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Why Do Some Photographers Not Believe in Editing?
Photographers range from original and gritty to plastic faces. It's as simple for a model who has expectations to find a photographer whose style they're compatible with and have open conversations prior to the shoot so that there's no misunderstanding. Jan 18 13 03:22 pm Link I haven't learned to photo shop my images much less re touch them, With regard to re touching, I don't generally like the look of overly re touched imagery. My editing is bare, very minimal, and that's how I like it. Jan 18 13 03:23 pm Link Sometime photographers say they don't believe in editing because they don't know how to use Photoshop. Saying they don't believe in it is an easy out for them. Others genuinely like a more natural look. Jan 18 13 03:23 pm Link Kaouthia wrote: Yes, on film. And I still shoot film almost exclusively. But Photoshop has it's place in the world too. In past times you could do this edit in a darkroom but those guys who could do it then are all dead now. So it's Photoshop or nothing. Jan 18 13 05:52 pm Link Depends how good your Make-up artist is. Really I lean towards less editing when possible. If you look at magazine covers, adverts, there may be still a huge amount of post-production, but I think the industry is going back to less 'airbrushed' images on the whole. The early fashion photographers didn't have the capabilities the we do today, and they still managed to capture iconic images. Just because you have ten hammers in your kitbag, doesn't have to use them all for the same job. Having said that, each to their own. The client makes the call. Bobby. Jan 18 13 05:59 pm Link One reason might be the time involved. After a shoot, the model is done with it. The photographer's work is just beginning. Typically I spend 3-4x as much time just selecting the photos to edit as I spent shooting them. It's not uncommon to spend three hours (or more) retouching a photo. That's also why I don't give the model a ton of photos from a trade shoot. I'd rather have a few portfolio-quality photos than a ton of unretouched work. While I have gotten faster at retouching, I have also become more picky about it - so the time per photo hasn't decreased. I'd much rather spend my time shooting than retouching, but that's not how it works. (You won't see what I'm talking about in my portfolio. Everything in it is at least a year old. I've been working on a portfolio update for about three months, and I'm maybe half finished. The photos I'm considering using in the update go into a password-protected folder. And one day, hopefully, the update will be finished.) Jan 18 13 06:02 pm Link I like both edited pictures and those straight out of the camera. I have both types in my modeling portfolio here. For a photographer, I'd think it'd be important for a model to have an unretouched picture or two in there. As far as my own photography: I do mainly landscapes and macro. I retouch/edit some pictures and not others. To me, it depends on how bright and cheery the picture out of the camera was. Recently, I had a lot of trouble in west Texas getting the bright and cheery to come through, so I played with the levels/contrast/etc. for for quite some time to achieve what I felt I saw in real life. Now, when I do self-portraits, all unflattering photographs are in the shitcan! Then I do minimal editing on the ones I like (if needed). I post my photography under my real name, so I don't want people who have seen me to think I'm delusional. Jan 18 13 06:20 pm Link If a woman has something on her skin that won't be there in two weeks (like a pimple) I remove it. If the lighting and camera (and myself) manage to unintentionally amplify wrinkles, I will smooth their skin a bit. I don't remove moles and such. Then again I am not shooting for a fashion magazine or catalog. Jan 18 13 06:41 pm Link Wedding - 300 pics @ 5 minutes in editing each = 1500 minutes or 25 hours of work. It's not financially viable for me to do a lot of editing. While photography is art, I'm also trying to run of business. Jan 18 13 07:47 pm Link I know I am going to get flack for this, but I believe that some photographers work at their craft and learn to use all the tools of the trade so their images can be the best possible representation of their vision when they snapped the exposure. Others are too lazy to learn and they justify this by claiming to be purists and that the image should be perfect out of the camera... except their images are not perfect. Sarah Lynn Modeling wrote: Jan 18 13 07:57 pm Link Back in the old days with film all you could do was dodge and burn when developeing an image on print paper. So most photographers tended to get the first best image possible with correct lighting settings background light and most of all model pose.Now a days you make a mistake and just say Oh hell lets leave it to photoshop. Jan 18 13 07:58 pm Link Fotografica Gregor wrote: I shoot for both ... nike this past weekend got ALL RAW images ... today, private school A.D. got edits, cropped and full post production images ... it makes a difference WHO the client is and WHAT was agreed upon ... Jan 18 13 08:07 pm Link William Kious wrote: I fluctuate between these reasons, but since getting on mayhem I have reached out to several very talented retouchers who I plan to hire to do work that I simply don't have the skillsets to do or the inclination to learn how. Jan 18 13 08:10 pm Link I'm a female photographer. I approach every photo thinking, "If this were me, what would I want retouched?" Most often: blemishes, dry spots, bruises, scrapes, bags and discoloration. Jan 18 13 08:12 pm Link reason. 99% can't use or don't own good software.... Here's the kicker... a good photographer doesn't need software to do post touch-up. Secondly, even the best out of camera shot can be made better, it's part of the trade, just like a wrench to a mechanic.. Jan 18 13 08:13 pm Link Neil Snape wrote: On your new avatar, by no PS do mean no adjustment of any kind AT ALL (i.e. straight out of camera) - or no "touch ups" but the image still went through Lightroom? Makes a difference. Jan 18 13 08:15 pm Link Hero Foto wrote: Nike is a client of yours? Well, that's impressive. I mean, really. Jan 18 13 08:51 pm Link  LOL Studio36 Jan 18 13 09:19 pm Link Cuica Cafezinho wrote: p.s. NEVER ever ever judge a book by it's cover ... what you "see" is NOT always what you get ... Jan 18 13 09:21 pm Link So, survey says... Balls of wax are never okay.  Personally, I'd rather see unretouched photos than photos that have been blurred or airbrushed beyond any hope of looking like actual skin. Two things I work on removing quickly are major red veins in eyes, and acne or complexion problems. I don't eliminate them 100%, but I cut the major issues out so that the photo still looks real but attractive. Since this is a photo of a human, I cloned to retain skin texture. Example from yesterday:  Final photo:  Jan 19 13 05:25 am Link Ever since I switched to film I've eliminated 90% of my retouching.. Jan 19 13 06:18 am Link Some just wanna take pics of girls...that all. lol. Jan 19 13 10:54 am Link I used to enjoy playing with photoshop to improve images. I wasn't bad. i was just good enough. But after a couple of years it became boring, spend time in front of a computer improving images. I also became sick of my images with my "perfect" images. Too plastic, too astificial, and so on. Becouse of that decide to just do the minimum in pos edition. Which was good because I had to work harder during the shoot and it was more fun. Then I experienced the film negative and I felt the look of it was even better than digital, sking more natural and more beautiful, image less artificial, colours more interisting. Beleave or not, with film negative my photographs requires less work im pos edition. The hear, the skif and so on are way better than digital. This year I decided to don't do pos edition on he computer, which is boring. No I work intirelly with traditional techniques, which is more fun and interisting. Jan 19 13 02:31 pm Link studio36uk wrote: Rumours of my demise are greatly exaggerated! Jan 19 13 09:56 pm Link I like taking pictures, not sitting in front of my computer hours on end. Because of this, I much rather spend a lot of time setting up my shoot, than spend all of my time "fixing" photos. Jan 19 13 10:21 pm Link Neil Snape wrote: This is the direction in which I am heading more and more - which would be much more apparent had I updated at all recently. I tended to retouch excessively while learning PS and the better I get at it (if I may say so myself, and I may as well because no one else will) I use it less and less and much prefer to pre-edit on set with better lighting technique. Jan 19 13 10:54 pm Link To me, photography is the creation of images that convey an emotion. Sometimes that image just falls right out of the camera, but most of the time, I need to work with it a bit to get just the feel just right. My live music photography wouldn't be possible without PP, and the bands that hire me to shoot them are fully aware of this when they contact me. They are looking for my 'take' on what they are doing, the same way that musicians but their own feel into the music. With portraits, this obviously is pulled back a bit, but every now and then, an image will only truly live with some PP. Earlier, I added an image to my portfolio here that really spoke to me after PP. The 'before' image was close, but the feeling that was missing was only possible by applying some touches in Lightroom. You may not agree, and that is way cool, it is the essence of photography. What speaks to me may not speak to you. To me, that means that I've nailed it. Otherwise we are both looking at an 'as is' image that came out of the camera and onto the web page without interpretation. (ok, i'm oversimplifying a bit here, but you get the point, yea?). Jan 21 13 08:00 pm Link I can't speak for anyone but myself so I won't attempt to do that. This is why I don't believe in editing: I'm a photographer, not a graphics artist or retoucher. I use a camera to do the bulk of my work. There are times when a computer is necessary ... rotating, cropping, etc, but nothing is more annoying to me than seeing a model that would probably be very pretty turned into a piece of plastic. The models I shoot are all beautiful people. To "enhance" their look takes away from their natural beauty (IMO). Those "fine lines" are an asset, IMO. I understand that multi million dollar customers don't agree but I don't have any of those yet. If one were to become a client of mine, the images I shoot will go to a retoucher because they will likely be far better at editing than I can ever hope to be. In the meantime, I go about my day trying to capture natural beauty at its best. ETA: Some people think the only way to do and present things is in a highly edited form. Someone in the critique forum told me once that my editing skills are 'somewhat lacking' (or something to that effect). At the time, I didn't edit a single picture outside of rotating and cropping (sometimes). If photography is truly an art, there has to be more than one way to do things. Jan 21 13 08:08 pm Link I like photography and I want my photographs to be photographs. How my subjects look will depend on the setting, make-up, attire and my lighting and not computer manipulations. The subject is who they are. MM has to be a big reason why I will always shoot film; the endless horrible fake looking images here keep me true to my craft. I am not the guy for those looking to be smoothed over; I choose to record moments of life not create cartoons. Jan 21 13 08:30 pm Link CDP Photo wrote: This is the archetypal extreme view on 'retouching'/post processing images. Jan 22 13 02:17 am Link Yeah! I'm one of those, "get it right in the camera" guys. Until a few weeks ago, I didn't even own a copy of photoshop, but I now have Elements 11, which came bundled with an Epson scanner. I now seem to spend most of my "photoshop" time getting rid of arse spots. Mostly I just lighten a bit and sharpen in an ancient programme called Nikon Picture Project. The rest is all down to lighting and getting the shooting angles right. Less is more, and I've seen some right PTD efforts over the years. PTD? Photoshopped To Death. However - to each his own. Jan 22 13 02:58 am Link Don't focus on the technique. Focus on the end result. If you don't like dark circles under your eyes, talk the photographer ahead of time so that the expectation WRT to the end result has been set. Then the photographer can choose to address the issue in an appropriate manner (makeup, lighting, retouching or whatever). Jan 22 13 03:39 am Link As other of stated previously you want to talk this over with the photographer before hand so you know if he/she can deliver the type of images that you're looking for. With that said its important to remember that quality retouching can take a good deal of time so let them know up front that you're only looking for example the best 1-2 shots per look, best 3-6 images from the shoot or 1 edited image per hr of shooting or some other combination. That both party agree to provided a fare balance between the time you spent in front of the camera and the time the photographer has to spend in post. Also don't forget to agree on a date, that you should receive your images that is fair to both of you. Also not always but often the better the photographer the fewer images that you'll receive from a trade shoot. This is because they put an extremely high standard on the work they put out there and also because they're busy with paying clients. Jan 22 13 03:46 am Link Drew Smith Photography wrote: Perhaps, but for me it has nothing to do with comfort, it has to do with my taste. I detest the look of the digital image and the look of prints made with ink printers when compared to a print from photographic emulsion paper. Jan 22 13 03:47 am Link I like clients to look at my pics of them and say "wow I look fantastic" which is why I retouch photos a lot. Most love the fantasy of looking much younger, or more "perfect". When doing street photography, I like to keep pictures looking as real as possible. If I edit, it is to remove things that don't belong in the photo, or to create a different look of realism to the photo. I hardly touch up faces on the street. Jan 22 13 04:46 am Link Bold Sheep Photography wrote: I am a male photographer, and I approach it every photo thinking are her boobs big enough, do i need to give more butt????? Jan 22 13 04:50 am Link Unless someone is *really* *REALLY* good at retouching, a lot of times, attempts made to cover up imperfections often make the image more jarring than the original ever was. Anyone can drag a skin smoothing tool over a model's body and then go back and sharpen the eyes. It's hack, and it's so obvious when looking through someone's portfolio. Making an image stand out by its design, composition and styling alone is what makes an image that gets attention... not giving every model a dead skin mask. That said, some photographers do have a nasty habit of losing interest after the shoot and just dumping a bunch of unedited files into a dropbox folder and calling it a day. That's not cool either, so it definitely benefits everyone to discuss not only the plan for the shoot, but the plan for post-work and expectations on deliverables as well. Jan 22 13 04:59 am Link I think how much and whether or not you retouch is totally subjective and depends on generally your ideology regarding photography. I try to retouch as little as possible because I am interested in people, how they look and by extension of that a visual representation of who they are. That though is because generally I've always found myself attracted to a German like photographic ideology. Others want to either find, or more often try to create beauty where perhaps it didn't exist before. Times change, and with them trends. Maybe one day it'll be daguerreotypes again! Jan 22 13 06:28 am Link Evaluating digital photography based on the sentiments of film photography is fruitless in exploring the full potential of the digital world! On top of that, evaluating the purpose and effectiveness of digital retouching based on those old sentiments is sophomoric at best. Some dont mind buying a brand new Pearl 75 and insisting on hiring a team of 25 oarsmen in the name of being a purist sailer! You will get to your destination all right, might even enjoy the ride - no doubt. But, surely not because you are a purist but perhpas because you are skilled in the old technology. I know to read and use a printed map, and even better, I am able to look at the map for a few minutes before the trip and memorize the route for tghe whole trip. However, I don't deny, ignore and refuse to see and enjoy the usefulness of my GPS enabled navigation system! The additional capabilities, capabilities and searchability of the digital system gives me a whole another experience of travel - far different from the experience of traveling with a printed map. Far different and far more experiential: The variations I can include or exclude along my route are enjoyable and useful. Jan 22 13 06:48 am Link |
