Editing to a Degree : An Insight to my Workflow

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Before and After in Adobe Lightroom showing capabilities of RAW editing to achieve excellent edited photos by Chris Gardiner Photography www.cgardiner.ca in Banff National Park, Canada
Lightroom : before and after 
One thing you might find most photographers a little hush-hush about, present company included, is what goes on in their workflow. It's one critical part of photography that I don't often discuss, so here's a little insight.

What a photographer does between taking images off of a memory card and delivering them as a finished product is often one of the biggest parts that makes up their individual style or look. When I edit, it's mostly in Adobe's Lightroom. Its a form of photoshop you could say but it focuses more on making global adjustments to your image.  I usually push to get an image that looks and emphasizes most about what and the way I remember it. That's what I show in a typical edit I might give a landscape image above. 

Below,  I show taking it further with Lightroom and pushing the RAW file to it's limits for the HDR look. Not my typical style, but there you have it, 


Before and After in Adobe Lightroom showing capabilities of RAW editing to achieve excellent edited photos by Chris Gardiner Photography www.cgardiner.ca in Banff National Park, Canada
Lightroom, before and after of a natural edit and then taking
it to an unrealistic, HDR style place.. 
Next, I compare in lightroom my natural style of edit I'll call it, with my interpretation of what your camera would have caught in auto. Also keep in mind, I had a graduated neutral density filter on here so the true original is even better than what an auto-jpeg capture would have looked like. These are all the same photo, just processed slightly differently. (the way instagram does) 


Before and After in Adobe Lightroom showing capabilities of RAW editing to achieve excellent edited photos by Chris Gardiner Photography www.cgardiner.ca in Banff National Park, Canada
My 'natural style' edit on left, and what your camera probably
would have shot on auto on the right.
What is it all about? Maybe you know how to wield your camera just fine,  but learning to wield the edit is just as crucial. Or else you wont be able to translate those megapixels into its most pleasing format for your medium.  You  may have an amazing shot you didn't know, simply because you don't know how to make the most out of it yet. So hold on to them, they will be fun for later when your skills improve.

So where is this place?  Kingfisher Lake in Banff, and as you can see - shot back in 2011 Never shared before!
The exposure is;
ISO 500 - f/6.3 - 1/20s @ 10mm

I could crop it, but this one shows where the ND filter wasn't completely covering the lens, on the right, from top all the way to bottom. haha. OOPS!

hope you enjoyed the post.


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