This beginners guide gives you 20 tips for getting started in Capture One 20

As photographers start to explore alternatives to Adobe’s suite of applications, Capture One is a piece of software that’s often recommended as an alternative to Lightroom. While it may be arguably superior in certain aspects, and very similar in others, the workflow is a little different to Lightroom. So, it can take a while for new users to get used to it.

In this video, Michael Comeau at On Portraits walks us through his 20 top tips for beginners to Capture One to help newcomers get to grips with the software quickly and speed up their overall workflow.

1. Customize Your Capture One 20 Interface
2.  Use the Pinned Areas and Scrollable Area
3. Always Back Up Your Capture One Catalog
4. Learn Your Capture One Keyboard Shortcuts
5. Double Click a Slider to Reset It
6. Use Select Next When for Faster Culling and Rating
7. Use Variants to Work With Multiple Versions of an Image
8. Use Process Recipes to Output Multiple Version of a File at Once
9. Be Careful With the Focus Mask
10. Use Metadata Presets When You Import an Image
11. Use Styles and Presets
12. Use Layers for Local Adjustments
13. Use Luma Masking for Selecting Parts of an Image Based on Brightness
14. Take It Easy With the Skin Tone Tool
15. Take It Easy With the Clarity and Structure Sliders
16. Use Gradient Masks for Gradual Adjustments (duh)
17. Use the Luma Curve to Control Contrast
18. Turn on the Crop Handles
19. Subscribe to My YouTube Channel (shameless plug #1)
20. Grab My Free Capture One Styles (shameless plug #2)

The last couple of tips, as Michael admits himself, are shameless plugs for his channel and website, but Michael regularly puts out content and videos specifically for Capture One users providing tips and tutorials. So, if you want to improve your Capture One workflow, they’re worth at least checking out.

As raw processing software goes, Capture One is definitely one of the more powerful ones out there, offering a wide range of useful features for photographers. It’s also one of the most popular tools out there if you like to shoot tethered. If you haven’t tried Capture One yet, you can find out more about it and download a free trial version on the Capture One website.

Do you use Capture One? What’s your top tip for beginners?