Without Processing/ ProcessedThe most important part of making a great photograph happens when the photo is taken. The post production (Processing) of the photo is very important also. Good post processing of a photo can make a good photo great and sometimes even a poor photo can be made great.
Many photographers, especially those in my price range do not process their photos. They take the photo as a jpeg in the camera and put it on a disc and are done. I always process my photos- for every hour of shooting I spend on average 45-60 minutes on the computer. A JPEG is a processed photo, the camera captures much more information than is present in the JPEG. If a photographer shots JPEG they are relying on the settings they have entered into the camera. The photo is taken and the processor (the computer in the camera) makes the JPEG. All the other information is discarded. I shoot in a raw format that preserves all the other information so that I may control the creation of the JPEG later. Maybe one photo needs different settings than another. A shot of the brides face should have less sharpness than the details of a flower for instance. I also have much more latitude in the photo to adjust the exposure and color to get the photo right. Note the picture on the top, the color picked by the camera was a little too blue so I warmed the color and added some additional contrast to make the image pop.
I also always provide some extra special color and black and white images. A standard black and white that you get at the photo lab just removes all the color information. A custom black and white adjusts all the color channels individually to control contrast. I also adjust the exposure and total contrast and brightness. See the difference for yourself:
Standard/ Custom
Here you see the same photo in three styles: Antique Sepia, B&W and Sepia.
This was a high contrast shot with strong backlighting. In order to make the image pop I oversaturated (pushed the colors) and went with strong contrast.Joshua Kline Productions
www.jklineproductions.com
626-676-4458
