Every Picture Is a Compromise
Lessons from the Also-rans
Most photography websites show the photographer's very best work. Wonderful. But that's not the full story of a creative life. If we want to learn, we'd better pay attention to the images that aren't "greatest hits" and see what lessons they have to offer. Every picture is a compromise — the sum of its parts, optical, technical, visual, emotional, and even cosmic – well, maybe not cosmic, but sometimes spiritual. Success on all fronts is rare. It's ok to learn from those that are not our best.
This is a series about my also-rans, some of which I've been able to improve at bit (i.e., "best effort"), none of which I would consider my best. With each there are lessons worth sharing, so I will.
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Original digital capture
What I saw that I liked:Portland Japanese Garden. Lovely bent tree trunck and stone. What I don't like in the picture:Extreme contrast with hardly any detail in the trunk or rock. What I learned:I knew I was fighting long odds with this one, but I photographed it anyway as a sort of test for dynamic range and how much detail I could pull out of those shadows. Compare the RAW exposure above to the result at left. The image at left is from a Lightroom virtual copy of the above. All the processing was done in Lightroom — without round-tripping to Photoshop. I continue to be amazed what we can do with today's amazing cameras. And, BTW, this was with my m4/3 Panasonic G9 that supposed has less dynamic range that a full-frame camera. If you have one, your results should be even more dramatic than mine! |
