Jul
2
Occasionally I have people asking me about my photography (what equipment/software I use). First, thanks to those who like to visit Samantha’s photo gallery at all…I have a blast taking her pics, and if I were the only person left on the planet viewing these photos, I’d still be doing it!
I encourage everyone to take the time to enhance their photos, especially the ones you admire the most or consider precious. Even pictures taken with the cheapest of point-and-shoot cameras can benefit from a little digital improvement here and there. You’d be surprised at the difference it can make.
I liken this process to preparing raw meats for a meal. Rarely do you simply cook and consume a piece of meat as is from the store, without flavoring or marinading it at least a little. You almost always have to resize the meat somehow and then marinade it for taste, even if that only means a dash of salt or pepper to enhance its flavor. Well, rarely do images captured with any camera (high-end ones included) come out prepared perfectly, the best it can look. Once in awhile you’ll get lucky with that great money shot, but even then I bet it still can benefit from a little bump in contrast or recovery in the highlights (a little salt and pepper).
This becomes even more true if you’re shooting in RAW format these days (which most of my photos are taken). Your camera is outputting the best possible image quality that it’s mechanically capable of shooting (100% color/levels/white balance etc information). But it then becomes your job to tweak all that information so that it comes to life. It’s like the butcher giving you the best quality meat he has. Its up to you to season and prepare it so that you bring out the best flavors of that meat. Ever see pieces of raw footage from a hollywood movie or commercial before it’s been sent to the highly paid Colorist for grading? It’s almost unrecognizable in a lot of cases. The difference in before and after are stunning. And we’re talking about ridiculously high quality cameras shooting this raw material.
Which brings me next to my software of choice, Adobe Lightroom. Unlike Photoshop, which to me is more of an image manipulation software, Lightroom is a photograph enhancing tool. This is different than manipulating a picture…nothing is physically altered in the image. It’s simply enhanced… toning this detail down, bringing that one up.. until its digital information is balanced the way you like it.
Lightroom is built for the photographer and purist. Getting familiar with its specific sequence of Developing tools alone can be an education in the fundamentals of photographic principles. Starts with white balance to tonal balance to color ranges, and finishes with vignette correction… exactly the natural sequence of logic that a seasoned photographer would follow. Its quite easy to learn the software by experimenting, and you can start slow. It doesn’t take much time before you figure out the necessary tweaks and what they accomplish. Can’t say enough positive things about this tool. Give it a shot if you haven’t already. There isn’t a photograph of mine that i care about that doesn’t pass through Lightroom at some point.
As a side note, I might consider making some of my own video tutorials on topics such as this (showing my photo touchup workflow, etc). I’m trying to gauge interest, so if there’s anyone actually still reading this blog who would be interested in that, do let me know.
