On the left is Straight out of camera. On the right is edited.
Tonight may not be the best night to write this post but it's been brewing for some time... Very often when I share my photos I often end up hearing, "well, that's edited right?" for the most part none of my photos are straight out of camera (SOOC). This goes back to the days when I was working on film. Back then the work was done in a darkroom (dodging and burning by hand), now it's done in Photoshop.
Most people don’t mean anything by it (I think) but “other photographers” say it in a condescending way. It reminds me of a time (early in my photography) when I didn’t know how to explain the work others have done or how to recreate it so I assumed it was Photoshop magic and it made me feel better because “they were not better than me” they just knew Photoshop better.
Now that I’m several years into my photography career I look at my work and other works from a different perspective. Just because something comes, “straight out of camera(SOOC)” doesn’t make it any more “real” than something that’s edited. First of all an image SOOC is not necessarily exactly what you see or “real”...
In my life I’ve never felt very confident in my swimming, but I’d always admired the sea and people at home in the water. As a child I remember watching a show with Jacques Cousteau and he spoke about photographing life under the sea. I distinctly remember him saying that a camera can never capture the true colors of life under the sea, to see it in real life is so much more vibrant. I have no doubt this is true. There have been many times in my life that I have taken a photos and looked at the image and it does not capture the beauty I see right in front of me, sometimes to be there is the only way to experience it...
Other times a little space in between the experience and the retelling of the experience is all that’s needed. I often explain this occurrence as a memory I share with a friend. When we each tell the story the story always has our own color or variation to it. I also believe that in a few years they’ll “remember it (summer for example) better”. What I mean by better is that the story of their summers on the lake will be told without the flies or the bug bites or the nights when baby didn’t get enough sleep so they had a melt down at a fancy dinner. Instead they’ll tell the stories of fireflies, campfires, s’mores and playing in the woods and lake giggling all day. Both stories are true and both took place, some just have more color.
Above is a photo I took Straight out of camera (left) and edited in Photoshop (right). The image is not that much different and to be honest in real life it was brighter and pinker. Both are real and both are beautiful and it's art my art. Most mornings my cabin is pink with sunlight that I wish the world could experience with me. Until then you’ll have to take my word for it or just appreciate my photo of it...