Viewing & Editing Your Own Images
by William Lulow
Here are some words I wrote a while ago in a blog article about making prints:
I wrote a piece back in June of 2019 about making prints. I think it is still as important as ever for photographers to make prints from their digital files or from their negatives, whatever format they prefer. One of the reasons is that it is the way images were meant to be seen. But we have all become used to looking at our various screens when we are looking at photographs. But just take note of how you view photographs on either platform. When you look at your smartphone, for example, you are looking at an image, when it occupies the entire screen, of roughly 3.5″ by 2.5″. If you are looking at a tablet, iPad or something similar, the screen size is approximately 10″ on the diagonal. So we are not talking about large images here. Your computer screen could be substantially larger, but all screens don’t behave the same way. Some screens are sharper than others and the colors may be slightly different. Whenever a screen is larger, it usually takes more pixels to fill it and consequently to make a clear image. We are also swiping through literally thousands of images each time we look at our photo app! I had a friend once who wanted to show me his vacation pictures and then handed me his camera, put it in “playback” mode and showed me which button to press to play the next image! To me, that is not how photographs were meant to be viewed. I would have preferred him to make a couple of really good prints that were representative of his travels.
But looking at an image on a smartphone presents a totally different experience than looking at one on a wall in a gallery, say. One of the first things you notice is that you skip from one image to the next relatively quickly. In order to “study” an image, you have to enlarge it on your screen which means that you can’t view the total image, only parts of it. This detracts from the overall experience you get. Now, think of the images you actually stop at to examine more closely. Perhaps you use your fingers to enlarge it a bit. If you do that, you won’t get the entire image all at once. You will have to keep moving the image to see all of it. Then think of why you stopped at that image. If you can examine that motivation, you might get a hint at the kinds of images you need to shoot to make people stop and look at them closely and have a sense of awe when they view them.
So viewing a photograph on a screen is somewhat of an unsatisfying experience compared to attending a gallery exhibition of photographs that can be viewed from afar as well as close up. The other thing is that no matter what people tell you, you can never get a high-enough quality image from a smartphone unless you take the trouble to mount it on a tripod (which you can do), or take other precautions to keep the phone as steady as possible. The iPhone 13 has an upgraded camera from some of the earlier models, but its resolution is still only 12MP (megapixels). You can make an excellent 8×10″ print from that resolution, but not much bigger than that. One of my regular DSLRs has 18MP and the other has a 32MP sensor. I always have judged the resolution of any of my images by making a standard 16×20″ print. If the detail in the image was sufficient to make an excellent print that size, I knew I had enough detail in the original image. That was how I judged my image sharpness and “enlarge-ability.” I have been somewhat obsessed with making even larger prints these days for exhibitions. I now like to make 20×24″ prints. One reason is that I like not having to view the picture from such a close range. It is also easier to see and if you do move closer, you can really inspect the print to get a good sense of its quality. And, larger prints make a greater impact, all else considered. (Sometimes small prints can be effective as well. It depends on subject matter and how they are treated).
A DSLR with an 18MP sensor, creates an approximate 50MB JPEG image which translates to about 60×40″ as a print. If you shot the image in RAW format, it would generate roughly a 90MB file which you could use to fill up the side of a building. There is no doubt that, up to a certain point, the resolving power of the sensor will determine how much the image can be enlarged before it begins to lose some sharpness.
With all this being said about making prints, it represents one sure way of really determining how good an image is. If it stands up to being printed, and you think it is good enough to make a print, then it’s probably a good picture. But on this last trip I shot probably 800 or 900 images. Out of that, maybe I got 10 that I thought were good enough to print. Here is one:
I was attracted here by the various colors. I enhanced the image in post-production and retouched out some people on the right hand sidewalk. I don’t know if it is a prize-winner (I suspect not because, even though it is colorful and represents the actual place, I am not sure that it is all that unusual). I did make an 11×14 print of it though and I like the look of it overall! Because I like it doesn’t mean it’s a great piece of art.
There were actually many images I took on this trip that tended to look similar so I began making quite a few Black&White images. My thinking was to document the interesting light that I found in alleys and other walkways and roads. Here is one example. Note that detail is discernible even in the dark shadows:
This was one such location that seemed to appeal to my sense of composition as well as light and dark. Here is another monochrome image, which was shot in original Black&White and filtered rather than converted in post:
When I look at my own work, I try to assess the images based on several factors:
- Composition: The image needs to appeal to my sense of what a good composition entails. It has to draw the viewer into the frame and have enough information to keep someone’s attention.
- Tonal Values: The image has to follow basic requirements of good Black&White images. There has to be detail in the highlights as well as in the shadows and has to have one spot of pure white and one of pure black.
- Subject matter: The image has to be visually interesting. Either the action or the subject matter needs to have qualities that would make people interested in viewing it.
- Visual interest: The image, because of all the above aspects, really needs to be interesting to look at.
- Lighting: It almost goes without saying that light is a major factor in the making of photographs. By definition, they are “light images,” so the lighting is of paramount importance.
So, all the factors listed here and my gut feelings about having made the image in the first place, go into deciding if I want to print it and exactly how I would print it for some kind of impact. I actually thought about making a collection of some of the Black&White images all printed on the same page:
I was thinking about making several images as small, sort of vignettes and printing them all together. This was my first effort, but I may change my mind about this.
Editing one’s own images is often extremely difficult because you are the one who made them. You know what went into making them and therefore, carry a little prejudice when it comes to deciding if they are really print-worthy or not. We have to train ourselves to be able to look at our own work with a more objective eye. That seems to be the secret.
