9/25/2023 0 Comments Burn barrel screen![]() It’s important at this stage to remember that even the best images can look flat and uninteresting as RAW files. Some photographers like to use ratings to subdivide their keepers, for example on a scale of 1 to 5, but we’re more binary in our selection – an image is either good enough or it’s not. Then on a second pass we’ll spend more time comparing and selecting from similars, looking for the small differences that can make or break an image, such as pricked ears, alert expressions or a dynamic body or wing shape. These are images that are fundamentally and irreversibly flawed, technically or aesthetically – out-of-focus, badly exposed, animals blinking or with rubbish expressions or awkward poses, etc. We’ll first go through a folder, in the Library module, with large thumbnails, deleting any obvious no-hopers (Backspace > Delete from disk). Now it’s time to sort the wheat from the chaff. We find it’s easier to then choose keepers and delete stuff when comparing like with like. If we’ve had a productive shoot and have a lot of images in the folder, we’ll often create sub-folders (right click > Create Folders Inside…), perhaps for different species, name these folders accordingly, and drag in the relevant images from the master folder. Once imported, we’ll rename the folder in Navigator (right click on it > Rename) to something that means something to us (‘Zimanga game drive 1’, for example). This takes a little more time initially, but means we then have the highest quality previews available for decision-making. When importing files into Lightroom we always select the option in File Handling to build 1:1 previews. Our uncut RAW files are copied to two separate devices before we import them to Lightroom: one set to the PC where they will be processed, and a back-up to an external hard drive. But accidents happen, so before we do any image manipulation, making back-ups is a vital first step. ISO 400 Import and edit: the first cut is the deepestįresh from a shoot and eager to start work on those special shots you hope you’ve captured, it’s tempting to dive straight in, cherry pick a few strong ones, and start processing. The bird, lit by warm evening light, really stands out against the cooler, darker background. Here, we also went into masks, selected the subject, inverted the selection to choose the background, and pulled the temp slider a little left, to slightly cool the blues. ![]() It’s very easy to burn out the highlights on a white subject, so we’ll routinely underexpose a little in camera, then bring back the exposure in Lightroom, while dragging the highlights slider left to retain detail in the brightest plumage. There’s always room to freestyle, to experiment and have fun. Post-processing is part science, part art. We use Lightroom Classic for the bulk of our post-processing, Photoshop for dust-spotting and for some more sophisticated work with layers when required.Įvery photographer has their own post-processing workflow and we’re not claiming ours is best, just explaining what works for us. Our post-processing is predominantly about image correction and subtle enhancement, our goal to achieve the vision we had at the point of capture. ISO 1600Įxcessive saturation, over-sharpening, unnatural colours these all are great ways to kill an image, to make nature unnatural. Bringing up the whites gave some punch to the owl, while the highlights slider was pulled left to stop the brightest plumage from burning out. This image required some fairly heavy duty dodging and burning with a brush mask tool to achieve the low key feel of a secretive bird in a dark forest that was envisaged at the time of capture. For us, the mantra ‘less is more’ is the key to editing, and we share a pet-hate of over-processed images. It saves time, preserves authenticity, and maximises image quality. We believe in getting our images right in camera, rather than relying on post-processing to salvage mistakes. And with a little more artistic licence you can deepen the drama and magnify the mood, to make your work stand out from the crowd. Yet post-processing is a vital part of the creative process, whether you’re an old-school advocate of wildlife photography as documentary, or prefer a more interpretative, expressive approach to your nature images.Ĭlever editing can really make your subject sing while retaining the essential truthfulness of what you observed. We’d rather be in the fresh air than in front of a computer screen, handling a camera rather than a keyboard. ![]() The digital darkroom isn’t the natural habitat of keen wildlife photographers. ![]()
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