Editing - Faking Reality

I like to do as much as I can in camera but I'm also not afraid to use editing to enhance or improve an image after the fact. Here are a couple of ways that I approach editing in my work.

Correction

Sometimes images just need a quick boost. The example below is from the 2018 Miranda RSL Youth Club Display Day. I was shooting video and stills on the same camera with the same lens and so I wasn't always able to nail the perfect settings. On top of that, I needed a fast shutter speed to capture crisp action shots which left me with less light that I would have liked.

After the event, I quickly threw the images into photoshop and adjusted the exposure and brightness levels, lifting the whites and bringing back the vibrant blues and yellows. This simple colour correction vastly improves the appearance and quality of the image.

Enhancement

Sometimes you want to create a certain atmosphere. Below is an image of a small mushroom that sprouted in my back yard. When I first took the picture, I didn't have any aesthetic vision in mind, I just thought it looked cool and wanted to get a picture before it was stepped on.

Looking back on the image while data wrangling a couple of months later I decided I wanted to revive the image with an enchanted forest theme. To do this I popped the image into photoshop and played around with different levels and layers to downplay the greens whilst highlighting the natural, vibrant colour of the mushroom. By approaching editing in this way, I am working with the qualities of the original image to create something that is more aesthetically pleasing than the original without dismissing the reality of the image.

Transformation

Sometimes it's about entirely changing the palate image. While on a ski trip in 2018, I took some sunrise pictures of a ski run near our lodge. Enjoying the morning air, I chose to take the long way back, wandering through the village square where I found this spot. By this time, the sun was already above the horizon and the delicate sunrise hues long gone.

Once I returned from my trip I had a plan to transform the image and thew the photo into photoshop. I fiddled with the levels and used the palate of the genuine sunrise images from earlier that morning to re-cast the image. By completely altering the colour palate of the image, I was able to transform a relatively mundane snap into a stunning image.

I think there is a time and a place for editing, and personally I try to use it sparingly. That being said, these three images, each with varying degrees of trickery, showcase some of the ways in which I do use editing in my work.