Processing Bird Photos ~ Fake it till you make it!
I have a photographer friend who rejects all photo processing.
He's a very good photographer and for him it is a matter of principle that a photo should have ZERO processing done to it. Nothing. No cropping, no brightening. Nothing whatsoever.
If you know me at all, you won't be surprised that I completely reject this idea. I process the hell out of my photos if necessary.
The first thing I will do to almost any bird photo is crop like crazy. The photo above was shot at 600 mm and I still cropped it until the bird more or less fills the frame. I want you to be able to see the bird. After cropping, there was a lot of visible noise so I ran it through a noise reduction filter, and then brightened the shot a little. To me, this is a huge improvement over the straight-out-of-camera photo.
Here's another edited shot. Not much was done to this except for removing a huge blob of bird-poop on the rock behind the crows head. You want to look at bird-poop? Not me. Let's see... anything else? I believe this was also brightened and sharpened a bit. Overall this is still pretty "real", not that I care much about that sort of thing!
The Peacock shot above was cropped and I adjusted the highlights and shadows to achieve the "look" I wanted. There's no need to increase colour saturation on a Peacock, but I'll also do that without hesitation if I feel a photo needs it.
Ok, let's get crazy... the bald eagle photo was cropped a whole bunch and then I replaced the boring white sky behind the bird.
And finally, one more with an enormous crop and a sky replacement. To get this close to the eagle I would have needed a 2,000 mm lens. I'm not sure one exists for my camera, but if it does I probably couldn't lift it and it would cost more than my car! The sky replacement might be too much but would you have known if I didn't tell you?
What about you... will you post-process like this or do you consider it "cheating" like my boring friend does? :-)
All photos are by me, @keithboone. Thanks for visiting!
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Cropping is a great tool, I also color boost, and do the shadow protection and sometimes brighten. I need to work with my photo program a lot more, but I do like stitching photos together for panoramic shots, and that means getting the colors the same and the having the ability to control that by simply picking the center frame and then matching all the other frames to its settings is a must, to avoid that banding look, though I still get it on occasion.
I don't think editing is a cheat at all, it is a tool to bring out and present the best image one can, and you do that very well.
Modern cameras can do so much in terms of making panoramas etc. I forgot to ask my friend how he feels about that. For example, my camera can make great macro shots by taking eight images with different focus points and stacking them into a single image, all in-camera. I wonder if he would consider that 'cheating' as well? Strangely, my camera does not make panos, but I've used Photoshop to merge images and it does a good job of blending the individual files.
Thank you, @pixresteemer!
I agree with you. And especially photos of birds need processing because as you said I wanna see the bird, but you can't get too close to most of them to shoot it close enough.
Well, and other stuff like shadows and highlights, and contrast.
But I also think it all depends on your purpose, what do you (or your friend) photograph for.
Exactly right... what is the purpose of the photo? For me it's only to post online. My cropped images could not be printed large because there are not enough pixels remaining. Thank you!
I like these photos after cropping. Birds can be seen well.
Thanks very much, that's the main point for me. My zoom lens doesn't get me close enough to show the birds unless I crop a lot.
Thanks very much, @ackhoo and @qurator! I appreciate your support!
I shoot in RAW and that alone means I have to process my images in a software. Cropping, saturating, desaturating, sharpen, dodge and burn ... I think I use all features that Lightroom offers. Not all with every image, of course, just what I need to beautify the photo, to make it look like or better than what my eyes have seen in the landscape or other motif.
But I try to not overdo it, so that the images still look more natural than edited.
And yes, I have already replaced the sky, but I have always used an image of the sky which I have photographed myself.
So, I have to answer yes, I completely agree with you and I wouldn't call it cheating, because photography is art and even the great Ansel Adams has edited his photos.
I assume your friend shoots JPEG images only. Does he know that his camera has already done some editing, when he downloads the images to his computer?
Have a great day Keith and take care 😊
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Cheers and !BEER
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Thank you, Johann! I was watching a documentary about Ansel Adams last night and that's what prompted this rant. Ansel Adams would spend an entire day in the darkroom working on a single image and he always said his objective was to create an image that captured how a scene felt to him more than how it looked. Over the years some of his most famous images changed when he reprinted them and he would say 'that's how it feels to me now.' I think if Ansel was alive today he would fully embrace post-processing. I believe he was the father of processing!
Yes, my friend shoots jpegs and I've had that argument with him... the fact that his images are already processed by a scientist in a lab at Nikon who never saw his photo! Despite this, he is a good photographer who sells his work in juried art shows... He does not do birds however. Without a big zoom lens, how could you do birds without cropping?
You're welcome Keith 🙂
Right, and I have seen quite a few videos how other famous photographers who shot and still shoot film "cheat" in post processing. This is, why I don't feel bad when I clone something out or make other edits. It's my image and if I have seen it that way when I was there, then I may do anything to make it look that way 😉
I have a 150-600mm Telezoom, but in many of my wildlife photos you wouldn't recognize the animal if I didn't crop, and it's the same with most macros.
Have a nice evening and a wonderful weekend 🙂
Cheers and !BEER
I used to have a 150-600 and it wasn't long enough, but now the lens I have is 75-300 (equiv.) I hope you're having a nice weekend!
I have the Sigma 150-600 Contemporary and I don't think I would want a longer or faster lens, because they are certainly heavier too ;)
Maybe I'll purchase a Teleconverter if occasionally I should have too much money for some reason, but I don't think so, because you lose an f-stop or two.
Have a great Sunday Keith 🙂
Ceers and !BEER
Yes, I understand the light loss. I'm considering a 1.4 teleconverter to go on my 40-150 f/2.8. That would give me 56-210 mm at f/4.0 which would be equivalent to 112-420 mm in FF terms. I think that's about as good as I can do on my micro 4/3 camera when it comes to shooting birds.
Yeah, I'm saving for changing my lenses to 2/2.8 lenses, but man, they are expensive. I had to sell 2 of my lenses to be able to buy a 2.8, but even then I wouldn't get one of the new RF lenses for my EOS R. So these lenses will have to wait until the Hive price goes up or I win the lotto ;) lol
Otherwise I think I can be quite satisfied with my 150-600, although handheld shots are only possible when there's enough light.
Have a wonderful weekend Keith 🙂
Cheers and !BEER
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Oooohhhhhh, now.... I...... knowwww..................... 😮
Lol, seriously, there was once upon a time when I tried to go as "natural" as possible until one day I think I read a professional photographer's article where he pointed out that even adjusting your settings on the camera is a sort of "edit", and also we aim to show the photo as close to what we saw in reality (keeping in mind captured shots don't always show what we saw...)
And enhancing in terms of brightening (or darkening), adjusting the contrast, cropping, etc, if it brings out a photograph and subject better, why not? For me as long as it doesn't make it unbelievable (but Nature sometimes is.... especially sunsets/sunrises.... 😊), unless it's to follow a theme.... it's acceptable!
Unless it's a tongue-in-cheek style or effect that you're trying to show... Then again, that's art! You're allowed some creative license!! 😉
Haha! Yes, now you know because I've been hiding it up until now! :-) I forgot to mention in my post that there are times I go full-on "art mode" with painting filters and so forth, but with those images the objective is to look as unnatural as possible so that there is no confusion as to what is happening. Usually with my birds I'm trying to stay natural and I'll work on a photo for days to make it look "untouched" :-)
Seriously now... on 90% of my shots the only real edit is cropping, and I will crop away up to 3/4 of the original image so that you can actually see the bird. The final image will not have enough pixels to make a large print, but I'm not printing anything. These are just for display on computer for social media posts. Thanks for understanding :-)
Totally understand... unless you want a Picasso birdie, or something! Lol...
Yup, I don't own any macro lenses or telephoto ones - so a good trick is to crop the heck outta the pic (lol) until it's interestingly close enough to capture people's attention! :D Haha, a happy weekend to you!!
Have a great weekend, my friend!
And your bird photos are always stunning! Because you have always been open about the cropping and editing you do, I have experimented with editing my photos, and although I'm not as good at it as you are, my photos have been improved by the edits.
Now I just need to figure out how to replace skies and remove bird poop using the apps available on my phone!
Thanks for sharing this with #featheredfriends and thanks for all the support you give the community! ❤️. !Tip
Thank you, Melinda! When it comes to birds 90% of my edits are just cropping. I really would like to fill the frame with the bird if possible. I don't know what apps are available on the phone but I bet there are some. I'm not really a phone person like all you youngsters! :-) Maybe someone should write a de-poop-ify app for phones? I love Feathered Friends, it's my favourite community on Hive.
I know you love FF (which is why you should have continued with it! 😉) and I really appreciate all the support and comments you make each week on all the posts! ❤️
There are some good phone apps, Pxlr is my favorite, but it either needs a few more functions or I need to get better at using it!
I'm not good at being in charge of anything... do you remember TrippyTuesday on Tsu? I had to give that up because it was "too much pressure" for me! I'm better off as a contributor which allows me to come and go as I wish. That's why I'm happy you took this over!
You are a great participant and I really appreciate all you do for the community! ❤️
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I am a guilty party here, as I don't like editing. I have seen many photos that were so overdone in color and other stuff, that it could never represent nature.
It takes a special touch such as yours, to keep things realistic and I know that I won't have that touch. So, I have never tried it.
Note that I don't condemn it, as to each his own.
Editing can be overdone and I've been guilty of that in the past, but I consider photography an art form and an artist should be free :-) I am happier when I can get my photo exactly the way I want it in the camera, and I understand and work with my camera settings and optics to try to achieve what I want... that's first. Then, I'll do whatever else I like on the computer.
You mentioned once to me that you have an inexpensive camera, and while my camera is fairly costly it does not have a zoom lens that comes close to yours... So that's the first thing for me, I crop like crazy to make the bird big enough to see! I love how close you can get with your camera.
Agreed with you my friend, we are all free and like I said. to each his own.
The zoom was the main reason why I got the SX60 and now that its been discontinued I also have the new SX70 with the same zoom.
Problem with the new one is that it is much smaller and some of the settings have been changed. Canon claims that it can operate on the new 5 Gig IT systems, but we shall see.
In the meantime I continue to use my old SX60, even though the gear on the zoom retractor does not work so well anymore.
Go with your creative soul that knows when an enhancemement will bring something (interesting)more, and when there is no need for it...you are good at it and most importantly, you enjoy doing it 😊
Thank you, Barbara, I appreciate your comments!
I do agree with you as I too want to see the bird and I do cropping and some edits. Still not as good as I wish, but I keep on practicing. And like @johannpiber said in his comment, if you shoot in RAW, you have to process the image afterwards. It is not cheating in my book. It gives us more freedom to create the image as we wish to look.
Right, Neli, thank you very much 🙂
Everybody should do it as he pleases, as long as it's not too bad - but beauty is in the eye of the beholder anyway 😉
Cheers and !BEER