It was almost a year ago when I launched my first set of Lightroom presets. I had ported my popular "Film Candy" set from Aperture. Since then I've ported most of the rest of the sets that I had previously released for Aperture to Lightroom and they have been really well received. However, I've also been working on some new presets, which aren't versions of previous Aperture looks. In fact, ever since I released Film Candy nearly a year ago, I've been working on Film Candy 2

Over the past year, every time I came up with an interesting look on a picture, I would save into in a folder in my Lightroom presets. I would then go back to those looks, and take them apart, breaking them down into the various elements that made them up. I ended up with a library of "ingredients". These consisted of various curve settings, split tone settings and so on. Once I had a big enough collection of "ingredients", I started putting those together into new looks. I would try a few combinations, use them on images, and save them, then I'd leave them for a little while and go back later to see them with fresh eyes. Some looks stayed and some were thrown out. I kept doing this editing process for several months, culling the collection every now and then, as I wanted to really be happy with the set, and I wanted to have a nice collection of diverse looks.

As these presets started creeping into my work, and I realised that I was getting to the point that I was happy with them enough to release them, but there was still a long way to go. I had to make sure they would work across a variety of images, and also that they would work reasonably well across different cameras. After a lot of work, I have finally finalised the collection, and Film Candy 2 is nearly ready for release.

Film Candy 2 will consist of 40 different looks. Like the first Film Candy, these have been inspired by the look of old and vintage films, and they also consist of some special effects. The new pack will be available soon (and if you want to get advance notice of when Film Candy 2 is available to buy, then sign up for the newsletter.) In the mean time here are a few images that I've used the presets on over the past little while. Enjoy!