Lightroom Users - buy presets?

[Izzy]

Do you guys buy presets or would you? I ask this because I have collected loads of my own personal presets and I was considering selling them in packaged sets. Not begging you to buy my stuff, just asking if presets is a commodity that you would buy. I personally would buy the right ones.

And if you would buy presets what do you think is a fair price.

[oldwolf]

I'm lazy. I've bought them. I also have my own. I have to see a good before/after picture to buy it though and it has to be something that I'm just too lazy to reproduce.

One thing I didn't like is the fact that some places sell these 15 or 20 packs and I only like maybe 5 of them. I don't buy the whole pack because that's like buying a CD or record for 1 or 2 songs. It's a waste of money. I'd have to like at least 50% or more of the presets before I buy the whole lot.

Just my two cents.

[zona5101]

There are so many free ones out there that I can't imagine paying for any (and its not like they are hard to make). I think I have 80 or so that came from Lightroom Killer Tips/Matt Kloskowski alone.

[RLucas]

No. I would not buy any. I have a few free ones though. Mainly b/w. I prefer to do the work myself.

[oldwolf]

Originally Posted by zona5101

There are so many free ones out there that I can't imagine paying for any (and its not like they are hard to make). I think I have 80 or so that came from Lightroom Killer Tips/Matt Kloskowski alone.

Matt has some pretty good ones. I've got a bunch of his as well.

[smcilree]

The only time I use other people's presets is when I want something very specific. For example I recently had a nostalgic yearning for the look of Fuji Velvia which was quite the rage in the early '90s. Since I shot mostly negatives in my final days of film usage, I never really got in on the Velvia craze, but I had the images from the many magazine articles in the back of my mind and thought the look might be good for some of my current shots. So I Goggled Velvia presets for Lightroom 3 and found several free ones with which I've been very happy.

I find it curious that presets to duplicate the look of good color film prints and slides are not easier to find. Maybe there are just too few of us dinosaurs who have made the transition from film to digital and actually remember the look of just out of the lab color or black and white for that matter. Remember, back in those days we had film choice instead of presets to get just the look we wanted. There are plenty of presets to duplicate the look of faded prints and slides from your Dad's shoe box and far too many that end up with supposed B&W, but very few that let you see what good film work looked like.