Digital Workflow

One of the questions that I'm asked most frequently at workshops and seminars is about my preferred workflow when working with a digital SLR. Here then are the steps that I take, from camera settings to Photoshop. I've also provided some insights, where appropriate, into the "whys" of what I do.
Camera Settings
If you are shooting for editorial purposes where deadlines are tight and images need to be transmitted then you will likely shoot JPG files. This makes sense for snapshots as well. I'm not going to dwell on shooting in this manner. Rather I will focus on the techniques need to extract maximum image quality from your camera, and shooting JPG files with pre-set colour balance isn't one of these.
A RAW file is like a camera negative. It contains all of the information that the camera's chip was able to record, without any processing. All of the camera's settings for White Balance, Sharpness, colour temperature etc are irrelevant if you shoot in RAW mode. The reason for t...