My Mindset Behind Editing

Editing can be a bit of a controversial topic when it comes to landscape photography. I mean, changing the light and color of an already stunning natural sight does sound a bit sketchy. But if you have the right mindset about it, you’ll see why editing is essential to a meaningful landscape photo.

RAW Files

In understanding why editing is necessary, it’s important to first understand what exactly a RAW file is. The common misconception is that a RAW image is the “real” image. This is not true at all. It is simply a mass storage of luminosity and color data that a program like Lightroom is able to produce an image from. When you take a photo on your phone, you deal with .jpg files. Your phone originally captures a raw image but automatically converts it to a viewable file type(jpg). When importing your RAW files into Lightroom, you’ll have the option to select a different color profile(a different interpretation).

I usually stick with Adobe Color but to each their own.

So a RAW image is built for the sole purpose of being edited! It stores tons of data and lets the photographer decide what they want to do with the data. If you are exporting the “real” image, you are really just letting Adobe Color, or Adobe Standard make creative decisions for you.

Change Your Mindset

Thinking about editing as changing reality just leads to frustration and a disliking for landscape photography. You’ll find yourself frustrated with images because you didn’t get the perfect light, or the scene was far less exciting than you would have hoped for.

Well, after 2 years of photography, I finally came to the realization that editing is not just about making the image look “prettier” or more colorful. It is a way for the photographer to recreate that real-life experience for their viewers. You need to start asking yourself some essential questions before even opening your laptop.

How did this place make me feel?

What stood out to me here?

What stands out to me in this image?

Was it cold here? Windy? Gloomy?

What do I want to say about this specific place?

These are all great questions to be thinking about while editing. They are also questions to ask yourself while shooting.

By editing not only for visual appeal but for the purpose of recreating an experience, you’ll find a comfortable set of guidelines for your creativity. Without knowing what you want to say, editing will become a jambalaya of tough decision-making. Trying to recreate that feeling of cold or the peacefulness that you felt at the location allows the edit to come to you. Let’s take a look at some examples of edits I’ve done.

Both images are edited, but the edits on the right are where my creative decisions were made.

While I was in Muir woods, the shady areas were about 10 degrees cooler and offered nice cover from the beaming sunlight. Another notable feature was the light that leaked down through the tree cover. In order to represent that in this photo, I created a warm orange glow up in the trees and darkened the shady areas to maintain those cooler tones. In the second photo, I help the viewer feel those physical traits through visuals only.

This was an extremely late second burst of color after sunset. About 40 minutes after the sun had gone down, the sky turned just the slightest touch of pink. What was so cool though was this stark contrast between what seemed like a storm coming in and these warm colors fighting to stay alive. I was able to enhance this storm by darkening the blues but also adding a bright light source coming from the middle. This felt like sunlight breaking through the clouds and accounted for the blue glow on the rocks.

Conclusion

As you can probably tell from this article, editing has the ability to completely transform a photo. There are honest and dishonest ways of using this tool depending on who you talk to but at the end of the day, it’s all just opinion. Personally, I will probably never replace the sky in a photo. That’s just not how I roll. It feels too dishonest. But see, that’s just my opinion. Plenty of photographers would disagree with me for equally valid reasons and some would even say that enhancing a light source is just as dishonest. No matter your opinion though, it is still important to understand the mindset behind creating a meaningful landscape through editing. It is all about recreating a feeling through visual elements. So remember to ask yourself, what do I want to say about this place?

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