VSCO, Mastin Lab Presets, Florabella, and Pretty Presets. If you’ve looked for advice on retouching in the last few years, you’ve probably been recommended one of these preset and action systems at least once. They’re designed to give you beautiful film simulation and color tones to make your images look great using a single click of the mouse – and I hate them all. Before I get too far into this rant, I do want to admit my own guilt. I’ve certainly used VSCO and similar preset systems in the past. Culling through 3000 wedding photos in Lightroom and editing 600 of them is no easy task, and anything that can help simplify the process is a huge asset. Using VSCO and other systems is a great way to speed up your process, and your time is valuable, so by all means, speed it up when you can. That said, our addiction to these systems needs to be tamed. Secondly, VSCO is singled out on the title solely because it is easily the most popular preset system available for photographers. Between mobile apps, Lightroom presets and 6 different packs of filters, VSCO has turned the film emulation presets game into a science. This article isn’t designed to address VSCO solely, but using them as a face for all filter systems available for photographers……..

Source: fstoppers.com

FStoppers Preset Systems Zach Sutton