How To Edit A Full Wedding In Lightroom

Editing an entire wedding in Lightroom in under 2hrs with the Genesis Collection

Do you want to learn how to edit a full wedding in Lightroom? What if we showed you a wedding photography editing workflow that can edit a FULL wedding in only 1.5 hours?! I used to think that was totally impossible – But with the Genesis Preset Workflow System, my photo edit time has been reduced like CRAZY. So I wanted to set a challenge for myself and see how long it takes to edit a full wedding in Lightroom, using the Genesis Collection.

In total I was able to edit an entire wedding in under 2hrs using the Signature Edits Genesis Workflow. Here’s how. 

(Watch Part 1 Culling Here – https://youtu.be/1QgKgdsYOBo)

Lightroom Photo Edit Workflow = Everything

When it comes to editing wedding photography, your photo editing workflow is EVERYTHING! From culling to exporting, every part of your photo editing process matters. Editing a handful of portraits allows you to take a long time editing each image. But when you have hundreds or even THOUSANDS of wedding photos to get through, you need to know the best way to edit wedding photos.

Step 1 is to cull first.

DO NOT edit or import every photo! Only edit and import the photos you know you’re going to be editing. We break this down in //EP01 – https://youtu.be/1QgKgdsYOBo

Step 2 is to import your selects and start editing your wedding photos in Lightroom.

In this workflow photography tutorial we break down the exact process we use to edit an entire wedding in under 2 hours.
How?
A) Editing using Lightroom presets to get our “base look” quickly and efficiently.
B) Batch editing your wedding photos by adjusting all the photos of a given “set” at a time. For instance, all the wedding photos from the groom preps will have similar lighting, so a similar base setting can be applied to all the photos at once inside Lightroom.
C) From there, cycle through your wedding photos one at a time and edit the basic exposure + white balance only. Using the plus and minus keys on Lightroom is an amazing shortcut that will let you adjust things like exposure way faster. Especially when you’re editing a wedding with hundreds of images, this is a BIG DEAL.
D) Use adjustment layer / adjustment brush presets to save time when adding effects.
E) Use effects subtly – Keep your feather high to avoid effects needing a lot of time for fine tuning.
F) Work efficiently. See a problem occurring over multiple images? ie every photo is overexposed? Use the SYNC function in Lightroom to adjust ALL of the photos to be darker at once, rather than individually adjusting every one.
G) Use export presets to save time when you’re finished editing!

For better performance in Lightroom:

When you’re editing a full wedding in Lightroom, create a separate Lightroom Catalogue for each wedding you edit. This will keep the catalogue smaller and Lightroom will run faster.
For faster editing time, keep your RAW files on a fast external harddrive with high read/write speeds.
For faster performance editing raw wedding photos in Lightroom, close all other apps / end any computer functions that might be using up resources (ie open programs, background apps like dropbox, even wifi)

Editing a full wedding in under 2 hours is possible!

Editing that many wedding photos depends on using solid presets and a lightroom workflow that will allow you to do as little manual photo editing as possible to get the look you want. Thats how to edit a full wedding inside of Lightroom. We hope this tutorial gives you a sense of what our Signature Edits Lightroom Preset System is capable of, and if you want to learn more, head here now:

https://shop.signatureedits.com/genesis-collection-lr-preset-pack