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Is Post-Processing Good or Bad?
I am sometimes asked why do I want to teach people to use their cameras to capture the image they want in the camera, when it can all be fixed later in post-processing programs like Photoshop. Well, I think there is absolutely nothing wrong with post-processing your images. I do it all the time. I think it is unlikely that any fashion magazine ever publishes an image that has not been "shopped" to some degree or another. In portrait photography in particular, I will smooth images to flatter my paying clients to any degree they require! However, I do still believe that the basic rules of photography apply and will always do my best to capture the best image I can in the camera. I don't emphasize post-processing, because other learning products cover it fully and effectively. GIGOIn the old days of computing they used the expression "garbage in garbage out", shortened to GIGO. This basically meant that you can't get good results from poor data. The less I need to post-process an image, then the less degradation can occur or artifacts appear in it. I believe that it is extremely difficult to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, although there is no shortage of photographers willing to give it a try to some degree and with some success. I get far more satisfaction from seeing a picture that captured in the camera the color of the sky as I saw it, rather than having to recreate it in Photoshop. Time is money
I have heard regularly of wedding photographers who swap heads on guests, because the action is good in one shot, but the expression is good in another. Amateur photographers and image makers may get a lot of pleasure from manipulating their files in post-processing programs. Professional photographers, however, are paid to shoot, so time away from shooting means time not making money. Some of the most successful wedding photographers do the minimum or even no post-processing of their images. They can shoot several weddings in the time it takes other wedding photographers to shoot and deliver one. If you get pleasure from it and think your images look better when you have worked on them on your computer, then your time is not wasted. The only thing I would say is that bad post-processing is worse than no post-processing. It's all processed anyway
The person who thinks they are capturing a more realistic view of the world by not post-processing their images is wrong. There is no such thing as a "true" image and the old adage of "the camera never lies" was never true even in the days of film. I used to work for a camera and printer manufacturer. We went to a lot of trouble to ensure that pictures you took and printed came out looking good. Small decisions about calibration and settings involved managers and engineers conversing in virtual meetings by conference call and computer for hours. It still makes me stop and think occasionally, how many people's hard work and opinions went into creating the images I take with my camera. The default settings on your camera are all based on the opinions of people like these. During my time there, we supplied a number of lab printers to a photo retailer in the UK. These large printers would print out pictures of San Diego as test prints during the self-diagnostic process. One day, we received a call that something was wrong with the printers. According to the customer, they were all out of calibration. The skies were printing unrealistically blue. We checked it out and found them to be ok. It appears that people in the UK were just not used to seeing skies as blue as they were in San Diego. I am not sure what happened, but I think the color was desaturated a little in the test prints to satisfy the customer. Your way is the right waySo, although I mostly teach image capture rather than image manipluation, I do not try to influence the way my workshop attendees follow their passion for digital image making. There is no right way to do art as far as I am aware. Getting joy and satisfaction from what you do is what I think is important. |
