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Often when a photographer is showing their before and after work, SOOC is referred to as "straight out of camera". I don't think many people realize that visually amazing photos are usually enhanced with editing software such as Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop. Once again, this was one of the learning curves I needed to understand if I was going to take my work to new creative levels.
There are many photography composition techniques that you need to keep in mind when composing a photo, such as rule of thirds, leading lines, symmetrical balance and framing. These are elements that you need to capture in your photo to create a visually appealing image. I will touch on these rules in another blog. But what happens after the photo is taken is the real magic.
In the photo above, I wanted to experiment with a smoke grenade, which I had seen done in other photos and I thought the look was creative. So, always looking to try new things, I headed to an army surplus store in search of them.
This shoot was a very small "covid wedding", and I wanted to give the couple a wow photo. Since I had never used the smoke grenades before, I enlisted the father of the groom to toss it into my frame. I wan't sure how many I would need either, but two of the same colour would have been ideal. I only had one. I think I captured a great shot of the couple kissing, but my smoke grenade fell flat. So, in Adobe Photoshop, I used a few actions to boost my colour, and then cloned the smoke to fill the frame and remove the dad.
I took another stab at the smoke grenades and this is the image I ended up with. In Adobe Photoshop I modified the colouring in the photo and tried my best to enlarge the smoke and make it pop out of the photo. I was happy with the outcome, and the creamy, dreamy look I gave the photo with my actions.
Although some photos straight out of camera are great, there's always a way to enhance and improve the colour, the cropping and details to make that photo a wow shot! Check out this video where a photographer walks through their editing steps to enhance a model portrait.
Here is a great debate on SOOC vs post processing: http://brucehoodphotography.com/the-sooc-debate.html
Other examples I found online of before and after images... which do you prefer?
