Do you process all of your RAW files?

[Kolia]

Oups! forgot the rest of my comment...

I use the star system for quality and color for theme in LR. The flags I use also to clear out the really bad ones and those worth looking at again.

 

[DBA]

5% ?

Wow I got my rear end chewed up in a different thread for claiming that a ratio of 1:100 very good picture was a good ratio for an amateur...

Lol

Link?

Define "very good picture", vast majority of the shots are decent to pretty good. lol However there's no need to process/edit 50 corner shots that are all pretty much the same, with the exception of being different riders. Unless a rider, magazine, newspaper, etc asks for one of a specific rider that is.

 

[Kolia]

"Very good" is one stop above "good" !

 

[EchoingWhisper]

I took Scott Kelby's advice and use the rating system inside Lightroom. Upon import, I go through everything and rate from 1-5, tossing everything that is 1,2 or 3. I'll keep the 4's until the next time I look at them and I immediately process the 5's.

I could never understand a 5 star picture rating system. What's the difference between a 1-2-3? How about a 3-4-5? Is a 4 just a tad better than a 3, but not as good as a 5? IMO that's way to confusing.

I personally use the LR "flag" rating system which gives you three options:
1 = junk, completely out of focus, random accidental ground shots. (delete at some point)
2 = tag and keep for possible future use (I do motocross events)
3 = process/edit

At a typical event I'll take 500-800 images and only ~5% get flagged (3).

Read the book and you'll understand.

 

[12sndsgood]

I took Scott Kelby's advice and use the rating system inside Lightroom. Upon import, I go through everything and rate from 1-5, tossing everything that is 1,2 or 3. I'll keep the 4's until the next time I look at them and I immediately process the 5's.

I could never understand a 5 star picture rating system. What's the difference between a 1-2-3? How about a 3-4-5? Is a 4 just a tad better than a 3, but not as good as a 5? IMO that's way to confusing.

I personally use the LR "flag" rating system which gives you three options:
1 = junk, completely out of focus, random accidental ground shots. (delete at some point)
2 = tag and keep for possible future use (I do motocross events)
3 = process/edit

At a typical event I'll take 500-800 images and only ~5% get flagged (3).

I rate with a 3-4-5 rating. basically i will quickly go thru the entire set and mark anything a 3 I want to actually look at. Then i'll just look thru the 3's and see wich ones are good enough to edit and wittle them down to a 4. Then I will look for the small stuff that I may have missed. something that will make me decide on wether to process it or not.

How many you process has so many factors. Like you said, if your set on a corner you may wind up with 20 keepers out of a bunch but you only need to edit up 1 of those images. so you could have 100 photos and have 50 of them keepers but you only edit one. so what's your percentage, 50% or 1% doesn't really matter.

 

[EchoingWhisper]

1 Star = Useable
2 Star = (I forgot)
3 Star = (I forgot)
4 Star = Portfolio Level
5 Star = Reserved for future use

 

[DBA]

I took Scott Kelby's advice and use the rating system inside Lightroom. Upon import, I go through everything and rate from 1-5, tossing everything that is 1,2 or 3. I'll keep the 4's until the next time I look at them and I immediately process the 5's.

I could never understand a 5 star picture rating system. What's the difference between a 1-2-3? How about a 3-4-5? Is a 4 just a tad better than a 3, but not as good as a 5? IMO that's way to confusing.

I personally use the LR "flag" rating system which gives you three options:
1 = junk, completely out of focus, random accidental ground shots. (delete at some point)
2 = tag and keep for possible future use (I do motocross events)
3 = process/edit

At a typical event I'll take 500-800 images and only ~5% get flagged (3).

Read the book and you'll understand.

If you junk 1-3 what's the point of using a 5 star system?

How many you process has so many factors. Like you said, if your set on a corner you may wind up with 20 keepers out of a bunch but you only need to edit up 1 of those images. so you could have 100 photos and have 50 of them keepers but you only edit one. so what's your percentage, 50% or 1% doesn't really matter.

Exactly.

 

[Kolia]

If you have only a 2 stars rating, it means your best picture can only be a 2 stars.

Which is well below my best pictures since mine have 5 stars...

It's common sense !

Aha !

 

[12sndsgood]

lol

 

[gsgary]

Yes because its either on a roll of 36 or 12

 

[jamesbjenkins]

I could never understand a 5 star picture rating system. What's the difference between a 1-2-3? How about a 3-4-5? Is a 4 just a tad better than a 3, but not as good as a 5? IMO that's way to confusing.

I personally use the LR "flag" rating system which gives you three options:
1 = junk, completely out of focus, random accidental ground shots. (delete at some point)
2 = tag and keep for possible future use (I do motocross events)
3 = process/edit

At a typical event I'll take 500-800 images and only ~5% get flagged (3).

Here's my rating paradigm:

1- accidental snaps, floor, crotch, etc.
2- bad focus, setting off, blinkers
3- technically ok, just bad composition or completely bland, uninspiring
4- technically perfect, well composed, interesting and artistic elements
5- what I call "framers", the cream of the crop from a set, usually 3-5 images

Using this system has a lot of benefits, not the least of which is it makes it painfully obvious how many of your shots are keepers. It has helped me be much more focused and thoughtful before taking a picture. No sense in wasting time, energy and equipment life on images you won't even process...

Now, probably about 60-70% of my images are either a 4 or a 5.

 

[EchoingWhisper]

I could never understand a 5 star picture rating system. What's the difference between a 1-2-3? How about a 3-4-5? Is a 4 just a tad better than a 3, but not as good as a 5? IMO that's way to confusing.

I personally use the LR "flag" rating system which gives you three options:
1 = junk, completely out of focus, random accidental ground shots. (delete at some point)
2 = tag and keep for possible future use (I do motocross events)
3 = process/edit

At a typical event I'll take 500-800 images and only ~5% get flagged (3).

Here's my rating paradigm:

1- accidental snaps, floor, crotch, etc.
2- bad focus, setting off, blinkers
3- technically ok, just bad composition or completely bland, uninspiring
4- technically perfect, well composed, interesting and artistic elements
5- what I call "framers", the cream of the crop from a set, usually 3-5 images

Using this system has a lot of benefits, not the least of which is it makes it painfully obvious how many of your shots are keepers. It has helped me be much more focused and thoughtful before taking a picture. No sense in wasting time, energy and equipment life on images you won't even process...

Now, probably about 60-70% of my images are either a 4 or a 5.

If you have the time, I'm suggesting that you should change the 1st star as rejects, and move to a 4 star system, reserving the 5th star. And, you can also use the Flag for photos your client want. For the color system, use it to tag HDR shots, Pano shots, HDR Pano shots etc.

 

[TonysTouch]

I'm switching from RAW to RAW+JPEG. I decided to give my JPEGs to those who wants my half decent photos (I'm not a pro) quickly while I play with the RAW happily by myself.

If you are shooting RAW then why waste the space on the JPGS. If you need JPGS for people and have Photoshop, then move the photos you want to convert and batch convert them into JPGS. I started doing this a few months ago and it has really saved me time and HD space.

 

[EchoingWhisper]

I'm switching from RAW to RAW+JPEG. I decided to give my JPEGs to those who wants my half decent photos (I'm not a pro) quickly while I play with the RAW happily by myself.

If you are shooting RAW then why waste the space on the JPGS. If you need JPGS for people and have Photoshop, then move the photos you want to convert and batch convert them into JPGS. I started doing this a few months ago and it has really saved me time and HD space.

Batch converting is kinda' slow for me though. Even if my computer is fast, I'm still shooting RAW+JPEGs for events. Most of the time I don't have any time to edit/convert. I have to pass the photos that day in some occasions.

 

[jamesbjenkins]

For the color system, use it to tag HDR shots, Pano shots, HDR Pano shots etc.

That's actually exactly what I use the color tag system for. Not just HDR, pano, etc. but for labeling different kinds of specialty shots.