# [Wet Thumb Forum]-photo editing software - good or bad ?



## h317 (Feb 2, 2003)

To a novice like me, photo editing software helps a lot. See the example below:

Original shot:









Modified with "Auto Contrast", "Auto Levels" and "Auto Color" in Photoshop:










What's your take on the using such software to enhance pictures?

Pictures of my tank

[This message was edited by Dr.Jay on Thu May 01 2003 at 08:06 PM.]


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## 2la (Feb 3, 2003)

> quote:
> 
> Originally posted by h317:
> What's your take on the using such software to enhance pictures?


My personal stance is detailed in the last three paragraphs of my first post in this thread (page 2). I'm curious to know how much software adjustment/enhancement is done for full-tank photos posted in the Aquascaping Gallery?

2la


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## imported_Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 31, 2003)

Using Photoshop to fix the contrast etc is fine. Messing with color saturation
IMO isn't right unless the white balance when you took the picture really
threw the colors off. In most of the pictures I take, I use the autocontrast
and nothing else. In some I may also use autolevels but thats only a handful.
If most of the background is dark and theres a patch or two of color
showing through - I'll airbrush it with black to make the picture balanced.
No need to mess with the colors of fish - they're gorgeous as it is!

-
Ghazanfar Ghori


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## Guest (May 2, 2003)

1. Are we against using photoshops in photography ?
2. Is it cheating or improving ?

Join as at www.njas.net


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## Guest (May 2, 2003)

1. Are we against using photoshops in photography ?
2. Is it cheating or improving ?

Join as at www.njas.net


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## Birgit & Wolfgang (Feb 5, 2003)

My take on that one is:
I use those tools quite a lot. But only to make the pictures look like the real tank does.

I use sharpening, color correction (just like I would use filters with nondigitals). And brightness and contrast settings.

Oversaturated pictures look unnatural anyway, so why play with colours. Sometimes I even reduce colour intensity (most of all greens and reds).

www.naturaquarium.at
view some of our pictures


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## 2la (Feb 3, 2003)

Anybody ethically opposed to sharpening photos with a digital editor? I've tended to avoid that on the premise that it represented doctoring, but if it's an acceptable practice here I'd be glad to abandon the notion!


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## Birgit & Wolfgang (Feb 5, 2003)

Why?
Nature is much sharper than a picture can ever be!

www.naturaquarium.at
view some of our pictures


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## h317 (Feb 2, 2003)

> quote:
> 
> I use sharpening, color correction (just like I would use filters with nondigitals). And brightness and contrast settings.


I agree. Enhancing pictures is more or less the same as adding filters with nondigitals. It just give user a chance to improve a picture that is otherwise well composed.

I would say it's not cheating as I don't reap benefits from enhancing my pictures. I don't see it as a problem as well if the pictures are enhanced lightly before being entered for contest.

If I have the skill, I may key in some thriving plants into my tank pictures and you can then call foul









Pictures of my tank


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## Birgit & Wolfgang (Feb 5, 2003)

Right at the moment I practice retouching with my best holiday pictures. I remove dust from the scanned slides. IMO that is not cheating, because in real life there is no dust of that relative size in the air.

The same with backgrounds:

Fortunately most of my pictures have a really fine black background. 
But if they wouldn´t have, I´d think about retouching. Why not. The tank background in real life is black, so what is the difference. I would just try to make it look like it actually is.

Our eyes can adapt very fine to everything (we see good contrast - especially in shaded areas, great depth of field, perfect colours). Our camera can´t. Editing software give us the possibility to do the job our eyes usually do.

www.naturaquarium.at
view some of our pictures


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## Phil Edwards (Jan 22, 2004)

As long as what we do doesn't misrepresent the actual aquarium, especially in a competition, then minor editing/corrections are fine. In fact, I should probably do some on my pics..









Proverbs 3:7-8


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## imported_locus (Feb 2, 2003)

Regarding color: different film stocks and printing methods in photography will give you different results with color. Digital photography just makes it a little easier for the average joe to do this without having to consider film choice, lighting & printing to a high degree.

An example of this outside the digital realm is slide vs. negative photography - if you were to compare the color reproduction you get when shooting on a roll of Velvia transparency film to the reproduction you get shooting with a regular negative film, the difference would be astounding.

Most people here shooting digital would not have top of the range cameras with the highest possible megapixels or best CCD/Lens combinations. This restriction alone means that you MUST use software such as photoshop to tweak your images. If I were shooting on film, I would certainly take the time to perform such processes when printing photos, so I see no reason why it should be different with digital.

Just my 2 cents.


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## 2la (Feb 3, 2003)

locus, I don't think tweaking photos is the main concern with Phil, Ghazanfar, and I, but that we caution people from portraying their subjects beyond their realistic appearance. The question then becomes, what entails realistic? Photojournalistic publications certainly feature pictures where the colors appear more saturated and vivid than I'd expect them to appear in real life, but I can never say for sure since I wasn't there when the picture was taken. "Real life" also gets altered when put under different lighting conditions including the flash, but I think this is acceptable as long as we aren't, say, shooting a fish under blacklight and trying to pass it off as Coralife Day Max.









 
(Click for pics)


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## JamesHoftiezer (Feb 2, 2003)

I practice limited color and contrast correction, but not alteration. I do it to represent the aquascape as it acually exists.

Until I can get polarizing filters there is a huge washout that occurs in the top of the tank from the lights which is not present in real life. The CCD of the camera pics up the brightest spots and corrects for it. To represent the tank accuratly, I have to drop it back down.

If you change the picture to improve the appearance beyond reality I feel you are altering the picture. To add greens or reds out the original balance would be inappropriate.

Any type of 'tool' work would also be inappropriate for aquascapes. I could use paintbrush to enhance the colors of my fish or to remove the speckles of the sediment in the water. I could also target plants with subdued reds and make them brighter. Heck I could cut and paste plants that aren't even in the aquarium. Any of these would be against the rules in the contest and shouldn't be used. Even in day to day pictures.

The only place I feel 'tools' are appropriate is manufacturing commercial logos, banners, backgrounds, etc(i.e. - 2la's banner). In that context it is understood that alteration and painting occurs.

*James Hoftiezer

Tank Journal - Aquascape ( Latest / Archive )
Tank Journal - Parts and Construction ( Latest / Archive )*


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## 2la (Feb 3, 2003)

> quote:
> 
> Originally posted by JamesHoftiezer:
> The only place I feel 'tools' are appropriate is manufacturing commercial logos, banners, backgrounds, etc(i.e. - 2la's banner).


What're you talking about, James? That's a 2la fish, _Estudiantis medicinalis_. I happened to catch it as it was chasing the _Nanochromis_ across the...aahh...never mind...









 
(Click for pics)


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## JamesHoftiezer (Feb 2, 2003)

OK ... didn't mean anything negative ...









BTW> Could you send me the code you use for the banner?

*James Hoftiezer

Tank Journal - Aquascape ( Latest / Archive )
Tank Journal - Parts and Construction ( Latest / Archive )*


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## 2la (Feb 3, 2003)

Omit the extra spaces:

[u r l = "website URL"] [i m g]image URL[/i m g][/u r l]

 
(Click for pics)


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