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How this three-principles editing template can help your creative vision

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When I work with an image, I want to create something pleasing to the eyes, a piece of art with a wow-factor. I desire to produce a scene that takes the viewer on a journey from foreground to background.

When it comes to editing, it really helps to have a guiding template. It helps the creative process. Many call this a creative vision. That said, I would never advocate or introduce rules for landscape photography. My photography’s core motivation is the freedom to express myself in whatever artistic fashion I find fulfilling. It should be the same for you.

For me, though, I have always found it helpful to have some guidelines that outline the direction I am heading. Walking blindfolded isn’t something I enjoy. I have adopted three main principles for my post-processing, and I will explain each of them in detail.

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Do you want to become a better landscape photographer?

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I vividly remember how stunned I was by the landscape images I saw when I started with photography. It was beyond me how someone could create such beautiful and striking images. Those artists inspired me, but they also created a strong desire to improve my own photography.

I set out on a long journey, and in this article I will share some of the lessons I learned along the way which may help you to improve your skills as a landscape photographer.

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Ergonomics of graphics tablets

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The perfect graphics tablet doesn’t exist. But you’ll eventually adapt to the weird specifications and ergonomics issues of your tablet model and make it perfect for you. This adaptation process made by your body (in regards of the ergonomics flaws of your hardware) will have an impact your health on the long run. It might also affect your pleasure to draw and paint…

Since 2002, I bought and used a lot of tablets to try to build the best setup I could. It came as a necessity to ease my full days of digital painting. Nowaday, my quest for the best graphic tablet still continues as the technology keeps evolving years after years. If you want to read more about what I used and why, read my maintained “Tablet history log” article, from 2002 to today. But beyond the choice of the hardware itself, I also studied other aspect about it. And the first one that comes to my mind is the ergonomics of my desktop position. So, let me share with you my experiences about ergonomics.

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How to edit in Lightroom using the “Dark Mode” technique for more contrast and drama

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When it comes to processing our images, there are all kinds of weird and crazy techniques out there. This is an interesting Lightroom one from Pye Jirsa over at SLR Lounge, which he calls “Dark Mode”. It allows you to quickly and easily draw a distinction between the lit areas you want to highlight, and the shadowy areas, without sending them to pure black.

It’s an approach I’d not seen before. It essentially involves bringing the exposure way down, the blacks way up to bring back the shadow detail and then controlling your contrast with the highlights. Some thought needs to be put into the shooting technique for this to work, but it looks to be quite effective if this is the final look you’re going for.

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Is it post-processed?

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Yes, it’s post processed.

I get this question all the time, like every other photographer on the planet, and it often sparks heated debates that challenge the notion of objective reality and the meaning of photography.

My claim is: all photographs are post-processed.

In one way or the other.

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Phase One has announced Capture One 20 with an array of new editing and workflow features

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Phase One has today announced the launch of the latest version of their photo editing software, Capture One 20. They say that the latest release was driven based on feedback from the Capture One community to deliver the features and workflow that people actually need.

It comes with improvements to the existing toolset, along with an array of new features, too, including the Basic Colour Editor, High Dynamic Range, Noise Reduction, a new Crop Tool and an improved user interface. It also brings with it, support for some of the most recent camera releases including the Canon EOS 90D and Nikon Z50.

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To edit or not? How far should you take your post processing?

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How much we edit our photos, or whether we should even do it at all, is a conversation that I see some up almost daily on social media. I say conversation, it often turns into quite the heated debate.

In this video, Sean Tucker shares some of his thoughts on the history of editing and post-processing in photography. It’s been going on since the dawn of photography, and Sean mentions many historically great photographers, like Elliot Erwitt, DFan Ho, Ansel Adams and others as examples of photographers who, pre-digital, were doing a lot of post-work.

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Triple processing of a single RAW file

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Please note that this tutorial is meant for advanced users of Photoshop who are well familiar with layers, masks and luminosity masks.

Occasionally when examining a raw file I get a reasonably clear idea on how I would like the end result to be. In this instance I had an inner picture of trees glowing from the sun, rather dark shadows and a sky with nice color contrast.

In order to achieve this I opted to create two virtual copies in Lightroom from the original raw file. I could alternatively have achieved what I was looking for using Smart Objects, but envisioned that Virtual Copies would be the better option for the image I had in mind.

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How to use frequency separation to remove chromatic aberration and colour fringing

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Frequency separation is typically seen as a technique for retouching skin – albeit often quite badly these days. But that’s not its only use. Separating colour from detail offers a lot of other potential benefits for working on your images.

In this particular example, from travel & landscape photographer Michael Breitung, it’s chromatic aberration and colour fringing that get the frequency separation treatment.

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VSCO Film Presets for Desktop are being discontinued in March 2019

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VSCO has announced that the much loved VSCO Film Presets for Desktop are coming to an end. The company says they’re moving completely away from the desktop to focus solely on their mobile app.

The Presets for Desktop have been rather popular over the years, although that’ll all come to an end on March 1st, 2019. VSCO hasn’t really said why they’re killing them off, except to say that they are “always moving forward” and focusing on mobile.

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