How do you define a "keeper"?

gatorguy · 08-12-2016, 12:15 PM

Originally posted by biz-engineer

I review shots with 4x quick zoom, if it looks ok, it can be printed, if not ok at 4x preview, the shot is not a keeper.

I've got mine at 8x in the preview quick settings. I'm a stickler for focus.

jcdoss · 08-12-2016, 12:37 PM

Originally posted by jatrax

The take from the day or the shoot goes into Lightroom:
- the initial pass marks everything I do not want with a black flag. this is usually out of focus, poor exposure, test shots, shots of my feet or the ceiling....
- the second pass I select the best shot from each angle or series and mark the rest with a black flag, I often leave 2 or 3 from a series if I'm concerned about the quality
- on the third pass I start looking at images in the develop module and selecting those that might be worth further processing. They either get added to a collection such as stock, fine art, etc for later work or they get a black flag

I do almost the exact same thing, except I delete the black flags immediately, which ends up being about 75-80% of the photos I take, and sometimes I think I'm keeping too many. And I'll do delete photos in-camera if I know it's a real stinker.

I suppose my definition of a "keeper" is one that is the best blend of artistic and technical quality that I was going for at the time I took the shot. Sometimes that means straight lines, level camera, and perfect exposure, and other times that means subject is at least partially in the frame. But I think to each person, that definition is different.

And my keepers are according to my standards, and not someone else's or what I think someone else's standards might be. I don't have the gene that makes me think anything I do is saleable, but if I did like some folks here, then that might come into play more often.

Wheatfield · 08-14-2016, 02:19 PM - **2 Likes**

Originally posted by pres589

How do you folks think of "keepers"; are they photos you would print? Or just photos you wouldn't delete? Obviously this is more a digital question and shouldn't be taken in regard to processing. Either with or without some PP work, what's your definition of a keeper?

If my wife likes it, it's a keeper.

Architecture · 08-15-2016, 05:24 PM

My system's pretty simple. I don't delete anything. I import everything and quickly rush through them in Lightroom to see what I have. Ones I want to come back to, I flag. Once I have a pile of flagged photos, I start editing them in no particular order. I occasionally go back over the entire import to see if there are photos I missed flagging the first time. Sometimes flagged photos get demoted back into the pile, so it works both ways.

kadajawi · 08-18-2016, 06:35 AM

Something just happened to me (it sometimes does)... I spent an afternoon/evening in Barcelona, and took 232 photos. Maybe there were a few very blurry ones that I deleted. I already went through the photos once, picked the ones I wanted to edit, edited them... Now I went through them again, and there were another 2 or 3 that I really like now, but seem to have missed the first time. Thankfully I didn't delete the "non-keepers", because otherwise they would have been gone.

What photos we like depend on many factors... mood, taste, when you look at them... I'm sure if you look at photos you liked 5 years ago, you'll find ones where you wonder why, and if you look at the rejects from that time, you'll find photos that you now would consider good or great. Yes, maybe they are great by accident, or maybe your subconscious saw something you didn't.

That's why I don't delete. And considering the price of storage, really, why are you deleting? Just flag the photos you don't want to see in your library all the time, and set it to not show them. Or move them to another folder. Maybe some external drive you can put away in storage. And maybe, one day, you'll look at them again and discover something great.

jcdoss · 08-18-2016, 09:37 AM

Originally posted by kadajawi

I spent an afternoon/evening in Barcelona, and took 232 photos. ....Thankfully I didn't delete the "non-keepers",

Just curious, how many photos do you take in a week? In a month? Are you using a K-1?

I think I need to re-imagine my storage solution.

kadajawi · 08-18-2016, 02:10 PM - **1 Like**

Originally posted by jcdoss

Just curious, how many photos do you take in a week? In a month? Are you using a K-1?

I think I need to re-imagine my storage solution.

Sometimes none for weeks, sometimes a thousand a day (especially when it's for work). It always depends, I am rather trigger happy when I've got the camera out (it has gotten less though... I'm holding back and try to think more, compose more...).

All in all I have roughly 216k photos, residing on one hard drive. I've bought 2 4 TB drives, which I wanted to use to do a RAID 1 with the drives so the photos would be there, but unfortunately my TV show/movie collection uses up one of them. Will have to buy another 4 TB drive I guess... maybe in October. And eventually I'll build a proper NAS... The photos are backed up on a cloud backup service though, so I'm not too worried.

K-5, so the 16 MP do help. Good photos get compressed again as lossless DNG (saves maybe 10-20% compared to in camera DNG or PEF), same for photos that are noisy, i.e. above ISO 6400 perhaps. The rest gets compressed as lossy DNG, which gets the photos down from say 20-30 MB down to around 5 MB. You can still edit the photos properly, to be honest I haven't seen a difference to proper lossless DNG files. Lossy DNG is less efficient with noisy images, you may end up with files that are bigger than the lossless ones. That's why I only use it on low ISO photos.

I tried a K-1 photo I've taken at a store, ISO 400. As lossless DNG (unfortunately I don't know how big the original file was) it was 33 MB, which isn't much bigger than my K-5 files... Compressed it using lossy DNG, now it's 9.4 MB. I think that is absolutely manageable. I also took a 47.2 MB big (ISO 400) sample file from... imaging resource? Compressed lossless DNG it went down to 41.5 MB. Lossy DNG it is 12.2 MB. That's less than in camera JPEG files have...

**MJSfoto1956** · 08-18-2016, 02:21 PM

Originally posted by pres589

How do you folks think of "keepers"; are they photos you would print? Or just photos you wouldn't delete? Obviously this is more a digital question and shouldn't be taken in regard to processing. Either with or without some PP work, what's your definition of a keeper?

a keeper for me is simply any image that I would be willing to spend time doing any amount of post processing on either now or at a later date.

Michael

**robgski** · 08-18-2016, 05:00 PM

Originally posted by MJSfoto1956

a keeper for me is simply any image that I would be willing to spend time doing any amount of post processing on either now or at a later date.

Very good idea!

normhead · 08-18-2016, 05:57 PM

If its is still in my library after my first session, it's a keeper. I've learned to be relentless with my images. Yesterday I took 650 images and kept 12. But, if you add 12 a day, that's a lot of images in the end. I shoot a lot in burst, often as many as 10 shots in a burst, sometimes a full buffer of 23. But I usually only want the best of the burst, there's absolutely no point in keeping the others.

TaoMaas · 08-21-2016, 06:54 AM

Originally posted by MJSfoto1956

a keeper for me is simply any image that I would be willing to spend time doing any amount of post processing on either now or at a later date.

That's a good definition for me, too. It has to have potential.

**ChrisPlatt** · 08-21-2016, 10:01 AM

Usually it's something I'm willing to print, 5x7 usually, 8x10 if it's exceptional...

Chris

**pres589** · 08-21-2016, 10:46 AM

Lots of good suggestions and ideas. I like the "if I would print it" and "if I'm willing to put time into post processing on it" sort of suggestions; short answers, easy to identify with.

Better thread than I expected this to be.

normhead · 08-21-2016, 01:55 PM

Originally posted by TaoMaas

That's a good definition for me, too. It has to have potential.

I Like the ones that are almost done, right off the camera. Those are definitely my favourites.

Rupert · 08-21-2016, 04:02 PM

If it's a squirrel...it's a keeper!

Doves are a close second!

Couldn't toss this little guy!

And who could dump a pair of lovers?

Regards!

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08-12-2016, 12:15 PM	#16
gatorguy Moderator Join Date: Feb 2015 Location: Central Florida Photos: Gallery Posts: 6,092	Originally posted by biz-engineer I review shots with 4x quick zoom, if it looks ok, it can be printed, if not ok at 4x preview, the shot is not a keeper. I've got mine at 8x in the preview quick settings. I'm a stickler for focus.

08-12-2016, 12:37 PM	#17
jcdoss Pentaxian Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: Ingelheim am Rhein, Germany Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 6,769	Originally posted by jatrax The take from the day or the shoot goes into Lightroom: - the initial pass marks everything I do not want with a black flag. this is usually out of focus, poor exposure, test shots, shots of my feet or the ceiling.... - the second pass I select the best shot from each angle or series and mark the rest with a black flag, I often leave 2 or 3 from a series if I'm concerned about the quality - on the third pass I start looking at images in the develop module and selecting those that might be worth further processing. They either get added to a collection such as stock, fine art, etc for later work or they get a black flag I do almost the exact same thing, except I delete the black flags immediately, which ends up being about 75-80% of the photos I take, and sometimes I think I'm keeping too many. And I'll do delete photos in-camera if I know it's a real stinker. I suppose my definition of a "keeper" is one that is the best blend of artistic and technical quality that I was going for at the time I took the shot. Sometimes that means straight lines, level camera, and perfect exposure, and other times that means subject is at least partially in the frame. But I think to each person, that definition is different. And my keepers are according to my standards, and not someone else's or what I think someone else's standards might be. I don't have the gene that makes me think anything I do is saleable, but if I did like some folks here, then that might come into play more often.

08-14-2016, 02:19 PM - 2 Likes	#18
Wheatfield Moderator Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: The wheatfields of Canada Posts: 15,981	Originally posted by pres589 How do you folks think of "keepers"; are they photos you would print? Or just photos you wouldn't delete? Obviously this is more a digital question and shouldn't be taken in regard to processing. Either with or without some PP work, what's your definition of a keeper? If my wife likes it, it's a keeper.

08-15-2016, 05:24 PM	#19
Architecture Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2016 Location: Texas Posts: 147	My system's pretty simple. I don't delete anything. I import everything and quickly rush through them in Lightroom to see what I have. Ones I want to come back to, I flag. Once I have a pile of flagged photos, I start editing them in no particular order. I occasionally go back over the entire import to see if there are photos I missed flagging the first time. Sometimes flagged photos get demoted back into the pile, so it works both ways.

08-18-2016, 06:35 AM	#20
kadajawi Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2010 Posts: 2,799	Something just happened to me (it sometimes does)... I spent an afternoon/evening in Barcelona, and took 232 photos. Maybe there were a few very blurry ones that I deleted. I already went through the photos once, picked the ones I wanted to edit, edited them... Now I went through them again, and there were another 2 or 3 that I really like now, but seem to have missed the first time. Thankfully I didn't delete the "non-keepers", because otherwise they would have been gone. What photos we like depend on many factors... mood, taste, when you look at them... I'm sure if you look at photos you liked 5 years ago, you'll find ones where you wonder why, and if you look at the rejects from that time, you'll find photos that you now would consider good or great. Yes, maybe they are great by accident, or maybe your subconscious saw something you didn't. That's why I don't delete. And considering the price of storage, really, why are you deleting? Just flag the photos you don't want to see in your library all the time, and set it to not show them. Or move them to another folder. Maybe some external drive you can put away in storage. And maybe, one day, you'll look at them again and discover something great.

08-18-2016, 09:37 AM	#21
jcdoss Pentaxian Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: Ingelheim am Rhein, Germany Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 6,769	Originally posted by kadajawi I spent an afternoon/evening in Barcelona, and took 232 photos. ....Thankfully I didn't delete the "non-keepers", Just curious, how many photos do you take in a week? In a month? Are you using a K-1? I think I need to re-imagine my storage solution.

08-18-2016, 02:10 PM - 1 Like	#22
kadajawi Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2010 Posts: 2,799	Originally posted by jcdoss Just curious, how many photos do you take in a week? In a month? Are you using a K-1? I think I need to re-imagine my storage solution. Sometimes none for weeks, sometimes a thousand a day (especially when it's for work). It always depends, I am rather trigger happy when I've got the camera out (it has gotten less though... I'm holding back and try to think more, compose more...). All in all I have roughly 216k photos, residing on one hard drive. I've bought 2 4 TB drives, which I wanted to use to do a RAID 1 with the drives so the photos would be there, but unfortunately my TV show/movie collection uses up one of them. Will have to buy another 4 TB drive I guess... maybe in October. And eventually I'll build a proper NAS... The photos are backed up on a cloud backup service though, so I'm not too worried. K-5, so the 16 MP do help. Good photos get compressed again as lossless DNG (saves maybe 10-20% compared to in camera DNG or PEF), same for photos that are noisy, i.e. above ISO 6400 perhaps. The rest gets compressed as lossy DNG, which gets the photos down from say 20-30 MB down to around 5 MB. You can still edit the photos properly, to be honest I haven't seen a difference to proper lossless DNG files. Lossy DNG is less efficient with noisy images, you may end up with files that are bigger than the lossless ones. That's why I only use it on low ISO photos. I tried a K-1 photo I've taken at a store, ISO 400. As lossless DNG (unfortunately I don't know how big the original file was) it was 33 MB, which isn't much bigger than my K-5 files... Compressed it using lossy DNG, now it's 9.4 MB. I think that is absolutely manageable. I also took a 47.2 MB big (ISO 400) sample file from... imaging resource? Compressed lossless DNG it went down to 41.5 MB. Lossy DNG it is 12.2 MB. That's less than in camera JPEG files have...

08-18-2016, 02:21 PM	#23
MJSfoto1956 Site Supporter Join Date: Dec 2013 Location: Boston Posts: 1,305	Originally posted by pres589 How do you folks think of "keepers"; are they photos you would print? Or just photos you wouldn't delete? Obviously this is more a digital question and shouldn't be taken in regard to processing. Either with or without some PP work, what's your definition of a keeper? a keeper for me is simply any image that I would be willing to spend time doing any amount of post processing on either now or at a later date. Michael

08-18-2016, 05:00 PM	#24
robgski Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Nov 2012 Location: Shenandoah Valley, Virginia Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 8,799	Originally posted by MJSfoto1956 a keeper for me is simply any image that I would be willing to spend time doing any amount of post processing on either now or at a later date. Very good idea!

08-18-2016, 05:57 PM	#25
normhead Pentaxian Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Near Algonquin Park Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 40,451	If its is still in my library after my first session, it's a keeper. I've learned to be relentless with my images. Yesterday I took 650 images and kept 12. But, if you add 12 a day, that's a lot of images in the end. I shoot a lot in burst, often as many as 10 shots in a burst, sometimes a full buffer of 23. But I usually only want the best of the burst, there's absolutely no point in keeping the others.

08-21-2016, 06:54 AM	#26
TaoMaas Pentaxian Join Date: May 2007 Location: Oklahoma City Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 3,574	Originally posted by MJSfoto1956 a keeper for me is simply any image that I would be willing to spend time doing any amount of post processing on either now or at a later date. That's a good definition for me, too. It has to have potential.

08-21-2016, 10:01 AM	#27
ChrisPlatt Site Supporter Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: Rockaway Beach NYC Posts: 7,694	Usually it's something I'm willing to print, 5x7 usually, 8x10 if it's exceptional... Chris

08-21-2016, 10:46 AM	#28
pres589 Site Supporter Join Date: Jan 2014 Location: Wichita, KS Photos: Albums Posts: 4,529 Original Poster	Lots of good suggestions and ideas. I like the "if I would print it" and "if I'm willing to put time into post processing on it" sort of suggestions; short answers, easy to identify with. Better thread than I expected this to be.

08-21-2016, 01:55 PM	#29
normhead Pentaxian Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Near Algonquin Park Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 40,451	Originally posted by TaoMaas That's a good definition for me, too. It has to have potential. I Like the ones that are almost done, right off the camera. Those are definitely my favourites.

08-21-2016, 04:02 PM	#30
Rupert Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Texas Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 25,123	If it's a squirrel...it's a keeper! Doves are a close second! Couldn't toss this little guy! And who could dump a pair of lovers? Regards!