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How to Build Photoshop Actions From Scratch (And Actually Trust Them on Real Work)
Video Tutorials

How to Build Photoshop Actions From Scratch (And Actually Trust Them on Real Work)

I built my first Photoshop action at 26 and I haven’t manually repeated a task since. That’s not hyperbole - I track this stuff. But even after years of building complex action sets for commercial clients, I still find myself going back to fundamentals videos when I want to tighten up how I’m structuring a new workflow. In this Aaron Nace (PHLEARN) tutorial, Watch the full tutorial on YouTube, Aaron walks through creating a split color effect as a vehicle for teaching the full action recording and playback cycle.

Apple's EU Commission Changes: What Photo Editors Need to Know
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Apple's EU Commission Changes: What Photo Editors Need to Know

Apple Shifts Commission Structure in Europe I’ve been watching Apple’s regulatory moves pretty closely lately, and there’s some genuinely important news for anyone selling Photoshop actions, Lightroom presets, or other creative tools through iOS apps. Apple has announced updated commission rates specifically for developers operating in the European Union, and this could reshape how many of us think about pricing and distribution strategies. What’s Actually Changing? For years, Apple’s in-app purchase commission has been a pretty consistent 30% cut.

Freeze It Right: What a Mexico City Soccer Shoot Taught Me About Flash Duration and Composite Lighting
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Freeze It Right: What a Mexico City Soccer Shoot Taught Me About Flash Duration and Composite Lighting

There’s a specific problem that comes up constantly in commercial work: you need to photograph a subject in motion, under full control, against a background you’re going to swap out in post. The subject has a narrow window of availability. The shot has to work both vertically and horizontally. And the lighting needs to freeze movement with enough sharpness to survive a full-page print. I’ve set up variations of this scenario dozens of times for ad agency clients, and the details are what separate a usable image from a reshoot conversation.

How to Build a Custom Fog Brush from Your Own Photo (And Why It Beats Every Preset You've Tried)
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How to Build a Custom Fog Brush from Your Own Photo (And Why It Beats Every Preset You've Tried)

Every few months I have a retoucher on my team reach for a soft round brush to add atmosphere to a composite, and every time I see it, I feel a small, specific pain. The result always looks exactly like what it is: a white blob painted with a Photoshop brush. After 15 years of working in commercial post-production, I can spot a stock brush atmospheric effect from across a client presentation room, and so can the art directors sitting next to me.

From Memory Card to Final Edit: Building a Lightroom-to-Photoshop Workflow That Actually Scales
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From Memory Card to Final Edit: Building a Lightroom-to-Photoshop Workflow That Actually Scales

I have a confession that will surprise exactly no one who runs a post-production operation: I spent the first three years of my career losing files. Not permanently, but functionally. A raw file buried in a folder called “New Folder (3)” on a drive labeled “BU_FINAL_v2” might as well not exist. When a client calls asking for the original raws from a shoot you did eighteen months ago, “I think it’s somewhere on the G drive” is not a sentence you want to say out loud.

How to Build Lightroom Presets That Actually Travel Well Across Photos
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How to Build Lightroom Presets That Actually Travel Well Across Photos

If you process images for a living, presets are not a luxury. They are infrastructure. I have spent fifteen years in commercial photography studios watching editors burn hours on repetitive color work that could be locked into a single click. When I moved into running my own post-production consultancy, building reusable settings in Lightroom became one of the first things I systematized for every client workflow. So when I came across Aaron Nace’s Day 12 tutorial from PHLEARN’s 30-day Lightroom Classic series, I paid close attention.

Photoshop's Remove Tool Just Changed How I Handle Distraction Cleanup on Client Work
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Photoshop's Remove Tool Just Changed How I Handle Distraction Cleanup on Client Work

Every commercial shoot ends with a folder of images that are 90% there. The light is good, the subject looks great, and then there’s a tourist walking through the background, or a web of power lines cutting across an otherwise clean skyline. For most of my career, fixing those problems meant careful selections, Content-Aware Fill, a lot of cloning, and the quiet acceptance that this was just part of the job.

Stop Shooting Blind: How In-Camera Picture Styles Can Replace Half Your Post-Production
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Stop Shooting Blind: How In-Camera Picture Styles Can Replace Half Your Post-Production

Fifteen years of sitting behind a monitor has taught me one thing above almost everything else: the less you have to fix in post, the more time you have to shoot, refine, and actually think. I track my saved hours obsessively, and the biggest gains rarely come from a faster action or a smarter batch script. They come from decisions made at the point of capture. That is why, when I first watched RC walk through in-camera picture styles in this KelbyOne tutorial, something clicked for me in a way it probably should have years earlier.

Why AI Image Generation Tools Need Better Content Safeguards—And What It Means for Creators
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Why AI Image Generation Tools Need Better Content Safeguards—And What It Means for Creators

Another Lawsuit Against AI Image Generation Tools I’ve been following the growing legal challenges facing AI image generation platforms, and frankly, the latest development is deeply troubling. A fourth individual has filed suit against xAI, claiming that their childhood photographs were used to generate illegal content through the company’s Grok tool. This isn’t an isolated incident—it’s part of a pattern that’s forcing our entire industry to confront some uncomfortable questions about how AI systems are built, trained, and deployed.

Why I'm Starting Every Landscape Edit with Lightroom's Adaptive Color Profile Now
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Why I'm Starting Every Landscape Edit with Lightroom's Adaptive Color Profile Now

I’ve spent fifteen years watching editors reach for presets the moment a raw file hits the screen. I get it. Presets are fast, they’re consistent, and when you’re processing a hundred images for a client, speed matters. But presets have a fundamental problem: they apply a fixed look to images that are all fundamentally different. What works on a golden-hour desert shot falls apart on a flat, overcast forest scene. I’ve been hunting for a better starting point for a while, something that adapts rather than overrides.

Stop Freezing On Location: A 5-Step Composition Workflow That Actually Works in the Field
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Stop Freezing On Location: A 5-Step Composition Workflow That Actually Works in the Field

I’ve spent fifteen years telling clients exactly what their images need. Stronger subject placement. A leading line. Something in the foreground to create depth. The advice rolls out automatically. But landscape photography is a different beast entirely, and for a long time I was humbled by it every single time I went out with my own camera. I knew all the principles. I just couldn’t apply them fast enough when I was standing in a river at golden hour with cold water in my boots and fading light overhead.

One Click to Clean: Photoshop's AI Distraction Removal Tools Actually Work
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One Click to Clean: Photoshop's AI Distraction Removal Tools Actually Work

Every week I’m handing off images to ad agency clients who need clean, distraction-free backgrounds. Power lines behind a product shot. Pipes crossing a portrait. A random bystander who wandered into a lifestyle image at exactly the wrong moment. For years, my go-to fix was the Clone Stamp tool paired with a carefully tuned Healing Brush action I built to speed up the repetitive parts. It worked. It also took time I often didn’t have.