Photo editing

[coupe jay]

Just wondering if there's many people on here that edit there photos a lot to make them more attractive or to brighten them up a bit, im constantly finding myself having to edit photos (mainly contrast & brightness or exposure) am i doing something wrong or is this a common thing in photography?

[robski]

First of all I think your find the majority of us make some small tweaks to brightness and contrast. Much depends if your subject allows to take accurate readings from a grey card for exposure. In real life the scene rarely equates to a grey card so the camera metering system will give some exposure errors which are a fact of life. With experience exposure compensation helps but again rarely gives you perfect exposure. If your exposures are within a 1/3 of a stop you are doing well and still have plenty of latitude to correct to get an ideal image.

Transparency slide film required the exposure to be spot on as there was no room for adjustment. This band of users tended to pour scorn on folk from the negative film brigade if the expose was not spot on each time.

The other thing to consider is the camera has a set range of shutter speeds and a set range of apertures. The camera will select the closest value for each to make the exposure. The difference between the required and closest value will produce an error.

If your not making huge adjustments ( to correct a 1 stop error ) I should not worry about it.

[miketoll]

If you are using a DSLR then they apply comparatively little in camera post capture processing so photos tend to look a little flat, especially compared to what you might be used to after a compact. This is done, I believe, on purpose to allow you more control yourself. So as Rob says unless you are doing huge adjustments this is normal. You can always up the in camera processing in the menus if you want.

[Fixer]

I shoot raw, and have my setting turned down in camera so I have to add some sharpening so at the same time I also look to see if the main subject is in focus and if a little crop might help to frame it.

[Arthur53]

When I get a photo on the computer the first thing I do is check the levels. Cant recall any photo that did not need some fixing.
Then I also have camera settings turned down. I like to have controle and mess things up my own way.
So to answer your question, do I edit a photo? Yes, to improve it and its fun.

[gordon g]

Post-capture processing is a fact of life in digital photography. Compacts and dslrs recording images as JPEGs will do this automatically, according to the camera's settings or your menu choices.
Shooting in RAW, no adjustments are made to the data recorded by the sensor, so at the very least, a choice of colour space and some saturation and sharpness adjustments will be required, even if you have nailed the exposure values.
How the histogram looks for any given image will depend on the subject's tonal ranges and how you decide to render them - there isnt really a 'correct' exposure other than the one that looks right to you, so if the image looks how you want it too, then you've got it right.

[coupe jay]

thanks for clearing that up guys, glad its the normal thing to have to do, don't know where i'd be without PS, took a couple of pics today and totally messed them up, saved by PS again