[BruceBanner]

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Ok, so I don't really know what to call this, but I'm just trying to open up a forum of discussion on peoples various styles for PP. You see, if you check out my flickr page you'll see I'll wildly flip from one style to the next, image to image, I have little consistency. One minute it could be b&w, and the next even another b&w but this time processed very differently, then onto a colour pic with declarity, then onto a vibrant desaturated but high clarity shot. I have no 'style guide'. Looking at each picture one at a time is fine, but take a step back and look at many at once and it can look a bit off putting and amateurish.

I think partially this is due to my feeling that each and every picture is taken with its own unique composition and settings therefore rather than trying to stuff it into a particular preset I feel it benefits from going in this direction or that.

But now I might have to develop some consistency from a job or workflow/presentation perspective. Even framing or bordering every shot with the same thickness and colour of bordering might bring out that kinda consistency I think some of my work may need.

I haven't gotten into LR presets yet, and I just wondered if anyone out there takes this kinda thing seriously or deems it important?

Cheers,

Bruce

[biz-engineer]

I'm really bad in post processing things, I'd need a lecture and a coach.
Beside that, folks have their own little secrets in post processing to win over photography contests, and it's very personal, experience must be developed it can't be copied easily.

What you could do is to have a certain look in mind about a style you are trying to achieve, take a raw photo of your own and play around with settings , note the settings and export the jpeg for that settings, tweak another setting note it and export another jpeg etc. One you have a number of recorder PP settings and corresponding JPEGS, seat back and take a fresh look another day, or one week later, then note the photo you prefer and find out what PP setting was used, use that setting as a reference.

I've noticed that I'm not good at selecting photos immediately after taking them or immediately after processing them, I guess that is because or being soaking into the view for too long and lose the objective sense.
When reviewing photo after a week or even weeks or months, the keepers are more obvious, but perhaps that's just me.

[skierd]

Developing a personal style as an artist is extremely important. Looking backward at your work can be helpful to figure out what you do stylistically. Group your like photos (portraits, landscapes, nature close ups, etc) together and evaluate them as a collection. After you know where you've been, you can look forward to where you want to go in terms of post production. Style is not static but continually evolving. Some people swear by presets, but I don't. I do take my editing seriously however as its what makes my photography mine.

Thing is, one style for one type of photo doesn't necessarily translate to the other type of work. You can't necessarily shoot people like you would shoot a landscape... which is why there are landscape friendly film stocks like Velvia and Ektar and people friendly stocks like Portra and 400H.

Style should flow through your entire workflow. Which camera do you favor and choose, which lens or lenses, flash or no flash, tripod or handheld, tight or loose framing and the rest of composition, what do you change and what do you leave in Lightroom are all decisions that have to be made; to make those choices it helps to have a goal in mind when you create the image.

The best way to develop a style is to practice practice practice. Shoot only in jpeg black and white for a month. Shoot only in tungsten white balance for a month. Only landscape. Only portraits. Only with the 15mm. Only with the 50mm. Etc.

[beachgardener]

I think partially this is due to my feeling that each and every picture is taken with its own unique composition and settings therefore rather than trying to stuff it into a particular preset I feel it benefits from going in this direction or that.

exactly, each image is unique
not just the camera settings, that helps, but the story you want to tell, or even the feeling to portray. a presentation might need some sort of sameness for continuity as such, but not stopping each image being unique.

[Tas]

But now I might have to develop some consistency from a job or workflow/presentation perspective. Even framing or bordering every shot with the same thickness and colour of bordering might bring out that kinda consistency I think some of my work may need.

If you want to take people's money for your photography, the consistency in what you capture and create is important. But beyond you is who is buying your work and what they seek that must be considered when choosing which direction to head. PP is just a part of creating the end product.

Flickr is a great resource to find very average amateur wedding photographers and if I was on Facebook I bet that's another resource to find them too. A lot of these people can buy stuff and take photos, but what you're going to need to be successful is the style that sets you apart from everyone else. Sadly there are many 'pro wedding photographers' who are, quite simply, terrible. And when you put yourself into the shoes of the bride and groom and their family having a great time on their special day, it's particularly sad to think in years to come all they will have is a set of snapshots, not a moment created by an artist aiming to give of themselves for the people who are paying them. That's just me ranting as there's really great wedding photographers, competent wedding photographers, and some people who should not be paid for their work. Check out some examples of that last group here: You Are Not A Photographer - Exposing Fauxtographers Since 2011 and here: So, You think you're a photographer - Home | Facebook

I know a bloke via Flickr who's a wedding photographer professionally, but his landscape images are where his passion is. One style earns him money, the other is what he wants to do though I'm not sure if it's become a part of his income stream. Maybe it has as he/they have been published several times. Both Dylan and Marianne are very accomplished photographers, here's their (hubby & wife) website: Everlook Photography -- Landscape photography by Dylan Toh and Marianne Lim They're based in Adelaide.

If you go to their blog you'll see they're doing weddings, and for each wedding there's not necessarily the same style in each image, and if you go through the wedding examples you'll see there's a variety of styles being provided to the couples. This is consistent with the photographer for my wedding, there was B&W and a variety of styles, but maybe this is also to do with putting options out to the customer? I don't know, I"m not a wedding photographer or a pro photographer in any other sense. But what you see and what your client wants needs to align to be successful, so how do you ensure you know what it is they want?

By now you will have noticed I'm trying to write another novel, so before I do this I will provide you with a link to one of my 'Flickr contacts'. I don't know him but saw his images as a re imagining or re-capturing of some classic historical artwork, liked what I saw so started following him (FYI he used to shoot Pentax). He too has been published many times and his style is much more consistent: Bill Gekas | Flickr Bill is in Melbourne.

So there's two opposites in a way and both are being recognised for their work.

There's plenty of styles of imagery to research and study and what you create should be your style, whatever that will be, but maybe it's not necessary to lock into a style if something more flexible generates business for you. Especially as what you do to earn money versus what you do for the love of photography can potentially be different.

I recall last week I posted a link for the PP thread to the Photomorphis people, specifically Doug Landreth. His style is unique and I like it though I don't want to become a Doug Landreth clone. I will use his work as inspiration though. And whilst there's plenty of photography books out there I recommend you buy yourself a DVD boxset from the BBC called the Genius of Photography: BBC - Photography - Genius of Photography - Homepage

You can watch it here: The Genius Of Photography : BBC : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive but the resolution is cr*p so I recommend you keep an eye out for the disc version, here's an example on ebay: THE GENIUS OF PHOTOGRAPHY - BBC PRODUCTION - DVD | eBay

TL;DR - Aim to develop your own style if you want to become known and specialise in a specific style of imagery, but don't sweat on it if you're a consistently good photographer, as you can still make it work professionally and do your own thing in your own time.

Hope my 2c was worthwhile.

Tas

PS, I forgot to mention, don't waste your time with adding borders to your photos. They can look okay online in the right context but beyond that they're a bit naff (as the British might say).

[BruceBanner]

Great feedback thus far, especially Tas for the detailed and informative reply. I still have that Photomorphis video tabbed in my browser, yet to watch

I'm just curious to know whether any of our members here actually have done stuff like paid for presets (for LR) or come up with their own and save their presets and reuse often etc? Currently I am addicted to Topaz Clarity and B&W addons, but its a bit of a labour to toggle between these applications, it would be nice to stay within the constraints of LR and just click on some of your saved presets, might make workflow quicker and more streamlined and consistent.

Well... I'm just getting to a point that I might see a picture on Instagram or something and without knowing whose done it I can guess "yep... that looks like a shot from such and such" etc and more often than not I am right, proving that some of these people have a style you can point out... and it made me question mine (or lack thereof lol).

[dadipentak]

Developing a personal style as an artist is extremely important.

I've been turning that over in my mind for years and still haven't found a truth in it. Maybe that means I'm not an artist. I dunno.

[E-man]

For me, it's a two-phase proposition. First is to develop the technical skills necessary to accomplish what I want, then the second part is to learn to finesse that into something that appeals on more of an emotional level. Of course, I find it is often the case that what speaks to me on that level often doesn't speak to others in the same way.

[sergeremy]

I don't necessarily know what I want my final image to look like as I press the shutter, and I very much enjoy being surprised after the fact, i.e. when I cull them on my computer. Therefore I have absolutely no presets (I have at times had a bit of fun with the built-in presets in silverfx, but those never turn out to be my favorite pictures) and often improvise my post processing; but just as often I'll know exactly what I have to do to get where I want, - and have fun doing it, so I wouldn't let a preset do it for me.

Professional pressure is inexistent in my workflow however, and I perfectly understand how presets could be a godsend in such a context.

As for style, I'd say it just builds as you grow, and the more you do the more you build your style (or the more you think you know what your style is, or should be). That takes time and practice, lots of both! I've been writing music for long enough to have developped a style and be aware of it (and have an audience be aware of it), but photography... I have a feeling of where I want to be, but I don't get there as often as I'd like

I'd like to be here more often (cross-posted):



Where would everyone else like to be?

[Culture]

Great thread.
If someone goes to my site, they might think I know what I am doing.
But PP bring me a lot of stress. Half the time I feel like I dont know what I am doing.
I just keep turning dials and slides until it seem right without knowing how i got there.
For single shots or portraits, its no problem. But I also shoot weddings and consistency is important.

After shooting my last wedding I was not interested in taking on new jobs because of the stress.
I have hardly touched my camera because of this. I am trying to develop styles that I like in darktable for next years summer gigs.

Thanks for bringing this up.
Culture

[clickclick]

I think partially this is due to my feeling that each and every picture is taken with its own unique composition and settings therefore rather than trying to stuff it into a particular preset I feel it benefits from going in this direction or that.

My initial reaction is total agreement to what I believe you are touching on here. I started shooting black and white in the mid 70's and very quickly got into B&W darkroom work and then added color slides and ultimately Cibachrome printing from the slides too. As such, while there are things I would do in the darkroom like dodging, to give more or less exposure to an area of the print, the image captured in the camera highly dictated what came out the other end. What we can do today in PP is so far beyond what could easily be done or done at all in the darkroom. It's a different dimension.

But due to where I cut my teeth, I still lean that way. I do very little PP on my images. I'm actually kinda forcing myself to do more to see where I go with it. But here's the thing, since I'm not shooting for any particular purpose or person other than my own enjoyment, when I wander around with a camera and take the picture, I have in my mind what it is that I'm trying to capture. I look at the scene and just kinda see/feel what it is I want as the end result, and then the challenge is whether or not I succeeded when I look at the end result, and this is where I see PP coming in as a tool to help get you to where your mind's eye was. I can't help but think about a book sitting on the shelf upstairs - Photographic Seeing by Andreas Feininger, which is all about that - looking at the scene and seeing what it is you are capturing, or what is there to capture that many might look right through and not recognize.

So, all of this to me makes every photo potentially unique, and if there is consistency of style, that becomes a dependency of the individual photographer. Some have wide ranging works that cover all sorts of different material and moods etc. Others very definitely have a look to them, and I actually think this can be a trap and lead to a situation where the work is nice, but it all looks alike after awhile and risks becoming boring. However, all this said, I think if you're goal is to market yourself and sell your work, then a style, or a range of styles might become important, but even then I think the target client makes a huge difference in how important this might be. For example, if you are aiming at portraiture or event photography, the potential client is going to want to look at samples of your past work to judge whether or not they want to hire you, and in turn, you're ability to deliver and meet that expectation will determine your success. But if you are looking at displaying work in a gallery setting where the customer is walking in off the street and wandering around looking at a variety of work by different photographers/artists, then whether or not you have any particular "style" is probably not nearly as important, since the sale will be based more on a random person's reaction to any given work rather than an expectation of what that work should look like.

[Culture]

Phew. That is a whole lot of text.

Can you paragraph it?

[clickclick]

Yeah, I know. It was kinda a stream of consciousness, and I thought about going back and trying to make it pretty....

Actually fighting a killer headache - yes, had it before I started writing - not a result of writing (weather triggers these for me), but as I just looked back to see if I could break it apart, well, ugh! Maybe when the haze lifts.

---------- Post added 11-18-17 at 02:17 PM ----------

OK, gave a quick attempt at breaking it up. Please don't hold me to any writing style standards - my only explanation to even looking at the computer right now is being unwilling to surrender another day to these blasted weather triggered head pounders.

[BruceBanner]

My initial reaction is total agreement to what I believe you are touching on here. I started shooting black and white in the mid 70's and very quickly got into B&W darkroom work and then added color slides and ultimately Cibachrome printing from the slides too. As such, while there are things I would do in the darkroom like dodging, to give more or less exposure to an area of the print, the image captured in the camera highly dictated what came out the other end. What we can do today in PP is so far beyond what could easily be done or done at all in the darkroom. It's a different dimension.

But due to where I cut my teeth, I still lean that way. I do very little PP on my images. I'm actually kinda forcing myself to do more to see where I go with it. But here's the thing, since I'm not shooting for any particular purpose or person other than my own enjoyment, when I wander around with a camera and take the picture, I have in my mind what it is that I'm trying to capture. I look at the scene and just kinda see/feel what it is I want as the end result, and then the challenge is whether or not I succeeded when I look at the end result, and this is where I see PP coming in as a tool to help get you to where your mind's eye was. I can't help but think about a book sitting on the shelf upstairs - Photographic Seeing by Andreas Feininger, which is all about that - looking at the scene and seeing what it is you are capturing, or what is there to capture that many might look right through and not recognize.

So, all of this to me makes every photo potentially unique, and if there is consistency of style, that becomes a dependency of the individual photographer. Some have wide ranging works that cover all sorts of different material and moods etc. Others very definitely have a look to them, and I actually think this can be a trap and lead to a situation where the work is nice, but it all looks alike after awhile and risks becoming boring. However, all this said, I think if you're goal is to market yourself and sell your work, then a style, or a range of styles might become important, but even then I think the target client makes a huge difference in how important this might be. For example, if you are aiming at portraiture or event photography, the potential client is going to want to look at samples of your past work to judge whether or not they want to hire you, and in turn, you're ability to deliver and meet that expectation will determine your success. But if you are looking at displaying work in a gallery setting where the customer is walking in off the street and wandering around looking at a variety of work by different photographers/artists, then whether or not you have any particular "style" is probably not nearly as important, since the sale will be based more on a random person's reaction to any given work rather than an expectation of what that work should look like.

First off, I think yer bang on with the idea of PP helping to push the photo taken to getting it to a place that you very first intended in taking the shot. It could be very subtle changes, a little more clarity, sharpness and contrast tweaking and all of a sudden the shot is where you really intended it to be. Whether it was human error that caused the original shot not to possess these things, or whether you just want that 'amplified' look that the camera can not give natively, to me it doesn't matter.

But I'm not really talking about the benefits of PP here, I'm taking about applying a particular style or look across the entire range of photos, so that there is a consistency there to ones work (even at the risk of the work looking 'boring', it might just be a tradeoff that is necessary (or the lesser of two evils).
It could be that someones work always has that slightly 'desaturated' look about all their work, and if they do throw in the odd B&W shot then all their B&W shots have a similar feel about them (High Key or whatever).

Or perhaps someone consistently applies a cool tone, or warm or whatever to their work, but the point is each and every shot is supplied this way to give their work that 'signature'.

And maybe it's just as simple as being consistent with a level of vignette and bordering given, perhaps even if the work is quite varied, that application of edge touching consistency will be the marker.

Great thread.
If someone goes to my site, they might think I know what I am doing.
But PP bring me a lot of stress. Half the time I feel like I dont know what I am doing.
I just keep turning dials and slides until it seem right without knowing how i got there.
For single shots or portraits, its no problem. But I also shoot weddings and consistency is important.

After shooting my last wedding I was not interested in taking on new jobs because of the stress.
I have hardly touched my camera because of this. I am trying to develop styles that I like in darktable for next years summer gigs.

Thanks for bringing this up.
Culture

And this is the direction and cause of the thread, I cannot help feel that I need to deliver a level of consistency with the images I supply to the client at the end of the job, rather than a jumbled up mess of miss matched shots.

[clickclick]

And this is the direction and cause of the thread, I cannot help feel that I need to deliver a level of consistency with the images I supply to the client at the end of the job, rather than a jumbled up mess of miss matched shots.

Yep, and this is where I think it makes total sense for you to explore what ever it is that becomes your signature.