For a long time, one small barrier has kept me from uploading a lot more photos to my office Facebook Fan Page: Facebook.com/TheCharlotteDentist, and that is the simple fact that Lightroom did not have the ability to upload directly (no Publish Service) to Fan Pages — only to Personal Pages. I had to export the pictures from Lightroom to another folder, THEN go to Facebook and upload them from there. Not that it is a lot of work, but it required more steps than how easily I can Publish photos to my SmugMug photography site, CDPayetPhotography.com, where I have photo galleries of 6MonthSmiles Invisible Adult Braces patients, porcelain veneer before/after pictures, and more.
Jeffrey Friedl’s Lightroom Plugin Exports Directly to Fan Page Albums
Well, tonight (March 20th, 2011) I was researching some material to put in my upcoming Townie Meeting 2011 lecture on dental digital photography workflow, and through various roundabout ways, I ended up back on the blog of Jeffrey Friedl, who has been creating and updating highly functional Adobe Lightroom plugins for as long as Lightroom has been around. And I happened to read this very exciting statement:
Note: as of version 20110116.147, the plugin can upload to albums on fan/group pages.
Needless to say, I immediately downloaded the new plugin and registered it (it’s Donationware, which means it is “almost” free, which means all you have to do is pay the minimum 1 US penny via PayPal for unlimited registration/use of the plugin) with a $20 donation. With just a minute needed to authenticate to Facebook, suddenly I had the easiest way possible to send all the pictures I could want directly to Facebook and even keep track of them within Lightroom. You can even set it up for multiple Fan Pages, as I’ve shown here.
I highly recommend Adobe Photoshop Lightroom for dentists, and with this Facebook plugin, it became an even better option, given how important Social Media is becoming in promoting our dental practices.
Thank-you Chip. You are doing the dental world a great service!
Hi Chip,
this sounds like a great plug in for sure. Do you think Photoshop is over the top for dental use? Is Elements any good? I have the Lightroom on trial at the moment to see how I get on with it.
I have been following your advice on cameras recently. I went for a Nikon D90 with AF Micro Nikkor 60mm lens and have been very pleased with the results.
Thanks for all your advice.
Sanjay
Sanjay, great question about Photoshop. Do I think it’s over the top for most dentists? Yes, because there is a very significant learning curve to it. However, it’s not like you need to learn all of it, and there are a tremendous number of online learning options, especially Lynda.com and KelbyTraining.com. So if you really enjoy software and having an even greater level of control in editing and tweaking your photos, then go for it!
However, Photoshop Elements is also a very good option, and it works equally well with Lightroom. Easier learning cure, too, but there are more limitations.
I hope that helps. This summer some time, I hope to get started doing some instructional videos on those kinds of things.