Editing Does everyone use a photo editor??

Yay for someone else with a Sony A77! Now if I can just figure out how to use it I'm all like...what?!?! you can edit in camera?!?!

 

I try to get as close as possible in-camera, but I absolutely do check over every photo in Photoshop before posting it. I usually look at the histograms and often adjust the levels slightly, but rarely add in any "effects" or anything. I personally see nothing at all wrong with it. Film has to be processed, and I consider that check over and adjusting to simply be processing for my digital photos. Even film photos are rarely exactly as taken in-camera, especially those taken by photographers. Dodging, burning, there's LOTS of adjusting that has pretty much always been done to photos in the darkroom, and Photoshop and other image editors are simply a digital version of the darkroom.

 

You can make a good shot better with post processing, but it's not good to try and make a bad shot good with an editor. It generally just doesn't happen. That said, I try to take good shots and then use Lightroom to tweak areas that my camera just can't recognize, like adjusting the white balance or clarity of the image. Editors are very useful, but they should not be a photographer's crutch.

 

Do you use an editor at all? If not, I recommend at least torrenting Lightroom and trying it out. It really can bring out the best in a photo.

 

The main things I do in Photoshop are cropping and re-sizing. Unless I scan a film negative then there's a ton of layering work to do to capture the original. But before I do that I make a print in the darkroom to work from. So I orient the digital work to match the analog print. For digital shots sometimes what you see (on the camera) is not what you get when you view it on a large screen so I'll make minor adjustments. But usually if a shot is wack, I won't try to go through major exertions to fix that.

 

I'm a student but work in a photography/print studio part-time. Lots of what we do involved major photo editing and I'm fairly knowledgeable when it comes to photo editing programs. With that being said though I try avoid needing to do any major edits in any of the photos I take. The most I generally ever do to a photo is adjust colour/lighting. I find when I plan out each shot and pretend like there is no editing my photos turn out much better.

 

There's really no shame in using an editing program and I admit I'm always left scratching my head a little when people treat it like it's some big cheat. The way I think of it (I use lightroom for the bulk of my editing and tweak in photoshop) is as a digital darkroom, even back in the good old days of film people edited their photos after shooting, only it was done in a darkroom and by hand but most of the editing techniques that exist in editing programs are still based on those same techniques (dodging and burning being good examples of that as they're common darkroom techniques).

Generally speaking I definitely think it's always best to aim for as 'finished' a shot as you can when you initially shoot it and by that I mean lighting, exposure, making sure there's no obvious artifacts that you might have to edit out later (like stray hairs etc when it comes to dolls) and so on simply because it makes the editing process easier on yourself and you tend to get better results over all rather than when you're trying to rescue a photo. But when you're shooting RAW as opposed to JPG (RAW retains all the image information, meaning you've got a lot of flexibility with exposure and adjustments where as JPG is very limited in that regard since it's a compressed format and most cameras will apply presets to JPGs) you really are dealing with what amounts to a digital negative that at the very minimum needs converting to a print or web friendly format and a lot of the time needs the contrast etc adjusted as sometimes the colours can look a little muddy and flat straight out of the camera because there's just so much information there.
Personally I really enjoy editing my photos, because I consider the editing process a big part of the creation process in general and it can really enhance a photo, especially if there's a specific tone or aesthetic you're looking to create. To me it's just like switching over to a different tool when you're creating art, like moving on from a sketch to the inking process on a drawing. That said though I don't believe in using editing programs as a crutch to rescue lazy in-camera work.

 

doing no post processing to digital is like not developing your negatives.

You are completely missing a step if you do no post processing at all. And remember that when you shoot jpgs your camera is making processing decisions for you.

I have found that it is possible to make a bad picture look ok with a lot of photoshop but it will never be a great picture.

 

I do very little editing in editors, as a general rule, but I do check over all my photos in my editor. I will adjust levels or colour balance, etc. if need be. If I'm goind to desaturate or add 'sepia' filter, I do it on my camera. Unless I'm just playing around in my editor for fun and experimentation, I don't add a lot of effects or filters to my photos. If I'm going to add effects or filters, I like to start with a photo I already think is a good one. As someone else said, there is no shame in using an editor. HOWEVER, massive editing is no substitute for learning good photography skills. Editing isn't going to make a bad photo good, in most cases. It may make a bad photo look interesting, but if your goal is to have nice-looking photos, then the best thing to do is to learn how to take nice-looking photos and keep practicing! No one is ever going to take the 'perfect' photo - not even a professional photographer - but learning how to use your camera to its full effect and practicing your skills can make more difference to your photography than an editor ever could.

 

if u have a mac use a little bit of the enhancement option in the editing part of I photo. then go from there

 

As a student and professional I think it's great to see someone strive to get the image in camera. I'm not sure if you shoot in manual but when I'm shooting in manual and I get a perfect exposure it makes me really happy, I can understand not wanting to mess with something that looks just like what you wanted But I also really love to add my own element that I couldn't get so easily without going to a studio or setting up strobes. I saw some people be really harsh and say it's terrible you don't edit. as an artist you can do what ever you want I think (as long as it's technically correct )

 

I combo. I first set my camera in that modes, blender, shoutter, focus I will try with, and afterwards I use Photoshop or sometimes I just use them as they are. In photoshop sometimes I edit alot, sometimes I just adjust a little on contrast. And usually I take down the size of pictures so it goes faster to upload on internet, and keep my originals on the machine.

 

I love to use lightroom for editing and photoshop on occasions.

 

I love editing my photos.
I remember when I just started to take doll photos and was still using my little point & shoot I always took great pride in "not editing my photos, at all"; looking back I think I was pretty silly to think that this was something great
As soon as you get a DSLR editing also becomes a lot more necessary, else your photo might look dull, muddy and lacks contrasts and sharpness, especially when you shoot RAW and have a shitty lens.

My usual workflow is to strive for a good base, i.e. I try my best to get the photo to look like an unpolished version of the finished product.
I keep the background clean, brush the wigs and remove any stray hairs, remove lint on the clothes and pose the dolls and their clothes/wig/eyes, I use lamps and reflectors to get the light/mood I need and use white balance to get the color scheme I want to go for (no need for a blue tint when I want a warm photo, you know?) and if I want Bokeh I place some foil or anything else in the background to achieve that effect.

Now to the editing, when I say "natural" I mean it should be like the whole "no make-up" thing, there IS editing but it shouldn't be glaringly obvious or looking too artificial.
First step I do is putting the photo in Lightroom and tweak brightness, contrast, blackness and especially clarity (love that tool), maybe I will do a bit color correction too. Lightroom is used to get the dull base to look more like a sharp and fresh reality and less of the muddy contrast-lacking mess that a RAW photo can be.
In PS I crop/resize it, start sharping it and then start cleaning up, i.e. removing stray hairs I couldn't comb down or visible lint on the black clothes.
I lighten up the eyes and enhance certain shadows in the face (usually between the lips, nostrils, cheeks, eyelids).
That's my basic editing, everything else that follows highly depends on the doll, motive and overall look I want to achieve. Even though I try my best to fake everything before I take the photo (like friends throwing petals in the background or making wind for me so that my doll's coat goes up etc.) some things just can't be done without a bit help of Photoshop. Not to mention that dolls are different than real people and even simple poses can sometimes just be achieved with a doll stand...and nobody wants to see that one on the photo.

Oh, and since you ask for before/after photos.
Here's one of my "simple" edits, i.e. five minutes in Lightroom and PS and nothing big like removing people from the BG, closing eyes etc.
First the finished photo, and then two links to the unedited and Lightroom versions.



http://i.imgur.com/uZwUOMr.jpg (Unedited)

http://i.imgur.com/KVoLVYf.jpg (Lightroom)

I think Lightroom already makes a big difference and I'm pretty sure the majority of people wouldn't even realize that this picture has been edited.

 

I remember my fellow photographer told me that you should use as little editing in photos as possible, and I usually think of it taking shoots, but I use Lightroom to add some colour or contrast.

 

I've got a very old, very basic point&shoot, which is all I can figure out how to use - I'm dreading needing a new camera as I know it'll be too complicated for me! But obviously 3.2mp isn't great, even though the Olympus camedia C-310 is a fantastic little camera of its type, with macro, which is what I bought it for originally. But it just doesn't capture enough nuances in light or form, with only 3mp. I found a copy of photoshop elements 5 on amazon years ago for only £10, and that has saved me having to buy a new camera so far, as it pulls my camera's fairly useless pics back from the brink, adding more contrast, colour balance, sharpening, decreasing the washed out highlights, etc. Strangely it works better in artificial light on normal setting, with no flash, than in good daylight - which makes no sense at all! I never use flash - ever.

It's total nonsense to say a good photographer doesn't need to edit photographs - A camera just records an edited version of reality in the first place, and some record more detail than others, depending on the technology inside the camera. In addition in the 'olden days' a lot of editing went on in the darkroom (my dad was a professional photographer). So here's a 'before' and 'after' shot in which I've only edited the first pic for size, as my camera's photos are over 70cm wide. I sometimes crop photos too.

 

I always use lightroom to edit my photos because photoshop seems very diffcult to me.. it is good to use the software because the photos(especailly for the doll's eyes) could be real.

 

i always use photoshop to edit pictures
but my skills are poor..
seems there are many knowledge i should learn about photoshop

 

I don't edit my photos unless it's for a composite image. I'm a bit of a purest and I don't like to edit in things that are not there. Honestly if you are not a strong photographer no amount of editing in or out of camera will save you. Your photos will still look pretty funky. I do composite photo work though, and think using my bjd's for it is fun, but you can't just take any old pic of a doll and slap them into a background. It almost takes more planning and know how about lighting and focus work then just normal shooting.

My best advice to you is if you are new at bjd photography, go OUTSIDE during golden hour. Which is about 5pm or 7am central united states time.
Golden hour will SAVE YOU. Literally everything looks good at this hour even if it is actual trash on the ground. Being outside will help you too, you don't have to worry about backdrops, and natural light is always better than indoor.

A botanical garden, or fields in the country are great places to camp out and shoot. The botanical gardens are full of photoshoots for weddings and prom, no one will even question your doll, plus there are tons of different areas for different moods. In the country no one will bother you. If not a backyard always works too.

 

Not using photo editing is like handing your negatives over to the high street developers and letting them do what they like with them. Can you imagine Ansel Adams being happy with that? He viewed the negative and the print as two slightly different things.

"The negative is comparable to the composer's score and the print to its performance. Each performance differs in subtle ways."

So, the processing of the negative (or RAW photo) will necessarily change it, to produce a final image with its own characteristics.

If you take photography seriously, you need to learn how to use your darkroom, and our darkroom in the digital age is photo editing software. Yes, it is a lot to learn and the learning will go on for years but, boy, is it worth it.

My view is very much like Ara's. You use all your artistic and technical expertise to create as good a base photo as you possibly can, creating it with a view to how the final image will look. Photo editing software is then used to polish this and, perhaps, alter it slightly to bring it closer to your artistic vision.

This is not to say that there aren't awful things you can do to a photograph in editing software. There are, just as there are awful things you can do in taking the base photo. But, just as we wouldn't say that photography is a bad medium because it is easy to take a bad photograph, we wouldn't say that editing is to be avoided because it is easy to balls it up.

 

I try to do as little editing as possible but sometimes the composition may be great but lighting or what not just isn't everything you need to make the best photo possible. I try to get a good, well composed, well lit shot first go if I can but it's not always possible.

 

I would argue that this is where post processing should be used with caution. If the base photo isn't as you wanted it to be, editing it will take more time and produce a less satisfactory result than starting again and getting a better base photograph. The only exceptions to this is when you are shooting fast in a situation that won't happen again, such as events. Then you will just have to do your best and might need to zhoosh things up in post. But we don't do that. We shoot still life and that is generally very patient. Check each shot in preview and tweak what you have until you get it good in camera. Don't depend on post to correct mistakes or your photos will never be as good as they could be.

 

Editing to me is the same thing as cosmetics. It's best used to take something that's already present and enhance it. With dolls, I think editing is nice because if you can get a well lit and exposed photograph, you can always use the editor to bring out the mood you want to convey.

That being said, I have Lightroom and Photoshop for my own Photography work. I haven't really used Photoshop on any of my doll photos yet but I have a feeling I will very soon once I get my Dollfie Dream sister completely dressed in the way I want to. I use Lightroom for quick enhancements to make random doll photos pop.

 

I consider post-processing and editing to be all part of the artistic process of getting the end result that I want. I shoot RAW, and of course I try to get the best source material possible in terms of technically excellent photographs, but my "vision" for the end picture is not necessarily exactly what I'm seeing through the lens. There are some pretty dramatic examples of this that I've done as Halloween shots which I won't inline here due to nudity of the figure, but can easily be seen in my Flickr Album of Daenerys (my iplehouse Mari). Here is a less extreme but work-safe example of a case where I had a look in mind (a jungle temple tomb raider kind of environment) that I knew could only happen with post processing because I was shooting in the grey winter of Massachusetts, and not the colorful jungles of central america:

dany_raw by abs plastic, on Flickr

dany_processed by abs plastic, on Flickr

The processed photo has selective darkening, boosting of greens (obviously) , cropping, and contrast adjustments.

 

I am not photographer, but I still second this. Photo editing programs can make bad pic look better, but it will not transform it into great looking one.

I, myself, mainly use resizing, cropping and fixing color balance. But still, I use - and recommend others, too - photoedit programs.

 

I only edit some of my photos..
I usually just "crop" them. To make them the size needed..

 

I do, very much so! While I may look at other brands in the future, it would be more out of curiosity than any shortcomings in the A77.

 

Well I'm old enough to have been in photography back when I developed my own film and processed my own archival prints...two different skills! LOL
I've used view cameras, two and a quarter cameras, pinhole cameras. Polaroid cameras...and lots of others. In doing so I’ve learned the importance of good exposure, composition...among other things.

I wasn't anxious to replace my expensive “traditional” equipment with more expensive digital equipment (and didn’t for many years) but I did eventually buy a couple of point and shoot cameras with a Leica lens to take ‘snapshots’ of when I went on vacations and my dolls.

During this time I also used these photos from those cameras to "learn" more about digital photography and editing programs...I started with minimal alterations and recently have played with more ambitious things. Some of those photos I think more of a sort of photo illustration than photography. (LOL) But I do that to learn...to see what I like and what I don't like.

While having a solid knowledge of photography is always a big HELP...and I use my knowledge more subconsciously than consciously quite often, I still think of digital photography as a different animal....as people with little photographic knowledge can still get some amazing results...(back in the day...that just wasn’t possible unless you were incredibly lucky).

I recently bought my first micro 3/4ths camera with interchangeable lens and so the learning continues...as well as the fun.
Most my current photos exist only in the computer....or on Fourms and such...viewed through a machine....whereas the photos of my past were to me, little works of art, printed by hand on archival 100% rag paper....

 

Post processing is mandatory if you want to get the best from your photos.

 

I don't edit them much. I take the photos in RAW format so I can tweak the brightness etc after. But thats about it.

 

I don't have the money right now either for fancy photoshop software or even an expensive camera. I make do with a free photo editing software online but I don't change my photos too much - I just clarify them, brighten, and often add a little frame. I respect those who turn their photos into artwork by fiddling with them using computer magic, but that's just not my style, I guess. For me the joy is in the picture itself, and then just polishing it up a bit.

 

Always stay with photoshop!
lightroom maybe good too.

 

I try to take good pictures, most of the pictures I have on my Flickr are unedited. I don't really have a professional camera nor an expensive software...
Sometimes I open them up in Paint.net to adjust the sharpness or the color, especially if it was taken indoor and it's too yellow, I also often crop them.

 

Hi,

Every photo needs some basic editing, there are many things among them is that a camera does not remember colors so if you're photographing a scene that has lots of green then the entire overall of the photo will contain more green than it actually has.

You can see this in forest pictures or when people photograph sunsets and everything is way more yellow. But even more basic is resizing for instance. If you leave your pictures (maybe huge) when they come out of your camera it has consequences.

If you go further you can apply stuff like sharpening/contrast/brightness corrections. If you just take snapshots and don't care it's okay but if you're willing to take that little effort to start with you will look back differently to your photos!

Happy shooting
T.

 

Yep, me too except I've moved from 4/3 to a full frame Nikon.

Ansel Adams once said that the negative was his score and the print, his performance.

That's how I feel about my RAW file and the finished digital image. I still make a lot of
prints but now they come off my photo printer from Photoshop. Some different from
the days when a C22 print took 15 minutes of darkroom work. Digital is so immediate
with much more control than I had 50 years ago.

 

Didn't even have real focus points, only the round thing in the middle and had to make both sides sharp. I'm having a lot more fun now. Still wishing for a 1D but have to do with the older 7D. Worked in a printshop later and we were very advance printing huge posters on 4000 lines. Not sure what they do nowadays but it has to be a lot more.
Loved to make little projects of my own in the darkroom for positive slides.

 

Don't remind me of the round thing in the middle. You had to focus there and then
if you neglected to reframe for composition there was your subject smack dab in
the middle. One of the features of my dSLRs that I adore is being able to move the
focus point around.

 

Heh, yeah... that was a long time ago. In 1995 I started with the first 1 megapixel cameras. How wonderful it was not having to print anything on paper, only if you wanted to.

It looked like much 19 AF points at the time of the Canon 7D but now I'm short of so many focus points and the next set of cameras is so darn expensive 7D mark II or 1D series. 5D is just no option for me I think. I take photos with the faces as close to the edge because I want to have it as close as possible for details and there are no focus points in the corners and edges because it's only a diamond shape detection in the middle

 

I love editing as much as taking the photos. I never seem to be able to find the right lighting so photoshop is a great help when it comes to brightening the photo. I also tweak the contrast a bit depending on the mood of the photo. Then comes my favorite part: Actions. I love trying new things and see how the photo turns out. Sometimes I edit the same photo more than once and compare the results before picking my favorite.

 

That is a great approach before posting. I personally really don't like the behavior of people posting pictures of having moved 1 inch and posting 30 pictures out of their camera from that session

 

I photoshop for a living and enjoy it very much. So I'm always working a bit more on my photos after processing them in the Photoshop RAW importer because I can't imagine not to. The things I do are mostly more colour correction, light/dark balance and sharpening. I try to avoid excessive retouching by looking carefully when shooting. It sometimes happens that I'm satisfied after one or two small tweaks and that's when I know I made a photo that really worked ;p

Is there someone who can compare the Photoshop RAW importer to Lightroom? I'm inclined to think it's not necessary to use Lightroom but don't mind being convinced.

 

I have looked into Lightroom but, for the photos I take, it seems unnecessary. The advantages as I understand them are for batch processing and organisation. I recently took some wedding photos for a friend and I can see that the ability to batch process tens and tens of photos is a real advantage in situations like that. However, I don't generally do that and either take 10 or so shots to reduce to a single still life or 50-60 to whittle down to maximum ten if I am out and about doing landscapes and architecture. In situations such as these, the fine-grain adjustments available in Photoshop are more useful that the bulk processing available in LR.