I originally found your page while looking for a theme for my Blackberry, and i found Bphone…. WOW! its just awesome, and I’m very greatful that you have shared this theme for free use with all the Blackberry community.

Then i started reading your articles, they are fascinating, the Ebay article left me on the floor laughing!

And i found this article, which i liked very much because it shows what a dramatic change some little *after effects* can do to your “average” photograph. I never liked to modify my photos too much, but reading this has tought me a lesson!

Many thanks and best regards!

Jim

That’s an excellent question, and brings us as much into the technical aspect of digital photography as it does the intangible “feel” of the scene.

The short answer is, that place felt more like the final photograph than the original, blander file. Part of that is the reality heightened by your other senses — I could hear the birds and rustle of the forest, I could sense the dampness on my skin, etc — whereas in a photo you’ve got to rely solely on the eyes.

But the other reason is that when you shoot in RAW, you’re not recording an image. You’re recording sensor data which must be converted to an image, and how your RAW converter interprets that data typically is less “punchy” than what usually happens in-camera with JPG processing. I shot this in RAW, but didn’t really know how to properly manipulate it at first. RAW is a powerful tool, in a way, and learning how to use it right is something that takes time. If I had shot this same scene in JPG, it wouldn’t have looked so nearly flat coming out of the RAW converter — but there also wouldn’t have been as much data to work with to really fine-tune the image the way I wanted.

I think that is print quality work there! I am sure you have heard of Thomas Mangelsen. The crispness of the colors reminded me of some of his works, but I’ll not to make a comparison as I am not a avid nature photographer or an expert on the matter. My one question to you is kind of off what Kyle above said about having people “feel the scene”. If I were going to that exact place, would I feel the scene as if was from the original or would I feel the scene as from the enhanced version? In other words, if I went to that exact spot, would it be as beautiful as the image shows? Or would it look kind of bland like the original?

As for the article, GREAT point. If we were all meant to see the scene one way then cameras would always record an image as faithful, and we’d only add sharpening in post process. Contrast, brightness, hue, saturation, adjusting the blacks, fill light… they’re all part of the process, and your image demonstrates their value. Even something as crazy as HDR has it’s place! Photography’s an art, not a science… all the better to let people feel the scene, not just see it.

Oh, and you don’t need some expensive software. Don’t have Aperture, Photoshop, or Lightroom? Try GIMP… totally free, and does 90% of what Photoshop does (almost as well).

Great post…I discovered the same thing a few years ago when working on a photo project for a friend. It’s not just the crop that makes a photo great, but all the subtle tweaks.

I’ve heard a few “film junkies” claim that digital photography has no comparison to “real photography” because of all the tweaking and changes you can make.

I always like to point out, professional photographers have manipulated their photos for years with various chemicals, exposures, filters and other tricks during the processing of the film to photo paper.

Very helpful post – I’m sure it will inspire others to take a shot at spending time at the desktop.