Hi Brenda, and thanks for taking the time for this AMA!
I’ve been getting better over the last 3-4 years at post processing in LR and PS (I think) but often find myself wondering when to stop. Some say stop when you’ve achieved your vision but I don’t seem to know when that happens! Maybe I’m overthinking it… Sometimes I think I’m done with a shot only to come back some time later and keep going. I know it can be beneficial to revisit old photos (approaching them with new skills etc.) but I’m wondering how you approach this question of “is it fully cooked yet?”
Thanks
Larry
What are your favorite places in New Mexico to shoot, other than White Sands. I made my first trip there last year and came back without anything decent. I’m referring to landscapes. After seeing all those wonderful O’Keefe paintings I feel that I didn’t take advantage of the opportunity.
Brenda, I hope it’s ok if I sneak another question in.
I am relatively new here and still trying to get my balance. Beyond how I respond to other members’ works - what would you recommend in regards to the photos I post. I could post the good ones that I am confident in, the ones I am struggling with, or the ones that feel like a lost cause (if I don’t understand why).
Appreciate any thoughts on that.
Thanks again for the time and commitment to answer our questions.
Bill
Hello, Larry - that is a great question! For each of us, that ‘achieving your vision’ may be different. My first thought, when I am processing, is ‘what did the scene feel like? what adjustments bring me back to how I remember it looking and feeling? It’s something that with practice I just know in my gut, I guess. As a nature photographer, with experiences also as a photojournalist, I have always leaned towards a true representation of the scene/subject. Perhaps you know when that happens more than you realize and it’s just a matter of trusting your own ‘gut’ feeling about the photograph. That said, good processing is the only way to bring an image to life the way you remember it being in real time, and learning how to bring it to that point is important. With continued practice, you will just develop a personal ‘knowing’ of when it’s enough for YOUR taste. I know that when I have ‘pushed it’ a bit too much with contrast or saturation that it’s time to stop. Yet I often return to images a few weeks later, even months, and it’s amazing how I will find little tweaks that will make it better. I might have been in a ‘saturation phase’ and later think - “gosh, that was too much!” Or vice versa. Our emotional attachment to the experience and therefore the image when we first process it definitely influences our thinking. So when it is fully cooked? I believe it’s when I feel it expresses most closely how I remember the scene, and how I want to express what it was like. It simply comes with trusting your own vision, yet is based on good understanding of processing, too. There isn’t’ a magic answer to this question, but at some point you will just know ‘it is done’. I think we can ‘noodle’ images so much and we lose sight of when it’s time to move to the next images and accept that it’s good enough, honestly. Hope that helps!
Hello Igor, I am pleased to be here today! First, regarding White Sands, it sadly has such a strict entry/exit policy that it is very hard to be there in the sweet hours of light, unless you are with a photo workshop or group with a permit and they’d paid the ranger to keep the gate open late or open early. Sigh. That said, I have loved the area up around Ghost Ranch and Abiqui. When I taught for Santa Fe Photo Workshops I used to take my groups up into that general area a lot for the landscapes in afternoon light. I also really like Bisti Badlands -De-Na-Zin - and the other site, Ah-Shi-Sle-Pah area, for very unique rock forms and landscapes. Also love the Chama Valley in Autumn - the aspens are lovely up there. The area around Gallup can be really nice, in late afternoon light, as the cliffs on the north side of highway 40 get some sweet light on them. You have to explore a bit off main highway to find ways to get near them. Oh, and the landscape around Shiprock is very interesting to me, as well. I also like the area in/around Chaco Canyon. So much depends upon the light, but these are areas of interest to me. I have known about Tent Rocks, too, very unusual formations, but challenging to get good light for a landscape photograph in my opinion. Hope this helps!
Hi Matt, Love this question. A solid guiding principle throughout my career as a nature photographer is to show what is wonderful and beautiful about this planet. I call it “celebrating the planet through photographs,” and my approach has always been from this positive viewpoint. If I can inspire even one person to be driven to conserve and preserve what we have, I have succeeded. That’s one aspect of this question, I believe. My images are born out of my experiences, and what I’m sharing is that experience, through the images, so that others may feel it too. The other aspect, regarding my success in my career, has been to hold true to my passions. In a back story, briefly here, I was an editorial and corporate photographer for many years, which paid my bills but didn’t fill up my soul. It took me a while to realize that, because I wasn’t certain I could make a living from ‘just nature photography’. At one point, I took the risk and aimed my promotions towards getting work in outdoor recreation and nature, and moved away from corporate and business photography and never looked back! My business began to thrive with that shift - and I believe it was because the passion I felt for nature/outdoors/wildlife was attracting the right job and project opportunities to me. Once I realized that following my passion was the best way for me to be happy, I began to thrive. I hope that answers your question. Thanks for being here!
I am so glad you asked this question, Bill! I think many of us struggle with that. “Do I post only my best?” If you do, you get accolades and a few possible constructive ideas, but does that help you grow? We all have our best ‘twenty’ or forty best images, yet I don’t think we grow by just showing off our best. I believe that posting images that you are struggling with is a great way to get helpful input from the community. I think it’s difficult for people to post images that they feel didn’t work, yet those are the ones that will help us improve. We all want to see each other grow! That said, we all need positive encouragement so I would definitely say continue to post some photos that you are proud of, as getting kudos for those helps to maintain our confidence. If we just posted ones we feel didn’t work just right, we might feel a bit down, so it has to be a balance of the two. Hope that answers your question!
Hi Brenda - I appreciate your responses to questions here because they make so much sense to me. Thank you! I’m wondering what type and size of paper you like to print your work on, and why?
Hi Ann, thank you for participating here! I have an Epson P900 currently, so I can go up to 13x19 inches if I print myself. Most of my sales have been in the range up to that size. I love many of the Moab Paper products - especially the archival rag papers when I want a matte finish, and I have also liked the Lasal Exhibition Lustre. Their entire collection of papers are really wonderful in my opinion. It requires testing to find papers you like, and I found theirs to really do well for holding detail in the blacks and producing rich and colors true to the image. One more thing I should add here - sometimes I will get orders for images printed on metal or acrylic, for those I send out to a lab to fulfill. Also when the images are larger than my printer can handle, those go to a lab for production, as well.