Post processing for idiots

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Dorkroom > Post processing for idiots

JamesieAB: Nov 5, 2005

I just culled 50gb of my lovely pictures down to less than 1gb of not so lovely pictures. I did this in gallery on an android tablet by moving the few "keepers" I could find to the secure folder and then deleting the folders I had gone through. Once I had deleted them all I exported the files from the secure folder to a new folder.

Now that I have done this I need to change my habits so that I deal with all my pictures at the end of each day and perform proper post processing.

How do you lot handle this?
What tools do you use?
Where do you stand on "getting it right in the camera" vs Post?
Raw vs Jpeg?

# ? Feb 1, 2024 23:13

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# ? Apr 30, 2024 11:19

Megabound: Oct 20, 2012

Depending on how much you want to spend, Adobe Lightroom is what I use for my cataloguing and editing. If you don't want to shell out for that Darktable is a free Lightroom like program that will do the same for you. Yes you should edit, getting something right in camera is the first step and sometimes that's enough but there's no shame in editing and tweaking an image to be the image you want. Shoot raw to get the most information out of the image for editing purposes but if you like the jpegs out of your camera just fine you can just use those too.

# ? Feb 2, 2024 05:45

JamesieAB: Nov 5, 2005

The sheer volume of pictures made lightroom unusable for me, now having deleted a huge amount of stuff I've given it another try and it does seem to be my best bet. I am using the express version and no darktable for me (on android for now).

I had swung between raw and jpeg, so now is a good time to choose one, presumably raw would be the best choice as I can do all the jpeg style manipulation in post anyway.

# ? Feb 2, 2024 13:00

Megabound: Oct 20, 2012

Yeah exactly, if you're enjoying your work and want to preserve the best possible copy of your image then RAW is the way to go. If you're happy with the jpeg output and you don't edit from that at all then you can save space and go jpegs. Raws you will need to edit tho as they don't have any of the in camera adjustments made applied to them (unless that has changed as I only shoot film). Maybe a digital shooter could chime in.

# ? Feb 2, 2024 14:11

Slotducks: Oct 16, 2008; Nobody puts Phil in a corner.

Software:
I use Lightroom. Learn how to edit in Lightroom. Create and use presets - don't be afraid to take one photo from the session, edit to your liking and create a preset from that and apply it to your whole batch.
Cull in Library mode, not develop mode (this is a surprisingly common mistake)

JPEG or Raw:
Others have mentioned, but if you're looking for low effort post-clicking the shutter button, get a fuji and shoot in film simulations. For my friends group, I'll shoot with 3 fuji film sims on and in jpeg - they don't care about my photos so who gives a poo poo. My concert & wildlife stuff is all shot in raw.

Culling:
Here's my post on culling tips that has been referenced a few times on reddit so I figure it's decent advice:

quote:

I cull three times - the first culling session is only to separate in focus / out of focus and obvious trash shots

The second culling is a rating system - 1* for keeps, 3* for really like, 5* for like "I want to edit this now" - The ratio kept here is nice - for every 5* rated photo, I have maybe 100 1s, and 10ish 3s

Third culling is going through those 1s and 3s and double checked in case there's any 5*s I missed.

I don't delete any 1s unless there's a 3 or 5* in that sequence (like I'm shooting birds at 10 fps - lots of duplicative shots of a bird being completely still - be decisive and delete near duplicates)

Go through little chunks at a time, like a day at a time - let it breathe. Take your time. It's a long process but it should help quell any worries of destroying a keeper.

Another tip I have: If you're shooting specific spots/landmarks ideas - Go backwards through your cull. Often times your first few shots are safety shots - you naturally react and change composition while you work the scene, so it makes sense to maybe grab the 5* at the end of the series first - it'll be easier to delete those first few shots as you were first working the scene knowing you've already found your 5* rated photo that you like a lot.

Also Culling with a Tourbox or even a xbox Controller plugged into your computer also helps - it's a bit more egonomic and helps break up the hand hovering over your numpad or top row of keys.

# ? Feb 2, 2024 16:30

xzzy: Mar 5, 2009

Lightroom all the way. It's slow and overpriced and Adobe is evil but the tool works and I've been using it too long to consider switching away.

Everyone's gonna have their own culling system but anything I sorta like gets 1 star. Anything I like more from the 1 star batch gets 2 stars and will be processed. Anything that gets processed and I like gets 3 stars and the really good ones get 4 stars for export and uploading. 5 is reserved for the far off day I get a world class photo.

As for getting it right in camera, it's great when it happens but it's totally reasonable to dodge and burn some areas in post to nudge things how you envisioned them. It's a creative hobby, so be creative. Never push a slider past 25, wiggle them until the look makes you happy. 90% of the time all you have to do is change the contrast and lights/shadows to massage away the flat RAW file look.

Beyond that, try editing something and post for feedback. It's much easier to give tips when there's specific questions.

# ? Feb 3, 2024 03:13

Slotducks: Oct 16, 2008; Nobody puts Phil in a corner.

Only thing I would challenge there is the slider 25 rule - I routinely have to knock my highlights down -60 or sometimes -80 at some points.

~ ~ Just Nikon Things ~ ~

# ? Feb 3, 2024 17:11

Blackhawk: Nov 15, 2004

I guess something similar to the 'slider rule' to consider is that if you find yourself spending a ton of time and effort editing a shot and trying to get it to look reasonable that's probably a sign that it's not good and you're trying to polish a turd. The caveat to this is if you shoot colour film and develop it badly you're probably going to have to spend a lot of time working on weird colour casts out of necessity (speaking from experience).

I shoot film mostly which 100% requires editing if you want a half-way decent result, but for my digital cam I got a Fuji x100f and shoot with a film simulation in jpeg and find that because the jpeg is already really close to what I want I never bother with the RAWs (although I still save raws as well just in case, I have plenty of storage on my NAS).

# ? Feb 3, 2024 20:54

Bottom Liner: Feb 15, 2006; a specific vein of lasagna

Slotducks posted:

Only thing I would challenge there is the slider 25 rule - I routinely have to knock my highlights down -60 or sometimes -80 at some points.

~ ~ Just Nikon Things ~ ~

I am routinely dropping contrast by about 50-60 as well. That's before touching curves or anything else that would boost it.

for a tip: White balancing in LR is a lot easier to eyeball if you pay attention to the RGB channels in the histogram and try to align them with the temp and tint sliders. If you have separate peaks in the shadows and highlights, you can use the Color Grading shadows/highlights wheels to dial that in.

It will generally get you to a good starting point for neutral colors, then you can edit to taste from there.

Bottom Liner fucked around with this message at 00:31 on Feb 5, 2024

# ? Feb 5, 2024 00:29

Megabound: Oct 20, 2012

That's a good tip, thanks.

# ? Feb 5, 2024 00:35

JamesieAB: Nov 5, 2005

Any suggestions on how to improve these in lightroom?

Perhaps blurring the background? How would you go about removing the side-on flower from the top of the head of the second swan from the right? Not sure how to do this.

I like this the way it is, but can't help feeling I'm missing something.

A bit blown out on the right, can I fix this in a jpeg? Does it need fixing?

# ? Feb 5, 2024 19:42

xzzy: Mar 5, 2009

Without opining on the should-you-take stuff-out-of-images debate, the new AI generate feature in Photoshop is magical for removing objects from a photo. Content aware fill might be able to remove that flower too but it'll be more manual. Adding bokeh would probably be a photoshop task too but it will never look quite right. If you want blur you really ought to do it in camera.

As for blown hilights, once they're gone they're gone. If dragging down the highlights in that area doesn't bring in some detail you're never going to fix it. With a jpeg it's very unlikely there's any data there to recover. If you don't like how it looks mark it as a mistake and move on.

# ? Feb 5, 2024 19:47

Viginti Septem: Jan 9, 2021; Oculus Noctuae

Might I suggest a high-key black and white and a slight crop.

# ? Feb 6, 2024 09:05

JamesieAB: Nov 5, 2005

Thanks for the suggestion and the secreenshots of the controls! That helps enormously with the learning process.

I have also decided to abandon the swans, I should have taken a better picture.

# ? Feb 6, 2024 15:45

Viginti Septem: Jan 9, 2021; Oculus Noctuae

JamesieAB posted:

I have also decided to abandon the swans, I should have taken a better picture.

Nothing wrong with re-taking it, or just keeping that lesson in mind for future shots.

# ? Feb 6, 2024 16:26

Viginti Septem: Jan 9, 2021; Oculus Noctuae

JamesieAB posted:

Thanks for the suggestion and the secreenshots of the controls! That helps enormously with the learning process.

It's sort of seems counter-intuitive to drop the highlights and whites in the basic panel while boosting them in the curves, but I enjoy trying to find the most balanced histogram from just the basic panel sliders prior to going into the curves. So, finding the proper white point and black point (or closest to that � the whites in this example were overexposed and fully white � but get it dropped just above where it starts to turn grey) and all the zones in between with the sliders first. Then move onto the curves to paint in the light how I want it. I start at the left-hand side (blacks' side) and place a point handle where I want the darkest blacks to be. That way my blacks don't go below that point. Then slowly work to the right by placing new points as I get closer to the whites. Each new point to the right dials in the next zone of grey that I want to paint in. Move that next handle to where the next zone is exposed properly and repeat all the way to the far right (whites).

# ? Feb 6, 2024 16:41

xzzy: Mar 5, 2009

Those sliders are annoying in that the labels make you think they're doing the same thing, but they're not. I've never really found a good technical explanation of the difference but the shadows/highlights sliders at the top feel like a more hamfisted global adjustment while the curves versions are much more targeted at specific bands of the histogram.

Maybe Adobe realizes this now, because LR Mobile has lost the sliders for setting up the curves.

# ? Feb 6, 2024 17:02

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# ? Apr 30, 2024 11:19

Viginti Septem: Jan 9, 2021; Oculus Noctuae

Haven't personally seen that issue with lightroom regarding the histogram. You can click in the histogram in the Blacks / Shadows / Exposure / Highlights / Whites areas and drag left or right to adjust and it will also adjust the sliders. They're the same thing.

# ? Feb 6, 2024 17:51

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Dorkroom > Post processing for idiots