before and after
When shooting RAW images with a digital camera the result of a proper exposure within the camera is often quite dull and lifeless. There are thousands of small but important decisions regarding colour, contrast, sharpness, noise and many other things which are made automatically by the camera when shooting in jpeg, these decisions are left in the hands of the photographer when shooting in RAW and some post-processing work is required in order for the image to finally emerge.
The post-processing tools available to today's photographers have the capability to make huge and fundamental changes to the original image, but often a good raw file needs only subtle tweaks in order to get to a pleasing result... it is not necessary for every image to get the full "Apocalypse in Mordor" treatment. On some occasions however the situation calls for some more drastic actions.
My philosophy has been to try and learn every possible technique, and then try to use them to create images which look like they are (or at least could have been) natural. The question "has it been photoshopped?" is often asked. Well, in my case, the answer is always "yes it has"... but I try to end up with a result that does not appear to be a computer generated fiction.
Below you can see two before/after examples showing the changes from the original RAW file to the final image.
The post-processing tools available to today's photographers have the capability to make huge and fundamental changes to the original image, but often a good raw file needs only subtle tweaks in order to get to a pleasing result... it is not necessary for every image to get the full "Apocalypse in Mordor" treatment. On some occasions however the situation calls for some more drastic actions.
My philosophy has been to try and learn every possible technique, and then try to use them to create images which look like they are (or at least could have been) natural. The question "has it been photoshopped?" is often asked. Well, in my case, the answer is always "yes it has"... but I try to end up with a result that does not appear to be a computer generated fiction.
Below you can see two before/after examples showing the changes from the original RAW file to the final image.
Example 1 - Llanddwyn Island
Below is a before/after example from Llanddwyn island in North Wales.
Main changes made
Main changes made
- slight darkening of the lighter areas in the sky using a graduated filter (in camera raw)
- slight lightening of the darkest areas using a graduated filter (in camera raw)
- a small increase in the saturation of the yellows and greens, especially in the plants lining the path (hue/saturation adjustment layer + mask)
- subtle orton-like effect (using a photoshop action I created)
- a subtle matt effect for the darker areas of the image (exposure adjustment layer + mask)
- clean up of some debris on the path (spot healing brush)
Example 2 - Dolgoch Falls
My second example is from Dolgoch Falls, also in North Wales.
For this image the environment presented a few challenges - firstly the dynamic range of the scene was rather high (bright highlights and deep shadows) and secondly the wind was moving the foliage around severely. These issues required some actions to be taken in camera at the scene and some additional work to be done in post-processing. It is very important to be mindful of these challenges at the time of shooting in order to make sure that you have all the needed raw files before leaving the scene!
For this image the environment presented a few challenges - firstly the dynamic range of the scene was rather high (bright highlights and deep shadows) and secondly the wind was moving the foliage around severely. These issues required some actions to be taken in camera at the scene and some additional work to be done in post-processing. It is very important to be mindful of these challenges at the time of shooting in order to make sure that you have all the needed raw files before leaving the scene!
At the scene
I know from experience that with my camera (and many others) it is easier to recover the shadows in post-processing than it is to try and fix blown out highlights, so I made my main exposure based on the brightest parts of the image.
When shooting a scene containing movement, the importance of the shutter speed selection is huge, in this case I found that 1.3 seconds was giving me the right amount of motion blur in the water. The aperture needed to be small to ensure front to back sharpness, so I used f16. I also used a polarising filter to reduce the glare from the water and enhance the greens in the trees. An iso of 100 gave a good exposure (no highlight clipping, no shadow clipping), all the right details were there although the image overall was very dark.
In cases like this you really are trying to capture a RAW file which will allow the best results in post-processing, not a RAW file which will look best on the back of the camera at the time - this is important, but can be counter-intuitive to begin with.
This left the problem of the moving branches. For that I captured another RAW file with the same settings apart from an iso of 4000 which enabled a shutter speed of 1/25, fast enough in this case to freeze the motion of the leaves.
When shooting a scene containing movement, the importance of the shutter speed selection is huge, in this case I found that 1.3 seconds was giving me the right amount of motion blur in the water. The aperture needed to be small to ensure front to back sharpness, so I used f16. I also used a polarising filter to reduce the glare from the water and enhance the greens in the trees. An iso of 100 gave a good exposure (no highlight clipping, no shadow clipping), all the right details were there although the image overall was very dark.
In cases like this you really are trying to capture a RAW file which will allow the best results in post-processing, not a RAW file which will look best on the back of the camera at the time - this is important, but can be counter-intuitive to begin with.
This left the problem of the moving branches. For that I captured another RAW file with the same settings apart from an iso of 4000 which enabled a shutter speed of 1/25, fast enough in this case to freeze the motion of the leaves.
Post-Processing
Main changes made (to both the RAW files):
Main changes made to the combined file:
- Slight overall increase in exposure (camera RAW)
- Slight overall reduction in highlights (camera RAW)
- Increase in exposure and saturation of the darkest areas of the image (graduated filter in camera RAW)
- Slight warming of the colour temperature (camera RAW)
- Combining the files to resolve the moving leaves problem (layers + layer mask in Photoshop)
Main changes made to the combined file:
- Correcting black and white points, adding a small amount of contrast (curves adjustment layer in Photoshop)
- subtle matt effect for the image (exposure adjustment layer)
- subtle orton-like effect (using a photoshop action I created)
- vignette (camera RAW)
I hope that this has been useful or interesting for some people. Please feel free to contact me with questions or comments.
Andy
