Ahoj. This is Zdenka. In today's episode we will cover 5 big editing mistakes
new and experienced photographers such as myself make and how you can fix them
in Lightroom.
And if you are new here, welcome. My name is Zdenka Darula. If
you want to learn how to take better photos and videos with the latest gear
and participate in creative camera challenges, consider subscribing. I've
been taking photos for 15 years now and when it comes to photo editing,
you can't stop learning. There are always new styles you need to catch up with,
there are always new software updates with new tools. Simply put, you need to
keep track. Since I started photography, my editing style has changed over the
years drastically. Sometimes I simply get bored with what
I'm doing. Sometimes I just feel like I don't like the style I'm doing anymore
and I need to change things and that's pretty normal. And to keep track
what's in style right now, what's popular right now, obviously I search online and
I look all over the place and one of the places I even look is Facebook and I go
even to Canon M50 user group. Hello everybody! Or I go to other groups where
new photographers are asking for help. They are showing their photos and
they're asking what they could possibly improve when it comes to photo editing.
There are a number of things I generally see over and over and over again in a
lot of images which could be improved, so here are five common mistakes and how
you can fix them. Before I start though a very quick announcement. For a few months
you've been asking me... yeah you've been actually quite bugging me if I can make
a video where I am editing your RAW images. I've been thinking about it for a
while, I'm accepting your challenge so at the end of this video you will find out
all details. Mistake number one. Over edited photos. There are photos out there
which are simply over edited like this one. The
saturation is simply pushed way too far, the colors are very unrealistic, they are
way too bright. The photo is way too contrasty where the
blacks are way too black until to the point where the pixels are crushed and
there is no data. There is no visible detail in the photos. And yes there are
photos where we want them to look dramatic but there are also photos which
simply look incorrect. The sharpness is pushed so much that is simply way too
much as well as texture and clarity. Next time you are editing your photos, ease up
a bit on the contrast. Watch the histogram window at the top. Whenever you
are working with exposure, blacks and whites so you don't get this line on the
left. When you go on that arrow right here, this will show shadow clipping. That
means the black pixels are crushed. The same goes to the whites on the right
side. Whatever is red that is clipped. The exception is when you are shooting
high key bright photos or low key photos. Let's look at the texture and clarity. I
really only use those tools if I am making photos for Instagram, if I know
the photos will be very tiny, very small or actually on YouTube videos on my
thumbnail and I need the photos to pop. I need the people to actually notice it.
For photos which I will save in high resolution which might actually go even
to print I do even the opposite sometimes. I make the images a bit softer.
You don't have to go my route as this is just my style, that's what I like to do.
Generally though, photos which are not over sharpened look much better. Let's
look at vibrance and saturation. They are not the same. Here is a perfect example
as there's a person in a photo. Saturation will increase all colors in
the image so even the skin will look orange.
Vibrance on the other hand will protect the skin from becoming orange and it
will increase muted colors. But again quite easy on that. When it comes to
photo editing, especially if you are editing some very important shots.
It is the best if you take a break. If you walk away for few minutes, even for
few hours, kind of reset your brain and come back to computer and see if you
still like your edit. When I came back even a few days later after I edited
some image and I thought I edited it awesome, I looked at it and I was really
amazed what a colorful crazy creature I actually created. Or sometimes on the
other hand I thought to myself, ah that's uh quite a dull image. There's nothing
really to it, something needs to be changed here. Something needs to pop.
Mistake number 2. Cropping. There are images out there which have way too much space
around the object or the opposite. There's simply not enough of space. Part
of the head is missing, part of the arm is missing or the photos simply are
just boring and can be improved by cropping. If you have to post photo with
certain aspect ratio like 1:1 for Instagram, that can be tricky. But for
photos where you can be creative, when it comes to cropping, there's a great tool
in Lightroom which can help. Go to crop tool where you will see the standard
grid. Then one majority of us know. Press letter "O" on your keyboard. This will
bring you different grid or overlay. Every time you actually press "O" new one
will pop and when you press Shift + o new variation will show up. Here you can
choose one which will help you to frame your image the most interesting way.
Mistake number 3. Preset. Some of the new photographers might say and I'm not
picking up on anybody here, I'm not picking up on anybody here. I am not so
good at photo editing but I bought these
presets and I'm just going to use that. You know the photo
looks good so I am done. Presets won't work on just any photo. It will
work with some photos similar to the original image the preset was created on.
Choose your preset which looks good with your photo but rather than finished
photo, use it as a starting point to tweak the image further. Mistake number
4. Black and white. Someone recently asked me in a comment section below the
videos. How can I set my Canon M50 to shoot in black and white only? And my
immediate reaction was, why do you want to do that? How do you know the photo is
now going to look better in color. Sure there are some cameras which shoot
amazing black and white photos but if I have the option to choose, I'll do just
that. There are some photos which look amazing in color but then there are
photos which have strong emotions and the colors are taking away from those
emotions. I do this for wedding photos all the time. I see a photo with a strong
expression, someone is crying... I'll make it black and white to make the emotion
pop. Also, when you want black and white photo, don't just change it to black and
white and assume you're done. What I like to do is switch at the top where you see
treatment from color to black and white. Click that and then just further adjust
the photo until you are happy with the result.
Mistake number 5. Brightness all over. When it comes to photos of places,
vacation spots like seas, mountains, fields, beautiful cities and streets, I see a lot
of new photographers adjusting the brightness just of the whole image at
once. Or I see also photographers changing the colors or adjusting the
colors of the whole image at once, limiting themselves working only in the
main panel. They might not know that they can use tools to adjust brightness in
areas separately, sort of like a Dodge and burn effect.
Let me show you a few tools. There is graduated filter. Select an area. You can also
extend it and then use sliders to change exposure or other things. And the same
goes to radio filter.
or brush. Brush over the area which you want to further adjust.
It is time to talk about that video where I'm gonna be editing your photos. I
believe Peter McKinnon started this so huge shout out to him. If you don't know
him which would be very weird if you didn't know him. Everybody knows him. He's
a great photographer and he does a great videos as well. He also likes a lot of
coffee. When it comes to photo editing, it really comes down to your personal taste.
You might like certain styles of photo editing. Others might like other styles
of photo editing. For example Peter McKinnon is more about landscape. He has
his own very specific style. I am more about fashion, glamour. I shoot a lot of
people. I take photos of other people, I don't shoot them. So you will see very
different style than his. So where can you send your raw photos? You can send me a
message on Twitter where you will send your raw image. Don't make it public and
don't post anywhere your RAW images. Or you can send it in the Instagram in DM
message. Normally I don't accept any DM messages but I will make an exception
for 48 hours and today's date is and the deadline is...please don't send any photos
after that. And naturally, I will choose most interesting images and edit them
the way I edit with my style. The video will be published in a week or two,
something like that. Hit the thumbs up button if you liked today's video and
subscribe to all videos like these. If you have any questions, comments or
simply want to say hi or ahoj. You were asking me what that means. It's hi and bye in
Czech language. You can do so in a comment section below. See you in the
next video... Cau... Ahoj...