I was back into editing photos this weekend and wanted to share with you three things that I look for in ALL of my photos when editing sessions and weddings. These three items are so simple but make the BIGGEST difference in your images when you are looking to deliver professional images every time.
If you are a new photographer, it might seem daunting to look at every single image but I can PROMISE YOU you will 1) get faster with time. It used to take me a few days to edit a session and how I am spending around an hour on my sessions when editing. 2) You will get your full return on this over time. Putting in the extra mile now will pay off down the road.
So the three things that I look for when editing my images are Straight Lines, Unwanted Distractions, and Negative Space. Let’s get started and I will show you how I apply these to my editing process!
It 100% normal to not have your camera perfectly level when taking photos, but make sure to correct those crooked lines before sending images to your clients. The best way to know if your image is crooked is by looking at the horizon line or if you are indoors, use a wall, window, or cabinet as your guide. Lightroom makes straightening your images very easy by pressing the “auto” button when selecting the crop tool. Most time Lightroom is able to auto straighten your images, there will come a few times where you will need to manually straighten it.
Here are few examples!
Are there any items in the grass, the sky, or on the walls? If so get rid of it! You want to make sure your eye goes right to your subject and not to the people walking around or other light switches on the wall. Use the “spot removal” in Lightroom to eliminate some of those simple items. When it comes to bigger/more complex items that need to be taken out, I use Photoshop!
Here is the original image with own my preset applied. Right away there is something that catches my eye that takes away from the image. *
How is the space around your subject working? It is working in a positive way or more distracting? If the space around your subject is distracting, then grab that crop tool and get it out of your image. You don’t have to keep an image exactly how you took it.
In the image below on the left, I really like the image but I felt like the ceiling was taking over much of the image and not in a good way. More distracting to my couple and your eye is left going all around the kitchen instead of on them. All I did was take the crop tool and zoom in to eliminate the ceiling to make the focus on my couple.