Editing Images
Derek Smith • 22 May 2021
Before Editing
Photo By: Derek Smith
After Editing
Photo By: Derek Smith
Following on from my previous blog posts, today I would like to discuss editing the images that you have carefully, and thoughtfully taken.
Naturally an image editing software will be needed, on a smartphone or tablet several good editing suites are available some free, and some paid for, I find Snapseed useful on a smartphone. A basic free image editor for Windows is FastStone, which I enjoy using because of the keyboard shortcuts. Darktable, RawTherapee, and The Gimp, are free “open source” image editors which can yield good results on Windows, Mac, and Linux platforms. I have found the Darktable software very useful, and there are some excellent tutorials for this editing suite. Paid software such as Affinity, Luminar AI, Adobe Elements, and Capture One, have a single payment model, whereas Adobe has a monthly subscription model. I would suggest finding a trial version of the paid software and finding your way around the program with the aid of various YouTube, or Vimeo tutorial videos.
Now that you have the software on your preferred device, it is important to realise that there is not a “right way” to edit an image, however I would seriously advocate that you begin editing an image with the crop tool. Look carefully at the image, would the aspect ratio benefit from amending, a portrait may be improved by choosing a square 1:1 ratio, a landscape image may require a change to a 16:9 aspect, or even a freehand letterbox style. Apply any lens corrections needed, and adjust any verticals, or wonky horizon, clone or crop out any distractions.
Once the image has been tidied, now is the time to move onto the exposure, levels, saturation, and clarity adjustments, again no “right way” to do this, try not to overcook the image, again take time, possibly walk away from editing the image and return to it with fresh eyes.
More advanced techniques involve adding a graduated filter to tone down a bright area of an image, use the dodge, and burn tool to locally lighten, or darken parts of the image. A word on sharpening an image, rather than sharpen the whole image, termed a global adjustment, use a mask to sharpen just a part of the image, a photo of a bird in a tree may benefit from sharpening, but the tree is best left unsharpened.
Having a RAW image to work with leaves plenty of latitude to recover details in the shadows using the highlights, and shadows adjustments, whereas a jpg image may not offer the same degree of latitude. A RAW image can look very “flat” when opened in some photo editors, Affinity, and Darktable apply an initial tone curve to the image by default to alleviate this, but if you prefer the “flat” look, this can be turned off in software preferences.
Some photographers like to create a duplicate of the image in the photo editing software, so that a copy of the original image is retained, I don’t do this for 2 reasons, the first is that the editing software I use is non-destructive, so I can revert to the original from the “History” tab, and the second reason is to do with my work flow I always copy the images from the camera into a folder on an external hard drive, opening the image from that folder, and export the finished edit into another folder, which is a temporary folder designated as “Upload”, and I never save my edits, Luminar does by default, automatically, as it has a inbuilt Luminar catalogue file. My edited images are always manually uploaded, from the “Upload” folder to cloud based storage away from the computer, using Smugmug, Amazon Photos, Google Photos, and Apple Photos.
Personally, I use the Affinity editor, as well as the Luminar AI software. I have found the “Tone Mapping” persona in Affinity very useful, as some of you will have seen in my tutorial of editing a train at the platform. In Luminar AI I will sometimes use the supplied templates to edit an image with just a couple of clicks, saving lots of work. Affinity, and Luminar AI also have the option of creating personal adjustment pre-sets, or templates to save and use on a set of images. Recently I returned from a model photo shoot with over 200 images, all shot in the same lighting conditions, with the same camera lens combination. After selecting the first image and cropping / tidying, I applied one of the portrait templates which very nearly matched what I wanted the image to look like, I applied a couple of fine adjustments to the template, then saved the template as my personal template, and was able to apply this to all 47 images that I selected for keeping and sharing with the model, saving a lot of time, and giving a consistent “look” to all of the edited images.
I have included before, and after images of two barges entering a lock on the River Lee Navigation, shooting the scene as I did on the lock gates was unavoidable, so, the first task in Luminar AI was to correct the verticals, next cloning out the unwanted details in the water, editing this image manually was very difficult trying to keep detail in the sky, and in the water. After a frustrating time, I applied an AI template, and the image just “popped” with improved detail in the water, while retaining the sky detail, I was massively impressed.
Louth Photographic Society
The New Inn, at Saltfleet will be hosting our well attended Classic Car Nights, these now have a regular following among the classic car and vehicle owners in the area. The dates for the next Classic Car Nights, are the 8th August, and 12th September. In addition the New Inn will be holding a Bike Night on 22nd August.
Last weekend we spent a pleasant Saturday in the north Lincolnshire Wolds. Our first stop was to All Hallows Church, Clixby, the church is very hard to see from the road, as it is hidden away among trees on a double bend. The church dates from the 13th century, is grade 2 listed, and was declared redundant in 1973. The stone carved font is 15th Century, and was formerly in a Low Toynton Church. Driving on to Caistor we stopped at the Rock Foundation Nursery, and café for an excellent coffee, and cake, for lunch. Returning home we pulled off the Caistor - Brigg Road to visit the hamlet of Somerby. A monument has been erected on the side of a hill here in 1770 to celebrate the 29th anniversary of Edward, and Ann Weston, and in the tenth year of the reign of George III. The views from here are amazing, clear across Lincolnshire to Lincoln. It was a pleasant excursion with my young lady, and my camera.
About a year ago, my computer crashed, and I lost all my files and photos. After learning from Curry’s that retrieval from the defective hard drive was costly and uncertain, I chose to buy a new desktop computer and start afresh. I had backed some of the older photographs up, with some club talks, and a lot of holiday photos on memory sticks. I had also been lazy about deleting photographs on my camera SD cards that went back to July last year. I decided not to use any of the old photos I had for competitions, and instead using only new images, essentially starting again. Downloading what I had on my camera and re-editing some I had worked on previously (hopefully better) as I had purchased the latest Adobe Elements (25) editing software on my new desktop, after losing my previous copy of Adobe Elements (10), and taking more photographs when I had the chance. I now have over 40 PDI's in my competition file but still need a few more in the print file as I like to print what I consider my best photographs; competition judges may have other ideas of course. Reviewing my last year’s monthly competition scores to May of this year, with Prints Subject - 3rd, Open-2nd, and PDI's Subject-3rd, Open-2nd, not bad considering that I started from scratch. Lessons learned then; firstly back your files up and don't let your computer get too old and out of date, secondly, I think it has been a good thing to start again and use only the latest photographs for competitions.
As photographers we take many photos over our lifetime, personally I have over 30,000 photos, my photos of family, friends, and holidays are precious. A selection of my memorable photos of various subjects are pictured here and hold particularly fond memories for me. The first image is of Mam Tor at dawn, I and two other club members climbed Mam Tor in the dark by torchlight, to photograph the sun rise, unfortunately owing to the low cloud, and mist the sunrise disappointed, with just a lightening of the eastern sky, but we still managed to obtain some excellent images. My second image is of a London Docklands basin, this one processed as a monochrome image taken on a family outing, it looks stunning with the office towers, and the reflections in the water. Most of you know that I enjoy my portrait and model photography, this one staged at Doncaster Motorcycles, is gritty, and realistic. Obviously, she isn’t a motorcycle mechanic, but she entered into the spirit of the theme, and covered herself in dirt, and grease for the shoot. Lastly, a photo that I have longed to capture, you see photos like this in all the farming magazines. We were driving back from the Humber Bridge, through the lanes near Winterton, when I spotted the combine harvester in the field, we pulled up on a wide verge. I had to wait in the corner of the field until the tractor, and combine, were in just the right place so that I could capture the shot. Hopefully, you’ve enjoyed seeing these photos. If any members have any memorable photos that you can share, please email me.
Good Morning All I visited Chambers wood last Sunday in search of rare butterflies, I did manage to photograph a White Admiral and what I think is a Silver Washed Fritillary, it was a very bright day, and the butterflies were not settling for long. Last Tuesday four members attended the LPA Battle at Cleethorpes, Derek has done a blog on the evening to read on our website. Dave Turner has sent me a list of all the scoring over the three rounds which is attached, just be warned the scores on round three were quite low compared with other rounds. A big thank you to Dave Turner who has taken our prints to the away rounds and done all the administration for the Battles. It is our summer break now so the newsletters will not appear each week until September unless there is something to report. Feel free to send blogs to Derek if you have been somewhere you want to tell us about, or just a blog on anything photo related. Regards Graham
The 3rd round of the LPA Battles was held last night at Cleethorpes camera club was held last night. The judge for the evening was Erica Oram, from Sheffield, I enjoyed her style of judging, very considered, and with her speaking out her thought processes as she assessed each print. The standard of prints from Cleethorpes, Louth, and Pinchbeck, in this 3rd and final round, were extremely high and Erica had quite a job to select the prints retained for higher points, her “hold backs”. I took this photograph of the “hold backs” at the break, about three quarters of the way through the initial judging, it was very evident then that Cleethorpes Camera Club had chosen a very creative, and well photographed set of prints for the LPA Battle. At the end of the judging process, Cleethorpes had 10 “hold backs” in the running for awarding higher points, accordingly Cleethorpes took first place in this round with 274 points, against 238 points for Louth, and Pinchbeck trailing with 234 points. Cleethorpes took a deservedly first place in this round, many thanks to Cleethorpes for the hospitality, making us feel very welcome.
Good Morning All Last week at the club we held a local PDI competition, Wildflowers and Open, there were some very good entries and especially well done to Keith Rossington who was placed first in both categories. The results are on our website. Thank you to Dave Turner who judged the Open, the first time he had judged live, and he did an excellent job with plenty of helpful comments and some good advice as regards processing our images. That was the last meeting at Church House until September as we now begin our summer break. There is however an LPA Battle, third round at Cleethorpes camera club next Tuesday, It is at 7.30 in their clubroom which is between 49 and 51 Reynolds Street DN35 7TU. Parking is best by the tennis courts. Regards Graham
Last night we held our last competition before our summer break. The PDI (Projected Digital Image) competition had the categories of "Local Wildflowers", and "Open". As this was a members competition, Dave Turner judged the "Open" category, this was his first time judging a competition, he had previewed the images, and made notes, and he gave some excellent critique, which will help members when submitting images in future competitions. After the break, Graham Harrison judged the "Local Wildflowers", a couple of the submitted entries were excellent, but unfortunately did not meet the category criteria so lost some points, flowers always make a good subject for a competition, and Graham had quite a task in judging the images. It was a superb evening with some amazing images, Keith Rossington took first place in both categories, the images he submitted show how much time, and effort he takes with his photography, well done Keith.
Good Morning All Last Sunday I went to the Armed forces day at Cleethorpes, there were not so many people about as I think most wanted to see the Red Arrows on Saturday. There was an excellent display from a group of first world war re-enactors who were mounted and in the uniform of the Lancers as well as a limited air display the highlight been the Spitfire. Last week was also the run for life in Louth, Sam from Colorgrafix did the run in memory of Paul Malley and raising money for cancer research. Sam asked the club for sponsorship so we sent her a donation from us all. Last Friday 21 members and partners enjoyed a meal at the Royal Oak, Cawthorpe, it was good to be able to socialise with each other with a few drinks and a very good meal. I hope everyone had a great night. This week, Wednesday 9th July, we are holding a PDI (Projected Digital Image) competition, with the categories of "Local Flowers in Their Environment (25 miles limit)" and "Open". I am going to judge the Flowers with Dave Turner judging the Open. Regards Graham
Most people are aware of “writers block”, where a writer sits staring at a blank page, and can’t think of a story to write, well photographers suffer from a similar affliction, with a camera sitting on a shelf, and we can’t think of anything to photograph. I believe that change in one way or another can invigorate our photographic creativity, one of our members renowned for his seascapes, has begun taking photos of birdlife, creating some stunning images. My favourite photographic genre has been in fashion and portraiture for the past 6 years, but I’ve lost the “joy” in the genre, so now I want to take more landscape, and macro photography, varying my style. I have just changed my camera system, and now I’m excited to try out the new lenses and watching endless YouTube videos to learn about the new camera system, as well as getting out, and trying the new techniques, these are some of the images from my new camera system. Another method of invigorating your photography is to start a project, think of a subject, and build a portfolio of images, watching how your photography improves as you take each image over time. Joining a camera club is another way to invigorate our photography. Many of our members have stated that their photography has improved since joining, being inspired by the talks, workshops, and regular competitions. The competitions are important both from a learning perspective, but also from the challenges in the subject matter. Recently I was dashing around trying to photograph “Wildflowers in the Environment” for our next competition, a lot of the roadside verges had been mowed reducing the wildflowers locally. Next, I tried some churchyards, there was some “Ladies Bedstraw” flowers in Scrivelsby churchyard, but it didn’t make for a convincing photo, I found some wildflowers along a footpath that did work. I did find another convincing photo in a local church yard, but still I had only two out of three photographs, and the deadline for competition entry submission was fast approaching. Driving out of Horncastle I spotted an ideal wildflower candidate, so quickly turning the car around, parking on the verge, and laying flat on the ground I was able to take one of the best images of the three, and with a lens that I wouldn’t normally associate with this style of photography. In conclusion, dust off that camera, take some photographs, and rediscover the simple joy of photography.
