderful news) er, Thanks from me, too!

[skdupre]

When I first started using ACR in January I deselected the check boxes as described above. I then processed each file from my weddings. After a computer upgrade I forgot to set up the new defaults and I loaded a wedding and found that ACR was doing a pretty darn good job - especially when you are looking at 250+ images. The contrast is usually spot on and so is the Shadow settings. I typically only need to adjust exposure and white balance. I know jockey back and forth to double check some images and make slight adjustments. Definitely cuts down my processing time. BTW - I've now processed over 5K images since January. Even tried out Aperture, but still prefer ACR.

Sean

[JohnT]

Originally Posted by skdupre

...found that ACR was doing a pretty darn good job - especially when you are looking at 250+ images. The contrast is usually spot on and so is the Shadow settings. I typically only need to adjust exposure and white balance. I know jockey back and forth to double check some images and make slight adjustments.

Many times, I find that as well.

[epoh]

It seems to work pretty good on images that are already well exposed w/close to proper WB. But when I'm working with a whole batch of pics taken in a dark hotel room, it didn't help me much! LoL.

[jeffkohn]

I find that Auto Shadows usually works pretty well, but the Automatic Exposure and Brightness settings are often too extreme, resulting in an image that's way too bright.

IMHO it's best to leave these settings off as the default though, and only turn them on if you want to see the effect. Because otherwise it can make judging the exposure of shots very difficult since you don't know what the shot really looks like without the automatic adjustments. Trying to judge which exposure is best from a bracketed set becomes an exercise in futility with the auto adjustments enabled.