The Naked Truth…

After posting the photos of my kids in their playhouse and I mentioned how I processed them 100% in Lightroom 3 I thought I would show a before and after of each. Essentially the “naked” photo in the RAW vs the complete one.

Part of being a photographer is having a creative eye, knowing what your camera is capable of and in the end being an artist which comes in when you are taking the photo and processing the photo. I could have spent more time processing these images as well, however went for a clean edit and processing. Yes I process 99% of my images, thats why using Lightroom for the majority of my editing saves me SO much time!

I have always had an interest and eye for art, when I was in highschool I took art lessons for many years, always had an enjoyment for photography and after our kids were born I truly found my passion. I LOVE that I have photography as a way to express my artistic side and also capture the memories of our family and most importantly our children as they grow and change.

With these images I wont go step by step what I did, however when I shoot, I only shoot in Manual (M on the top of the dial on the camera), so I choose all my settings. My LCD shows me not only my image after I take it but it also shows me my settings and my histogram and blinkies – any blown spots in my image. This is the biggest reason why I shoot in RAW, these images I was able to save the blown spots in the snow – although because I shoot manual I am also better capable to control this. Being outside in the snow and bright sun its hard to see the complete details on the LCD which is why I do tend to under or over expose slightly. As we went from the front yard to the back yard there wasnt as much sunlight so the photo was slightly under exposed. However this is easily fixable in Lightroom or Photoshop. I do use both programs, however I am becoming more comfortable with LR and the exporting saves me SO much time with saving etc!