STEP ONE: We have start over in Photoshop. Open a new document, and then use the Place command (under the File menu) to bring in your logo, so it appears on its own layer above the background layer (as shown here).

STEP TWO: Now, go to the Layers panel and drag the Background layer into the trash can at the bottom of the Layers panel. That leaves your logo sitting on a transparent background (as seen here).

If you do this, and you still see a white background behind your logo, that means your logo has a white background embedded into the logo image itself, and you’ll have to remove it manually. In many cases, that’s as simple as clicking the Magic Wand tool on a white area of the background to select most, if not all, of the white areas. To make sure you get them all, go under the Select Menu and choose Similar to select all the white areas in your entire layer, then hit the Delete (Windows: Backspace) key, and now, if all goes well, your logo will be on a transparent background like the one you see above.

NOTE: If you want to have your logo appear reversed in white (so you can place it over any color background), press Command-I (Windows: Ctrl-I) to invert the image. If that didn’t do the trick, try this — put a rectangular selection around your entire logo. Hold the Command-key (Windows: Ctrl-key) and hit the up-arrow key once on your keyboard, and then hit the down arrow key once. You’ll see selection perfectly snap-to your logo. Now, press the letter “d” on your keyboard to set your Foreground/Background colors to their defaults. Now press “x” to make white your foreground color. Now, while your logo is still selected, press Option-Delete (Windows: Alt-Backspace) to fill your logo with solid white. Didn’t except to be learning so much Photoshop today now, did ya?

STEP THREE: The key to keeping the transparency in your file, as it comes into Lightroom, is to save it in the right format. Go to Save As, and when the Save As window appears, down at the bottom where you choose the file format, choose PNG (as shown here), then click Save.

STEP FOUR: Go to any of the Identity Plate editors (in the Print Module, Slideshow, etc.) and when the Editor appears, click on “Use a graphical identity plate” (as seen above). A locate file button will appear in the lower left. Click on it and find the logo you just saved in PNG format. Then click OK.

STEP FIVE: Now when you choose that logo you imported as your Identity Plate, it appears with a transparent background behind it (as seen here, where I brought in my logo, and placed it over a black background. I did that “reverse white logo” trick so it would appear in white over any background color I chose).

Well, that’s really quite a few steps, but that’s it — a transparent logo in Lightroom. By the way, when you’re in that Identity Plate Editor window, don’t forget to click on the “Custom” pop-up menu lower left side and save your logo in Lightroom, so you don’t have to go through this process again — you can just choose it from the Identity Plate pop-up menu.

OK, that one should keep your busy for the weekend. Hope you have a good one.

-Scott

The post Bringing Your Logo into Lightroom (with a transparent background behind it) appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

Thanks, Benjamin!

Here’s to having a way better than usual Tuesday!

Best,

-Scott

P.S. Tomorrow my guest on The Grid (my live weekly photography show) is photographer Melanie Kern Favilla, and we’re doing blind photo critiques. Submit your images now if you want to be considered for a blind photo critique on the show (it’s airs Web at 4pM ET). 

The post Customizing Your Lightroom Identity Plate appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

Above: Check out that more fitting nameplate in the upper left corner.

STEP ONE: First, right-click on the graphic above and download it to your computer.

STEP TWO: Go under the Lightroom menu (on a Mac) or the Edit menu (on a Windows PC) and choose “Identity Plate Setup” as shown above.

STEP THREE: When the Identity Plate editor appears, from the Identity Plate pop-up menu at the top left, choose ‘Personalized.’ Then click the ‘Use a graphical identity plate’ button (as seen here), then click the ‘Locate File’ button; find that new Lightroom Pro nameplate graphic you just downloaded, and click the ‘Choose’ button. Now click the OK and the name ‘Classic’ is now the old name (see what I did there)?

OK onto the results from this week’s Lightroom Classic/CC Survey
Nearly 2,800 Lightroom users took the survey (I have already shared the results directly with Adobe), but of course, I also wanted to share them with you here as well.

Thanks to everybody who participated in the survey.

I know a lot of you have posted questions here or sent me emails or comments about all the recent changes. Make sure you come back Monday where I’m planning a Lightroom Q&A to answer as many questions as I can.

Have a great weekend everybody, and hope you enjoy going “pro!”

Best,

-Scott

P.S. Just in case you missed the new —  the folks at DxO brought the Nik Collection plug-in suite from Google, and they are continuing development of it and planning a new release in 2018. Until then, they are offering it free for download. 

The post Lightroom Name Change Tip and the Lightroom Classic/CC Survey Results appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.

In fact, it was probably the single “most asked” question of the day.

So, I thought I’d better cover it here, especially for folks who are new to Lightroom (or just new to LightroomKillerTips.com). Here we go:

STEP ONE: On a Mac, you’d go under the “Lightroom menu” (seen above) or on Windows it would be the Edit menu, and choose “Identity Plate Setup” as shown here).

STEP TWO: This brings up the Identity Plate Editor window you see above. In the top left corner, from the pop-up menu choose Personalized (as seen here). Then below that, you have two choices for replacing the Lightroom logo with your own custom logo. One is to just type in the name of your studio (the default choice is to have you do this), but if you click the button to the right of that choice, the one called “Use a graphical identity plate” (as seen here), then you can either click the “Locate File” button and navigate to wherever you keep your logo on your computer, or just drag and drop that image into the black rectangle on the left side (right under the two buttons). That’s it. Click OK — boom — you’re done. Now your logo will appear in that upper left corner.

TIP: Lightroom’s interface is solid black up there, so if you want your logo to blend in, you need to either:

(a) Put your logo on a black background before you bring it in to Lightroom this way, or

(b) Put your logo on a transparent background in Photoshop (put your logo on a transparent layer, then delete the background layer in Photoshop and save the file in .png format, which is a format that maintains transparency when you import it into Lightroom). I did a tutorial on how to do this transparent logo thing last year – here’s the link.

Hope you found that quick little tip helpful.

Have a great Monday, y’all.

Best,

-Scott

The post Replacing the words “Adobe Lightroom” With Your Logo appeared first on Lightroom Killer Tips.