BEHIND THE SCENES : Before and After

A lot happens behind the scenes between me photographing my clients wedding and them receiving their album. The editing of an image to being of an optimum quality for albums or the website is quite possibly the most important and sometimes the least understood (interestingly enough). After images have been proofed, some are destined for the blog, website, albums or other presentation options, and they get given a little extra TLC in Photoshop to become a Print.

I thought it might be interesting for me to share a little more behind the scenes of what goes into creating a finished print. So today I’m going to take you through a few before and afters of images showing the difference between straight out of the camera and then how they look once they become a print which is intended for any display option. There are so many different ways to edit images but my philosophy has always been that any editing should enhance an image, not detract from it. I aim to get the image almost perfect in camera at the time of shooting so I tend to limit most of my editing to lightening and brightening an image for it to become a signature print.

I have to add that I felt very vulnerable while putting this post together. The before images may as well be me sporting a very unsexy bedhead look after waking up in the morning. Once I’ve had my coffee, worked out and showered I feel a little more presentable and like my after images. Be kind, world wide web. So here we go.

This image of Emma’s bouquet was pretty perfect in my mind, but I increased the curves and added a warmer tone to really make it pop.

A very recent image from Andy and Brendan’s engagement session, was a simple curves increase using Totally Rad Actions Clarify action and I brought the cropping in slightly.

A perfect example of a little editing going a long way, this beautiful perfume bottle just needed a tighter crop and to have the curves increased and I felt it was perfect.

Von didn’t need much help but I increased the curves and warmed the image up a little to give it a little pop.

This image from Annika and Tom’s wedding was a little cooler than how I remembered the light during their ceremony. So a little bit of warmth was added and this is how I remember the scene.

Similarly, this image out of camera from Amanda and Kingsley’s wedding didn’t quite capture the warmth of the sunset as I remembered it. A little curves increase, an added glow and voila!

This is definitely not how every photographer edits and I don’t claim my method is better than anothers, but this is how my workflow takes an image from a meh photograph to a wow photograph. Hopefully this has been a little helpful to someone in understanding a little behind the scenes action Happy Thursday!