1 image, 5 effects... 5 free Lightroom presets

It's no secret how much I adore Lightroom. I really love it. I mean who can't? (if you are one of those people who thinks you don't love Lightroom, you need to give it a second chance. Life's all about second chances, right?) One of the reason's Lightroom makes me so happy is because of how easy it is to try out and play around with PRESETS. (Presets in LR are the equivalent of actions in Photoshop.)

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Since I'm talking about presets let me first give you my soapbox lecture on presets and actions... It's pains me to think that there are some people out there (I know you are not one of them) who think that if they just buy a certain action or preset then their photos will look JUST LIKE the person's who designed the action or preset. I'm sorry to say but this is just having false hope. If you have a picture that looks like crap to begin with, applying an action or preset will not make your photo magically look amazing. It will still look like crap. You must first learn how to take clear, properly exposed photos and THEN you can start thinking about playing around with presets and actions.

...stepping down off my soapbox now.

Okay, now with that said, let's get on to the fun. Let's get back to why Lightroom makes presets so fun. First of all, the process of downloading a preset to Lightroom is a SNAP. So easy. I'm not going to go into the process because where ever to find a present to download they will provide great instructions for you there. I also love that to apply a preset to a photo requires ONE click of the mouse. And to remove a preset also requires ONE click of the mouse. You can also preview what a preset might look like on your photo by simply hovering over the preset with your mouse. Yeah, it's all that simple.

I want to show you 5 different effects to one picture. Keep in mind that ALL of these presets were completely free. (Actually I've never paid for any presets. I always just use the ones that people so generously give away for free.) Also, I want you to know that 9 times out of 10 I will "tweak" the photo even after I have applied the preset to get it exactly how I think it looks the best.

Here is the original picture, straight out of the camera:

These first 3 presets--sweet, soft and warm, and fable--all come from this website. He's got 28 free presets that are a lot of fun to play around with.

Matt's wedding grain comes from my favorite free Lightroom preset site found here. This site is called Lightroom Killer Tips. There is so much info and sooooo many free presets.

And last, but not least...Lilac Love Preset. Thanks to one of my awesome followers I was able to locate where I actually found this preset! (SARAH!) Click here for the preset.

And there you go...5 cool new effects using FREE Lightroom presets.

Oh, how could I forget...the beautiful girl in these pictures is the very talented, Tristyn Tanner Brown. She is a singer/songwriter who is coming out with her first EP. (cd with 5 songs on it) My husband is actually the producer, that's how I know her. I can't wait to share her music once the EP is finally released. My husband's studio is in our home so I get to hear all the stuff he is working on. And let me tell you, I have had to ENDURE listening to many so-so bands while my he works on their music but it has been a PLEASURE listening to Tristyn's songs. They are awesome!