Recent Sessions
I’ve been more swamped than normal this winter. Usually winter is the slow time for photographers, but so far this winter has consisted of a whole lot of sixty degree days that are more like springtime. No complaints about that here!! However, there has been less time this year for mentoring, and even less for my photographer related Blog posts. On the agenda today – actions!
Disclaimer: I know that a lot of photographers use actions, and use them correctly for beautiful consistent images. If you’re one of those photographer, I’m not talking to you in this post. 
If you’re one of those photographers chances are 99.9% that you will agree with every word here.
Moving on – an action is a series of post processing steps that are saved into..well..and action. You open the image, hit play, and all of the steps are applied to the photo right in front of your eyes. Pretty cool right? Not always. Action makers often advertise that you can totally almost WIPE OUT your workflow time by purchasing their actions. Hit play and a finished image will appear before your eyes. I could explain to you why this is not true. I could tell you that most photographers, myself included, use only the actions they themselves have created and saved, and that they still tweak them for every single image. I could also explain to you that different parts of processing apply to different parts of the images so there is no way that an action can work with only the press of a button. I could tell you all of that and more, but the face remains that humans are a visual species, so I think that I will just show you instead. I know that we all remember the gorgeous Jen and Lenny -
This photo was processed either completely by hand, or with the action that I created out of my normal processing steps. I couldn’t tell you which because the results are identical. Even when I run my personal action I stop at every. single. step. and tweak to where it needs to be, sometimes eliminating a whole step in the process. Now for some “ready made, time saving, image creating” actions. The first is the popular vintage – I’m not a fan of vintage in most cases – and this will probably show you why.
The top image is the action ran just how most advertisements tell you too – hit play, watch it transform, and save. Not to attractive is it. I can guarantee you that my clients were not yellow in real life so why on earth would I want to make them that way?! In the bottom photo, I adjusted parts of the action, removed other parts from some areas, and all around fixed the image. It took me about as long as it would have by hand, except it cut down on how many places I would have to click on. You can see that they are now the correct color and that the image has a slight vintage feel without being overwhelming. Onto the second example.
How about that first image?! Alot of people just starting out think that the more contrast and saturation the better!! As you can see here that is simply not the case. In the second image, I again went in and adjusted all the different steps in the action, and removed a few again as well. Looks much better don’t you think? 
So many people that start out in photographer want to achieve Depth of Field in their portraits. Depth of field is that pretty background blur that draws the focus right to the subject of the images. This is done in camera, when shooting the image. It is not a post processing trick. Sometimes the photographer does is subtly, as in our example image, and sometimes they add more DOF as in the image below of the gorgeous Chelsea. 
There are several actions on the market that claim to give you the ability to add DOF in post processing. Some aren’t too shabby if used correctly, but they don’t even come close to matching the gorgeous blur created by the photographers skill with their camera. Regardless, they are out there and people will use them. Often the results turn out like the top image below.
You can see that in the first image, the whole picture looks out of focus. These kind of actions are not meant to be applied and left alone. In te second image I have used the action correctly and softened only the wall behind the subjects.
I may sound like I am slamming action makers – I am not. Most of them are photographers, and I love supporting other photographers in any ventures that they undertake. I don’t think they are intentionally misleading anyone at all. What I do think is that when they put the ads out there, they are aiming for their target market. Who is their target market? Season photographers that fully understand post processing and are just looking for a way to speed up the process a little, or a simple way to apply the occasional varied process to their photo. They WANT you to know what you’re doing before you buy. A good rule of thumb is that for any action you purchase, you should already know how to do the steps without it. If you already know how to do the steps then you will have a clear understanding in how to tweak them as needed. Action makers will appreciate that. After all they are running a business as well, and they sure don’t want photos that look like the befores in these examples representing it. Their business is to speed your workflow – not create it for you.
Don’t be afraid to experiment with actions by any means – but also don’t be afraid to really delve in and explore Photoshop. It’s amazing what you can learn by simply wondering what a feature does, and clicking on it to find out. That’s why they undo button is there – so put it to work. 
As always, thanks for reading along, and if you have any questions, drop me a line via the contact tab!!
I’ve been busy with holiday sessions and orders, and I have been neglecting the part of my Blog dedicated to other photographers and the industry in general. I have, however, been keeping up with the questions and comments from the readers of that section. The example posts are by far the most popular, and so it seemed like a good day to post one.
Here is the finished version of the image we will be looking at.
This version is a fully processed image with an urban theme, which is the theme I get the most questions about. It also happens to be one of my favorites. Knowing how to manipulate and set your camera, and not relying on auto functions is key to any good image. We have discussed that a ton, so I won’t go into it again on this post. Here is that same image straight out of the camera. (SOOC for future reference)
I’ll bet there’s not nearly as much work done to it as you thought is there? I get tons of questions on how to create images in Photoshop. My reply is always the same - you don’t create an image in Photoshop, you create it with the camera. Just as a painter knows the right mix of paints, or a musician knows the right key and notes, a photographer must know how to read the light, and how to use both the light and the camera to create the image that they want. Photoshop is merely an enhancement tool. It can not correct and out of focus image. It can not enhance quality or detail that is not already there. Heres a side by side comparison.
Let’s also take a look at the Black and White conversions that everyone loves. I myself, even with a love of color, adore a good black and white. Lets see the difference between a normal everyday conversion (which is what basic photo software offers) and a correctly done, basic, professional black and white image. The one on the left is the greyscale conversion and the on the right is the professional black and white.
Quite a bit of difference huh? Black and white images were the first images ever captured, since color film wasn’t invented until long after black and white film. And images taken on true black and white film only have black, white, and a mix of the two. There is no gray option, and that is the goal to accomplish with digital black and whites as well. You can see the difference in Caleb’s face in the two images – the one of the left is a shade of gray, and the one on the right is a true mix of black and white.
Here is a quick recap!
I hope this helps, and if you have any questions leave them in the comments or drop me an email with the contact tab!
My mind seems to be wondering today – so I thought it would be fun to grab a picture from a previous session and have a before and after. I’ve been preparing for some mentoring sessions, and concentrating step by step on explaining my workflow. Most of my mentoring clients are surprised that the majority of what I teach is in camera, and that my post processing is fairly simple. It’s simply developing a digital negative. :)
This photo of adorable little Carter is one of my all-time favorites. I love his expression, and the fact that he could really care less that I wanted to take his picture – he just wanted to play with the gumballs.
Here is the Before:
Isn’t he a doll? Here is the processed shot after just about three minutes of my normal processing.
And the two together -
Thanks for reading along, I hope you enjoyed the images!
Why the F.A.Q. post? I often get questions from other photographers, especially the aspiring photographers who are searching for knowledge on the web. I try to reply to everyone, and I think I pretty well succeed at that, but I’m sure that other people have the same questions. My goal here is to use a few peoples questions to help many. I’m going to *try* to do this once a week. If you have a question you can send it to me via the contact tab above or head on over to my Facebook Page Discussion Tab and post it there. I just added that page today, and I’m hoping for some interaction. You can post photography questions if you’re a photographer, session questions if your a client, or just drop a note and say hi! And of course you can always leave your questions here in the comments – I read them all.
Since this is the first post of this type, I’m going to start with beginner questions. These are three that I have received recently. Askers are anonymous of course.
~What is the most important thing when starting a photography business?
I think there are two main points. First of all, you are starting a legitimate business. This involves all the legal and tax aspects. If you are charging anyone any amount of money for any service, you ARE a business and you need to be legal. You don’t want the IRS to be mad at you – ever. Second of all, it take a ton of learning and a ton of practice. There is much, much more involved in being a photographer on a professional level than most people realize. If your serious, my best advice is to find a photographer you admire and ask about mentoring. And study your heart out – and PRACTICE!
~What camera do I need to start my business?
I would LOVE to be able to give a straight reply to this question but I’m afraid that it’s just not possible. I can tell you that I shoot Nikon, but I can also tell you that I’m friends with some amazing photographers that shoot Canon, Sony, and Pentax. The best advice here to go to a store and play with the various models. See what feels right in your hands, and have an idea of some of the features that you want. Remember – it’s the photographer that takes a photo, not the camera. A capable photographer can work any camera to do what they want it to do.
~How can I use photoshop to fix my images?
To put it simply, you can’t. When I ask new photographers what they most want to achieve, the things they love are all done in camera. Photography is all about working with light and angles to achieve desired results. You have to also know how to work your camera fully to make it do what you want it to do. Photoshop is definitely a great tool, and it can enhance images beautifully. It is not intended to fix mistakes however. It’s much more important to master your camera than photoshop.
I hope this helped! Stayed tuned for more F.A.Q. posts in the future and don’t forget to submit some questions with the links mentioned above!!
Here’s another before/after!! This one is pretty close to how I normally process everything – quick enhancements only. Anyone who reads my blog knows that I’m an advocate of getting it right in camera – but I won’t get on that soapbox today!
Before:
And After:
And the comparison:
Any questions, feel free to use the contact me tab above! Info on mentoring can be found on the photographers tab.
Have a great weekend!!
I love posting these as much as you guys love seeing them. Remember Samantha? Of course you do, we photographed her kissing Spiderman. Here is a before and after of one of her shots.
Before:
Normally I post the developed file as the before – not the processed but the developed, where it’s been changed from a digital negative to a Jpeg. I have found a way to post the actual digital negative, so this is a raw untouched file. It is exposed a bit dark because I didn’t want to blow out the sky in this particular shot. Although, you can see, it in focus. and the scene as a whole is properly exposed, and the lighting was nice.
After:
It actually appears like a lot more work was done here than there actually was. The image was already properly exposed, so I just did a crop to cut out the sky, since the clouds came through and the shot didn’t have the blue that I wanted for the sky. Then I did my basic process, which is fairly simple. As long as you have a great SOOC image, the post processing can be totally minimum and look amazing. This image took me a little over a minute to process from start to finish.
Here is the side by side:
There you have it! Want to learn more? Click on the Photographers tab up there and contact me for mentoring!!
Have a great night!!