Outdoor Family Portrait Photographer, Loughborough | Ever wondered what actually goes into editing a portrait?
I thought that you might like to know what my typical workflow looks like for me when editing photographs.
Following the shoot I always upload the images to my computer as soon as I get home. I also back them up in 2 different locations.
The next stage is the edit. My initial process is to cull the images - during your photoshoot it may feel as though I'm taking loads and loads of photographs. I do, this is because I take 3 of each shot - this allows for sudden movement, an odd expression or closed eyes. With children, a lot of the images are unusable - this doesn't matter because it's part of the process of catching them in the moment...
Once I have selected the gallery that I want to present I go through each image individually and hand edit them. Here is an example of what I do.
This image on the left is straight out of camera with no adjustments made. The one on the right has had a full hand edit.
It was taken on a recent workshop that I attended through the Guild of Photographers, of which I am a member - the training was delivered by Nina Mace - a previous winner of the Guild's Child Photographer of the year (she was and is amazing!). Please note that the child was positioned and posed by Nina, I took the photograph. I often attend workshops as I feel that my continual professional development is extremely important to my craft - they are also a great way to make new friends!
The image on the right has been edited in Lightroom and Photoshop. You may be able to see some of the adjustments that I have made, The overall adjustments I make in Lightroom, I have corrected the lighting (this image was pretty good straight out of camera and didn't need a lot), I've added a little vibrance to give it some 'pop', I've cropped and straightened it. I've also reduced the grain slightly as with it being the winter the light was quite tricky.
I then transfer the image to photoshop where I work on the details. On the little boy I have removed a couple of blemishes, brightened and sharpened his eyes and added a subtle vignette and some contrast to give it a little boost.
As you can see my role of photographer does not end when we part on the day of your photoshoot. I always hand edit every image in the gallery that I present to you because I want you to be able to see exactly what the finished portrait will look like.
Here are the other images from the workshop with their befores (left) and afters (right) - a couple have had some additional alterations which I feel improved their overall feel - can you spot what they are?
I have availability for Outdoor Family Portrait sessions in Loughborough and Leicester during February Half term - please book here
Each Photographer has a unique way of editing their images. The editing is just as much of an artform as the photography itself. The very talented Lynne Harper talks about how she edits her newborn baby photography in Ayrshire over on her blog ... please pop over and have a read.
