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Say NO to Post processing!

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Ok ldkronos, thanks for the explaination
ldkronos said:
I think you took it the wrong way. Not being from the US, you may
not know this but we typically use phrases like "dumb mode" to mean
a mode where you don't have enough options to shoot yourself in the
foot...and now that I think about, "shoot yourself in the foot"
might even be a US-specific phrase. It just means that as many
things as possible are done for you automatically so that you don't
have to think about them (and potentially make a mistake).

So there was no insult intended. Dummy is almost a synonym for
amateur or beginner.
Click to expand...
 
bvdboomen said:
Many posts here say "then don't postprocess and use the dumb mode
or shoot with simple p&s"

So there is an assiociation with not wanting to postprocess and
stupidity?

Comeon!

I find this very denigrating.

I know that many people ARE photographers but NOT PC wizards so how
about them? The idea of a camera which do the processing for you is
not a bad one as long as it can be switched of for the bitfreaks
among us.

I myself like photographing very much but not the afterwork. I do a
little PPS if I can make a picture actually better but that's it.
And yes, I use a DSLR to actually photograph.
Click to expand...
I associate bitfreak with a pathetic loser, who has no life and sits infront of a computer all day for fun. I of course don't think you meant it in that way. As the other person said there is a lot of slang talk that doesn't cross international waters. I learned this from our British exchange student when i was 15. I didn't read the post you were talking about so maybe they meant it in a negative way.
--
http://www.pbase.com/paulyoly/root

 
This is a perfect example -- you can get great photos out of the camera, no processing. But when you DO learn to process them, and get good at it, a few simple and very subtle things will turn that picture from "not bad" to "wow". Then you look back at the pre-processed image and it looks terrible. :)

No, you don't have to post process, but as others keep saying, if you want shots that compare to those posted here every day, yes, you will likely have to post process at least sometimes. Anything. Film, digital, Canon, Nikon, Fuji.
PaulyOly said:
No post processing, taken with canon 100mm macro



slight post processing, about 2 minutes start to finish.



it helps if you start out with a fairly sharp image. I would
recommend all primes if you don't want to post process and still
want your pics to look sharp, but it isn't necessary. I find both
these images exceptable, but i didn't sharpen the processed one
very much.

here's another example, taken with the 400 f5.6L

No post processing



post processed, sharpened a bit more than the dragonfly.



At first i was put off by post processing, but now i rather enjoy
it and wish i was better at it. I need a good photoshop book.
--
http://www.pbase.com/paulyoly/root

Click to expand...
--
Robb

 
http://www.photocleaner.com/home.html
gah1 said:
Ok. OK. I have decided that I dont want to spend hours on post
processing. I work in front of a PC all day, Why do I want to spend
my down time in front of one as well?
So, does this mean I shouldnt have an DSLR??
Some people tell me that PPS MUST be done, others say no. I
understand that in film cameras its done by the developers but
what about slide film? That isnt PPS is it? Surely not and that
always looked great.

I will only print say 5% of my shots - the rest I will view on my
PC so do I still need PPS or not?
If so I think that DSLRs sales will be limited in the mass market
unless this is sorted out. I just cannot see that most people are
gonna want to spend ages on this and if they buy a DSLR and then
find they have to there are gonna be a hell of a lot of
disappointed people out there!!

Or is this just a Canon/Nikon issue. Someone has told me that the
Fuji S2 doesnt need PPS at all.

I need to get this clear in my mind BEFORE I shell out £1000!!!

gah1
Click to expand...
--
JWP
 
jra111 said:
When I bought my Dreb I did not know the issue about PP . Now
really the only thing I can really do is Auto contrast , resize,
and sharpen. Anything other than that and I get lost and cant tell
what looks better .

I see guys on here with pictures that blow you away ,I wish I knew
Phoposhop better Like paulyoly said . I photoshop my pictures about
5% or less because when I try I suck badly.

--
Warning !
All my photos will have 1 or more of the following,
Softness,OOF,Under Exposure,Over Exposure,
and a poor attempt at Photoshopping.
Click to expand...
there is only so much you can do with post processing. I don't think the people on here with pictures that blow you and me away are all that good at post processing, they are just good photographers.

Here's the dragonfly again

no post



quick post processing, mostly sharpening



now this one is a re-edit of the above photo, i went back and did some heavy sharpening, which to me looks oversharpened



I had to go in at 300% with a small blur circle and blur out the noise that was brought out by the heavy sharpening, i also had some sharpening halos that i blurred out, this takes much more time, but can make it appear as though there is more depth of field, atleast on my monitor. Most people would probably prefer the third dragonfly, some might not even see a difference, it depends a lot of the quality of your monitor.

here's a parrot with no post processing, i think it looks good as is, but when resized it makes it look a little soft, looks much sharper at 100%



here it is with a little sharpening.



I think this macaw would look good printed as is, but for the web some sharpening after resize makes it much better.

So to the original poster are these unprocessed pictures exceptable? Remember these were not sharpened in the camera which you can change and get a sharper pic straight out of the camera.
--
http://www.pbase.com/paulyoly/root

 
Forgive me if this has already been mentioned and I hav'nt spotted it.

Another reason for me to post process is although I am a graphic designer, who thoroughly enjoys pping an image to get it just-so, sometimes you see a photograph within the photograph that you didnt see at the time the shutter opened.

Sometimes the photograph you took origionaly may be a bit flat and not as interesting as if you were to zoom on an area and re-crop to make the image more exiting.

Unfortunatly I dont really have a good example of this to hand, but hopefully I will have explained what I mean clear enough.

Oh, hold on, think Ive found one:



This image was initialy in the bottom right of the frame, but once it had been recomposed to fill more of the frame I feel it is more of a photograph to be proud of than it would have been.
 
If you buy a DSLR, you are buying a more complex camera. One that has a learning curve, compared to fixed lens camera. The sole reason for buying a DSLR, is to step up to more serious photography, and the options a DSLR affords. Now, if your wanting to be more serious about photography, then post processing is part of it. Whether your working in a darkroom with film, or a digital darkroom with files, it's a part of advanced photography. It would not make sense to buy an advanced DSLR camera, just to settle for what ever pops out of it. That's what simply point and shoot cameras are for. They are for those, that want decent pictures, without the fuss. DLSRs and more advanced fix lens cameras, are for those that want great, not just good. Since a camera, any camera, is limited in it's ability to expose perfectly many times, post processing gives you the tools to turn good, into great. A DSLR is not about taking perfect out-of-camera pictures everytime, that's impossible for any camera. A DSLR is about giving you more tools to work with. More lenses to better fit the job, a bigger sensor to give you smoother, noise free shots, and through the lens viewfinder and manual focus and zoom, so you can be more accurate. The parameters in the Rebel can be set to give you good out of camera shots, but they are not exagerated as in a typical point and shoot camera. This keeps the photo "clean" so further processing is possible.

One mistake new DSLR owners make, is they think post processing means hours of work. It doesn't. Most photos can be tweaked by post processing in a matter of seconds. Even the auto-fix or auto-level options in most editors can make a big difference in about 5 to 10 seconds tops. You will however, eventually find out that you can turn great photos into masterpieces through advanced post processing. It doesn't take long to learn these either. When I first started into most advanced processing technics, a week later, I was doing things I thought I could never do.

So my advice is this, if you want to advance your photography skills and produce great photos, get a DSLR, and learn simple post processing technics, which can be mastered in one evening.

--

Once in a while, please check back several pages in the forum, for posts that may have been overlooked. Thanks!
 
Hi, PaulyOly

The word bitfreak is not ment as it sounds. If it is, sorry for that. I certainly did not mean computernerd if that association came in mind.
The posts sounded a little negative to me indeed.
 
I think there's a lot of people like myself that do enjoy post-processing. I work 8 hours a day scanning and color correcting images for a large magazine publisher and what do I do when I get home? I kick back for a couple of hours with the wife then go to my computer and post-process (I only shoot RAW) pictures I had taken in the prior days or weeks. I love it. Imaging is my job and hobby.
 
bvdboomen said:
Many posts here say "then don't postprocess and use the dumb mode
or shoot with simple p&s"

So there is an assiociation with not wanting to postprocess and
stupidity?

Comeon!

I find this very denigrating.
Click to expand...
Yes, I think some of the posts you are referring too were being a bit insulting, thus their use of words like "dummy" modes, etc. When clearly the camera's mode has little to do with PP.
bvdboomen said:
I know that many people ARE photographers but NOT PC wizards so how
about them? The idea of a camera which do the processing for you is
not a bad one as long as it can be switched of for the bitfreaks
among us.

I myself like photographing very much but not the afterwork. I do a
little PPS if I can make a picture actually better but that's it.
And yes, I use a DSLR to actually photograph.
Click to expand...
--
Daniel
http://www.pbase.com/dvogel11
300D tips http://www.bahneman.com/liem/photos/tricks/digital-rebel-tricks.html
300D FAQ at http://www.marius.org/fom-serve/cache/3.html
 
gah1 said:
Its very interesting. I have posted this thread about No post
processing on both the Canon 300D and the Nikon D70 sites.
Invariably canon users all seem to think PPS is virtually
compulsory whilst D70 users are a bit more - only if you want to.

Etc...
Click to expand...
--

gah1 -

It took me a year to resolve this issue & create a process that I can live with (trying different tools & print shops). I still do some PPS, but I try to minimize it depending on target use. Here is my current approach to minimizing my time in front of a monitor:
  • Take the best photos possible. Don't 'plan' to fix exposure or other settings later; the better the 'negative', the less PPS. The same rules in film photography apply; composition, exposure.
  • Use JPG for snapshots or casual images. Even with minimum PPS, I get better results from JPGs & my 300D than I got from my store-developed & printed 35mm shots.
  • Use RAW for special shots; Special meaning images that you will be willing to spend a bit of PPS to create a 'work of art' photo. Weddings, special events, work for hire, stunning travel/vacation shots.
  • Be merciless in throwing away photos that are not worth printing or looking at. If you have five pictures of Aunt Marge & Uncle George, keep just the 1 or 2 shots that you would be most proud to show. Fewer images means less storage, less time dealing with files, & less temptation later to work on marginal files. Think of every session as a photo album; Keep what works, loose what doesn't work.
  • Use batch file processing as much as possible. If creating images for web viewing, I batch process (Raw or JPG) my originals through BreezeBrowser. I can go do something else while they are processing. Ditto for RAW: batch process them in C1/BreezeBrowser/PS/tool of choice.
  • Use Actions (in tools that support it) to automate common image tweaking tasks, especially for snapshots. For example, I have an action that applies automatic levels, increases local contrast, & applies a low to moderate amount of unsharpen mask. This perks up 90% of my snapshots.
  • Print your pictures at a store. I take my shots to Costco, where 4x6 are 0.19 cents, printed on 'real' photo paper. They have larger papers also. You can just take your CF/SD/etc card with JPG files to the store, load them, & pick up the photos in an hour. Note that for best image quality, you need to convert the final image file to the correct color profile (free profile files & information on how to use them is at http://www.drycreekphoto.com ). I created an action that automatically converts a batch of files to the correct profile.
  • Share photos with others as reasonably soon after the event as possible. Getting photos/web images to friends/family as soon as possible extends the event, lets people relive the event while memories are still fresh.
I am not against extended PPS when working on a picture that I plan to hang in the house, or just want to get the best out of. But for casual shots, results are more important than ultimate quality.

So, to summarize what I feel are the key concepts to my "less Monitor time, more Me time" approach:
  • Take a little more time to take good photos
  • Keep only the best pictures
  • Automate basic functions (RAW to JPG, JPG to Print, JPG to Web, basic picture tweaks)
  • Use stores to print photos
  • Share photos quickly
RGJ
 
Pauly, did you look at my response on the other forum? You may appreciate it. Nice pictures.
PaulyOly said:
jra111 said:
When I bought my Dreb I did not know the issue about PP . Now
really the only thing I can really do is Auto contrast , resize,
and sharpen. Anything other than that and I get lost and cant tell
what looks better .

I see guys on here with pictures that blow you away ,I wish I knew
Phoposhop better Like paulyoly said . I photoshop my pictures about
5% or less because when I try I suck badly.

--
Warning !
All my photos will have 1 or more of the following,
Softness,OOF,Under Exposure,Over Exposure,
and a poor attempt at Photoshopping.
Click to expand...
there is only so much you can do with post processing. I don't
think the people on here with pictures that blow you and me away
are all that good at post processing, they are just good
photographers.

Here's the dragonfly again

no post



quick post processing, mostly sharpening



now this one is a re-edit of the above photo, i went back and did
some heavy sharpening, which to me looks oversharpened



I had to go in at 300% with a small blur circle and blur out the
noise that was brought out by the heavy sharpening, i also had some
sharpening halos that i blurred out, this takes much more time, but
can make it appear as though there is more depth of field, atleast
on my monitor. Most people would probably prefer the third
dragonfly, some might not even see a difference, it depends a lot
of the quality of your monitor.

here's a parrot with no post processing, i think it looks good as
is, but when resized it makes it look a little soft, looks much
sharper at 100%



here it is with a little sharpening.



I think this macaw would look good printed as is, but for the web
some sharpening after resize makes it much better.

So to the original poster are these unprocessed pictures
exceptable? Remember these were not sharpened in the camera which
you can change and get a sharper pic straight out of the camera.
--
http://www.pbase.com/paulyoly/root

Click to expand...
 
gah1 said:
Some people tell me that PPS MUST be done, others say no. I
understand that in film cameras its done by the developers but
what about slide film? That isnt PPS is it? Surely not and that
always looked great.
Click to expand...
Either it's a chrome (slide) or negative, unless you don't need prints there is a processing involved. If you knew how many lines of E6 in this world are actually properly maintained you'd probably not think that slides look as great as you do unless you'r not peeky. Do the test of shooting two fresh identical rolls of E6 the same way. Shoot a few frames on white and have the rolls processed at two different locations. When you get it back compare the identical frames from each film on a light table. If they don't look identical in contrast and colors, you may want to think again at how unstable those lines are. Also, a good scan will take more time than a post processing and conversion. Talk about batching with a scanner... By the time your film is ready for a preview you can do a lot of RAW processing.

There are a lot of people who don't want a digital camera because of the processing they don't want to deal with. I respect that.

Digital gives you control over your images like never before. I think if you don't want to deal with the complexity of the unique control you can get with digital you should stay with film. You can get away with shooting jpg but truly you will not make the best use of your investment.
 
gah1 said:
Maybe the answer is that if you want a good all round camera with a
good lens of up to 200mm or more and dont want to spend your life
in front of a PC tweaking them for ever that you have to wait a few
years for technology to catch up? I dont think so. I think that
when sales suffer at beacause of this issue the manufacturers will
do something about it.
Click to expand...
But sales are NOT suffering, they sell every 300D, 10D & D70 they can make.
gah1 said:
My friend with the Fuji S2 is adamant that PPS is NOT required.
thanks for all the replies
gah1
Click to expand...
Your freind must have lower standards than the rest of us.

--
Brian Schneider
 
it depend on your ability to set the camera properly, decide of correct whit balance or correct in-camera settings. I think it's quite easy to set the in-camera settings to your taste so you don't have to do post-processing. If the image is correctly exposed, it will be very easy to get off without processing.

If you shoot raw, you always have no choice but it is still possible.
gah1 said:
Ok. OK. I have decided that I dont want to spend hours on post
processing. I work in front of a PC all day, Why do I want to spend
my down time in front of one as well?
So, does this mean I shouldnt have an DSLR??
Some people tell me that PPS MUST be done, others say no. I
understand that in film cameras its done by the developers but
what about slide film? That isnt PPS is it? Surely not and that
always looked great.

I will only print say 5% of my shots - the rest I will view on my
PC so do I still need PPS or not?
If so I think that DSLRs sales will be limited in the mass market
unless this is sorted out. I just cannot see that most people are
gonna want to spend ages on this and if they buy a DSLR and then
find they have to there are gonna be a hell of a lot of
disappointed people out there!!

Or is this just a Canon/Nikon issue. Someone has told me that the
Fuji S2 doesnt need PPS at all.

I need to get this clear in my mind BEFORE I shell out £1000!!!

gah1
Click to expand...
--
Minë Corma hostië të ilyë ar mordossë nutië të
Mornórëo Nóressë yassë i Fuini caitar.
Un thoron arart’a s’un hith mal’kemen ioke.
Saurulmaiel
 
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