A Creative Process Explained

[Robert Watcher]

Periodically it's fun to see what steps are involved in coming up with a final creative photographic image. And so I'd thought that I'd share the process of an image that I recently was working on.

Many times in my style of photography, I am simply capturing what comes upon me as I am walking or traveling. That doesn't mean that I just pull my camera to my eye and shoot however - - - even if I have only taken one quick shot and moved on.

I will always make quick adjustments in my body positioning and more often that not, I anticipate something more interesting happening and so get in a better position and just wait for it to unfold or not.

The situation for this image was that I first noticed some girls taking photos of each other around a huge rock formation that has a uniquely shaped rock sitting on the top of it. I was shooting down the length of the beach with a long lens - which gave a nice compression effect.

I am including a Contact Sheet of all of the photos that I took that included this specific content. The shots were actually not taken all one right after the other. I would keep an eye on what was going on, and then continue shooting other things, before turning my camera back on the rocks and girls.

Fortunately for me, the girls moved up on the rock formation and eventually one of them climbed up onto the lone rock to pose for the other girls cameras. Only one frame had all of the elements just perfect and then some of the girls lost interest and turned away - the scene quickly disintegrated. The last shots were my attempts to catch an interesting moment with the large waves crashing behind them. Nothing came of that.

Here is the contact sheet of photos I took during the development that led to the perfect capture. The first image was taken at 5:35PM and the final in the contact sheet was a bit after 5:38PM - so about 3-1/2 minutes in total:

 

[Robert Watcher]

So getting home, I ran through all of the images and quickly recognized the image that I wanted. It is circled in Red on the Contact Sheet.

THE CONTENT AND COMPOSITION HAVE TO BE THERE FIRST.

No image of mine would ever be complete with out some processing work done to enhance sharpness, contrast, colour, saturation, etc - or without selective dodging and burning.

All of my initial processing work is completed from within Adobe Lightroom. Here I have the original Selected Image from the camera - - - and below my processing to enhance all of the basics of the image, that includes the Lightroom Interface showing some of the settings too get to this look:

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[Robert Watcher]

Well, that Lightroom Processed image file suits me fine as a general image. But it's only part way there.

I am interested in creating captivating artistic pieces. And so I often like pushing my images much farther and so ran the processed image through one of my Custom Presets in Google's ColorEfex Pro with some tweaks and adjustments to the settings.

This is my taste - in other words a Final Image that pleases me. That is what I am after in my Creative Photography endeavours. My processing is done to look best in print, and hopefully it is acceptable on many devices and monitors too:

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[Robert Watcher]

As well, I always have the option of creating an artistic Black and White image if I choose - or if that is what is needed to match the toning of other images being displayed in the same series.

I have applied a moody tone to the file. Oh but also notice the girls on the left are from another file. A favourite method of mine is to sometimes combine the best parts of images into a more perfect composition.

I do that by clicking on "Open as Layers in Photoshop" - then I select the layers and use Photoshops "Auto Align Layers" tool, in the Edit menu - then create a mask to paint out the areas that need to be exposed. When done - just click "Save" (not Save As) and the combined efforts are put back into Lightroom to continue on with processing and outputting:

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[Doug Kerr]

Hi, Rob,

Thanks for that most informative essay, and for showing both the intermediate steps and the lovely final result(s).

Best regards,

Doug

 

[Tom dinning]

Nice one, Robert.
It's fun watching others go about their business.

I understand what you have done here. Most of us would go through a similar process.
I don't see this as anything creative, though. It's more of a mechanical process. Actions, preordained steps to an end.

The creative process is at a different level, one that I have difficulty in putting in my sort of order.
It's more of th and thinking behind the actions. Responses to such things as
Choosing this scene above others to photograph.
Shooting many shots instead of one or two.
Selecting particular stances, equipment, time of day etc.
Deciding on what post processing will occur.i know you do these things. What is interesting is why each step,it's done in a particular way and what is it you are looking for.
Why choose that particular shot?
Why process it in that particular way?
Why print it?
Why is it 'perfect'?

I wondering if you can give any insight into that part of the creative process.

Cheers
Tom

 

[fahim mohammed]

Be, and It Was.

That is the creative process.

All other processes are just interpretations.

Thanks Robert for an informative article to go from a photo to maybe a print.

Best.