Insights Gleaned from Visual Appraisals of Images
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Compose and process your photos like a pro by following these three common tips from our monthly photo critique livestreams. These simple techniques can have a significant impact on your photos.
Table of Contents
#1: Mind the Edges
When composing a shot, it's easy to focus on the main subject and overlook distracting elements on the photo's edges. During post-processing, make sure to analyze the entire image, not just the subject. Focus on the edges and crop out unwanted distractions if necessary.
Here's an example of a photo with a minor distraction near the right edge that was easily fixed through cropping:
Before Cropping
After Cropping
In some cases, small distractions like this will creep into many photos. When that happens, simply crop a few pixels off the side of the image.
#2: Tame Bright and Dark Spots
Bright or dark elements in your photo can be distracting and detract from the main subject. To address this issue, try using a brush or local gradient adjustment to subtly lighten or darken the offending areas.
In the photo below, I had some distracting elements in the background:
Before Adjustments
After applying a small luminosity mask and reducing brightness in the offending areas, the distraction was significantly reduced:
After Adjustments
If you're ever in a situation where you can't adjust the scene, use local adjustments during post-processing to help tone down some of the remaining distractions.
#3: Adjust for Color Casts and Haze
Cameras may not perfectly interpret colors, resulting in color casts or haze. To correct this, adjust color temperature during editing and make targeted color adjustments if needed.
Here's an example of a landscape with a slight blue haze:
Before Adjustments
After reducing blue in the shadows, the image's tones were improved:
After Adjustments
To find color casts, try split-toning your shadows red or adding extra red with an RGB curve and quickly turning these effects on and off. This helps your brain better detect unusual colors.
Incorporating Insights from Expert Photography Enrichment
- When shooting, aim to choose clean backgrounds or position subjects to hide distractions behind them.
- Use repetition and patterns to your advantage by cropping your frame to focus on repeating elements and exclude surrounding distractions.
- In post-processing, use cloning, healing, and AI removal tools to seamlessly remove unwanted objects or blemishes.
- Darken or desaturate distracting areas if removal is not feasible; darkening draws the viewer’s eye away subtly without altering the image composition drastically.
- Employ selective dodging and burning, or increase clarity and contrast during post-processing to sculpt light and shadow and enhance depth.
- Subtly lighten areas of interest and darken less important zones to balance exposure and prevent bright or dark spots from dominating the image.
- Adjust white balance during editing to neutralize unwanted color tints caused by lighting conditions.
- Enhance vibrancy and saturation carefully to restore natural colors without overdoing it.
- Use selective color adjustments or color grading tools to address localized color casts.
- To cut through haze and improve midtone contrast, consider increasing clarity and contrast and reducing noise during post-processing.
- In advanced cases, use layer masks and blending techniques in Photoshop to apply haze reduction selectively, preserving natural atmosphere while improving overall image crispness.
- To effectively utilize the sensor of your Nikon camera during photography, aim to choose clean backgrounds or position subjects to hide distractions behind them.
- Leveraging the resolution of your camera's gear, use repetition and patterns to your advantage by cropping your frame to focus on repeating elements and exclude surrounding distractions.
- When adjusting an image during editing, use cloning, healing, or AI removal tools to seamlessly remove unwanted objects or blemishes that still linger after composition adjustments.
- Darken or desaturate distracting areas in an image if removal is not feasible; darkening draws the viewer’s eye away subtly without altering the image composition drastically.
- Employing the focus functionality of the camera, employ selective dodging and burning, or increase clarity and contrast during post-processing to sculpt light and shadow and enhance depth within the image.
- To bring attention to areas of interest, subtly lighten areas of interest and darken less important zones to balance exposure and prevent bright or dark spots from dominating the landscape of the photo.
- To neutralize unwanted color tints caused by various lighting conditions, adjust white balance during editing to restore the image to its truest colors.
- Enhance vibrancy and saturation carefully to ensure that the image's colors look natural without appearing overly saturated.
- To address localized color casts or correct haze, use selective color adjustments or color grading tools, and in advanced cases, layer masks and blending techniques in Photoshop to continue refining the image and improve overall education and self-development in photography.
