I was explaining to a friend of mine the other day that I didn't know of any professional photographer who would sell their prints and images straight out of the camera. Most people don't know this, but there's quite a bit of post processing needed after a photo shoot. I've had very few images come straight out of my camera where I thought, "Hm, there's not much I need to do to this one." Some photographers spend hours and hours manipulating photographs to make skin tones "perfectly smooth." My philosophy, however, has always been "less is more." For instance, I just went to a local photographer's Web site, and to be sure his work is superb, I could tell he did a lot of post processing. The skin of one bride was so smooth, it didn't look natural.

When I was a pre-teen, my mother once told me, "The secret to wearing makeup is to make it look like you're NOT wearing any." This idea really perplexed me, but like makeup, the whole point of post processing is not to totally make over the image, but to enhance the natural characteristics that are already there.

To illustrate my point, I have two images: One is the original SOOC (straight out of the camera) and the other is the finished product. (click to enlarge)


Granted, the original image is pretty darn good (not to sound conceited or anything, but the colors are decent, there isn't anything distracting in the background -- minus a few annoying gnats! -- overall a good SOOC image).


However, this one has been brightened a bit, the colors are bolder and more saturated and their faces have been lightened to reduce the harshness of the shadows. I also went in and individually took out the gnats that were flying through the air, but you'd probably have to enlarge photos to even see them anyway.

So when you see my photos on my Web site, know that they are all hand color corrected and enhanced by me, so if it takes a few days to see your pictures, that's why :)

I might do a few more of these every now and then. It was fun and I think it makes people appreciate all that photographers do for their clients. Enjoy!