Working With Video Files In Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4

This is an excerpt from chapter 1 of "Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4 FAQs: 365 of Your Lightroom FAQs Answered", by Stan Sholik. It is available from Wiley, for £19.99. This excerpt concerns videos.

Q: What video formats can I import and export?

A: Video support is greatly expanded in Lightroom 4 although the word “video” has not been added to all the places where video is supported. Video import is available from the File → Import Photos and Videos menu. See FAQ #30 for details on importing.

Video import formats include AVI, MP4, MOV, and AVCHD.

Lightroom 4 supports the following video extensions: MOV, M4V, MP4, MPE, MPEG, MPG4, MPG, AVI, MTS, 3GP, 3GPP, M2T, and M2TS.

Export formats available are H.264 (MPEG4) and DPX.

Q: How do I preview a video without playing it?

A: When you view a folder of videos in Grid view, it is never obvious what each video contains from the visible thumbnail. But you don’t need to play a video to quickly preview the contents.

In Grid view, press the T key or choose View → Show Toolbar if the Toolbar is not visible. Enlarge the video thumbnails to a usable size with the Thumbnails slider in the Toolbar. The time duration of the clip is displayed in its lower left corner. Position your cursor over the cell border containing a video thumbnail or over the video itself and "scrub" left to right and right to left to view the contents of the video clip forward or backward.

You can also create virtual copies; rate, filter, and star rank videos in the Library module; and drag videos onto maps in the Map module to geotag them.

Q: Which Quick Develop features can I use to edit a video clip?

A: You can apply most of the Quick Develop features to a video clip. These include the
following:

• Treatment
• White Balance
• Temperature
• Tint
• Tone Control
• Exposure
• Contrast
• Whites
• Blacks
• Vibrance

You can also apply presets from the Saved Preset pop-up menu. Lightroom includes six prebuilt video presets in the Lightroom Video Presets pop-up menu in the Saved Preset list. You can also create your own presets (see FAQ #126 in the full title.) Quick Develop features and presets are applied to the entire video clip.

Q: How do I use the Develop module to edit video?

A: Only the Library module supports videos. You cannot open videos in any other module, but you can use features in other modules to enhance them. Develop module features that you can apply to videos are as follows:

• White Balance
• Temperature
• Tint
• Exposure
• Contrast
• Whites
• Blacks
• Vibrance
• Saturation
• Tone and Point Curves
• HSL options
• Split Toning
• Camera Calibration options

However, you cannot apply these features directly to a video clip. See FAQ #126 (in the full book).

Q: How do I use presets in the Develop module to edit a video clip?

A: Although you cannot edit a video clip directly in the Develop module, you can use features in the Develop module to edit a video clip by using Develop presets. Here’s how:

1. Capture a frame from the video clip. (See FAQ #128 in the full title)

2. Open the JPEG of the captured frame in the Develop module.

3. Adjust the frame. Use only the features listed in FAQ #125 (in the full title). If you use any others, Lightroom displays an error message when you attempt to apply them to the video clip and applies no adjustments.


4. Create a Develop preset. (See FAQ #144 in the full title.)

5. Return to the Library module.

6. Select the video clip.

7.Choose the preset from the User Preset list in the Saved Preset pop-up menu. Lightroom applies
the preset automatically. Choose other video clips from the take and apply the preset.

Q: How do I see only the video files that I have imported?

A: Lightroom provides several different ways to see only the video files you have imported, but I prefer my own method.

Here are Lightroom's ways using filtering. Choose All Photographs in the Catalog panel and do one of the following:

• Open the Attribute bar of the Filter bar. Chose the farthest icon to the right.
• Open the Metadata columns of the Filter bar. Set the first column to File Type and choose Video.
• Choose Enable Filters from the Library menu. Then choose Library → Edit by Kind → Videos.

I prefer not having to search at all. I make a smart collection that automatically gathers my videos together. See FAQ #52 (in the full title) for details on making a smart collection.

Q: How do I capture a still image from a video file?

A: To create a still image from one frame of a video clip, do the following:

1. Open the video clip in the Library module. Double-click the video clip or press the E key.

2. Scrub to the frame you want to select. Click and drag the playhead in the timeline or click and drag the time index. Click the gear icon if these are not visible.

3. Click the icon next to the gear icon. A pop-up menu appears.

4. Choose Capture Frame. Lightroom creates a JPEG image of the captured frame and stacks it beneath the video clip. Its resolution is the same as the resolution of the video clip.

5. Unstack the JPEG to view or work with it. Sort the images by filename if you can’t find it.

Q: How do I export a video?

A: You export a video in much the same way you export a photo. After you have made all your adjustments, choose File → Export. The Export One File dialog box opens. Some options are grayed out and unavailable. Choose options from the Export Location and File Naming panels. In the Video panel, select the Include Video Files check box and choose the output format from the Video Format pop-up menu and a quality level from the Quality pop-up menu. Finally, choose options from the Metadata and
Post-Processing panels and click Export.



"Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4 FAQs: 365 of Your Lightroom FAQs Answered" is available to buy for £19.99 from Wiley.