My photo processing technique

Rawr

Folks write in and ask what process I use on images and I'm not ashamed to say I start with an action set called Vintage Film for Photoshop. It's free. Though, I should mention the cost of Photoshop isn't included. The good news is that most of the techniques used in the automated set can be achieved with free or inexpensive photo editing programs and websites.

Once I run the default set I go through and fiddle—usually lowering the opacity of these layers made by the Vintage Film Action Set:

• Sepia 
• Cross Process
• Vignette
• Center Fill Light
• Magenta Cast

The amount varies but I usually keep things around 20% opacity.

Why do I do this? Well, in January I set out to make the entire year of 2010 appear as a cohesive set when viewed together. I honestly don't know why but I always think things will make more sense once you get everything together and take a step back.

Oh, and it's fun.

View the latest photos in the Album

Comments

[Oliver Ruehl]

@fredo
I also use lightroom and can recommend the plugins from Nik Software (Color Efex Pro is what you are looking for).
Those tools are not very expensive and give you lots of options to achieve vintage effects and more. I never use anything else. You can see some examples on my site.

The trick for me seems to add a blue and yellow tint so the photos look like from an old shoe box :-)

@Chris
Thanks for sharing your workflow.

Kind regards
Oliver

[fredo]

Thank you for this tip I use now for months.
Do you have the equivalent for Lightroom ? I have been looking for "vintage presets" for this software but none is as good as this one ...
Thanks.