how often do you do Post Prodcution on photos

[slugger]

A thread in portrait critiques got me thinking. When I do a shoot, I always shoot in RAW. I try to get all my settings right, but just in case I have to quick take a picture without time to adjust my settings - I like to lean on the RAW file for pp. Also - I'm still struggling with the correct white balance - so most of the time I have to change the WB on the RAW file, and MAYBE increase the lighting a bit, but that's pretty much it.

As far as photoshop - I usually use it just to brighten the eyes, maybe touch up the skin a tad if there are imperfections, and to convert to B&W.

What do you all do? If you have a RAW file - how much do you rely on it for adjusting the settings on your picture in pp?
How much post production are you doing in (photoshop...etc)?

[RexK_Cozumel]

I do a lot of post work on my photos. Contrast, sharpening, color saturation etc. This is all basic post work if you are going to shoot in raw format since it is not done in camera. As for more in depth retouching it all depends on the photo. It can be as little as some selective sharpening to bring out some details in areas that I want or it can be as in depth as pixel level dodge and burn to smooth skin, facial contouring, painting in highlights, cloning out stray hairs, etc.

[archersdad]

Nearly every picture I have taken had some level of post production. Think of it as a digital darkroom. I usually shoot in full manual and get my settings pretty close to how I want them in-camera but there is always something that can be improved.

[DRs]

hi want to ask something since you are all talking here about PP.

how do you PP raw file? i cant open it in my Photoshop CS3, it automatically converts to TIF file. so everytime im doing a PP im using the TIF file already. How you guys do it? please need help.

Thanks to all.

have a nice day and happy shooting!

[Brett Valentine]

I have my camera set to lower contrast lowered sharpness, so I'm editing everything PP. More flexibility in PSE7/PSPX2 and plugins.

[Ray Dockrey]

I post process everything. To me that is half the fun plus that is where I can make the pictures come alive. I have people tell me all the time that they just can't get their pictures to look nearly as good as mine. That comes from the post processing.

[wulf]

Since I'm pretty consistent about tagging on Flickr, I can use that to draw up the figure of 530 post-processed photos out of 4296 total (or about 12%).

Of course, while that may be quite precise, it isn't very meaningful. The proportion of publically available photos (as opposed to ones hidden behind various privacy levels and intended to share people and places with friends and family) would, I imagine, be closer to 25% or above of processed photos. If I look at my collection of favourite photos from 2009, only 2 out of 7 are unprocessed.

I also go through different seasons. Before I got my DSLR, I used to post process almost everything I published or even kept, to get round failings in the camera; for the first year or so of owning my D40, I rarely processed anything because I was trying to learn how to get the most out of the camera by itself.

Wulf

[slugger]

thank-you for the feedback.

[Joey the girl]

Originally Posted by wulf

I also go through different seasons. Before I got my DSLR, I used to post process almost everything I published or even kept, to get round failings in the camera; for the first year or so of owning my D40, I rarely processed anything because I was trying to learn how to get the most out of the camera by itself.
Wulf

I agree with that. When I had my point and shoot, I had to do a lot of PP to try to get the pics to look decent. Now that I have a DSLR, my post processing has become considerably less, although I still do at least a couple things to nearly every pic.