That contrasty image looks quite nice. I used to shoot high contrast black and white film and then push the contrast even further in the darkroom. Looks go in and out of fashion. Some of the best rated high art photography out there at the moment has ultra high contrast.

Yeah it's definitely a judgement call Lex. In my personal opinion people go way overboard in high-contrast photography. There are some who do it really well. I love the contrasty look of Daido Moriyama or Jacob Aue Sobol but I do still think in everyday use it's way overdone. When you make a print from the less contrasty version of this image it holds the mood of the day - hazy and overcast and moody. High contrast just kills that mood.

PSA has new category for BW photos this year (if not mistaken), my friends modify their camera (remove & add) to become infrared camera and could get many accepted photos for that new category. Those photos could fixed in camera..to be high contrasty (for me, is over-processed sin in camera).. One of my friends have 240 photos accepted for 2 categories..

The more processing I do the more subtle I become with it. I look back at shots I processed a few years ago and cringe. Thanks for the article!

Don't worry, even established publications like national geographic have ruined their photos by the same over-processing which is astonishing to me.

diddo, I have seen some of my pictures and im like "holly vignette Batman" lol and I have no desire to set there for a long time editing, less editing gives me more time for other creative things

I'm exactly the same - I'm even considering going over the first couple of weddings I did and just doing it all again! :-)

Surprised no one has mentioned it - unless I've missed it - but overdoing the Clarity slider in Lightroom is common (although it is tempting...)

I try and over do it every time I can :)

Yes, that's a very common problem mark.

I try to avoid those extreme manipulations very consciously and, in case of doubt, I always reduce instead of increasing the post-processing.

I particularly agree with your last point; I have been there myself more often than I would like to admit, and normally the results are not that good. Yeah, you turn a mediocre image into an acceptable one, but making it "good" is impossible. For that you have to get it right in camera. So true!

My personal contribution: a monochrome photowalk along the railtracks in Bangkok. I hope I didn't over process any of the captures there! http://gonzalobroto.blogspo...

I learned news photography on a Speed Graphic and spent most of a lifetime working with the unrelentingly WYSIWYG nature of slide film. Get it right in the camera!

Great article. I agreed on many of your points. I think too often people try to justify poor processing as artistic or aesthetic choices. Often those choices are made by just discovering a 'new' technique and getting a little too excited about it or trying to follow short term trends.

Thanks Marek - completely agree.

IMO, over-processing screams 'Beginner'. It's the biggest mistake that newbies fall in. However, the amount of processing doesn't matter. The key is to get a result that looks natural, if you are not aiming at artistic look.

Completely agree! Over-processing was meant more to mean the final look. You can process a lot and still have it look natural.

Yes yes and yes!! Lol.
I do some of them. :(

This is one of the best, simplest and most meaningful articles I have read for the black and white fine art photographer. All common faults we make in an attempt to heighten image appeal.

Happy you enjoyed it Ira!

Well, sometimes I do one or more of the above, beyond the point of the photo being a 100% accurate depiction of reality, but isn't that the value of artistic expression?

I don't do it by accident, and take great care not to create artifacts, haloes, clipped areas etc. I much prefer the high contrast version of the Plaza Hotel and think the garish version of the Taxi shot is only slightly overdone and would look great if the global saturation was dialled back slightly - certainly more so than the leftmost "correct" version.

The overly vignetted and the overly sharpened ones are poor but both of those look like technical errors rather than artistic taste; this being my point; if you deliberately push the contrast / saturation into unrealistic territory, but without creating obvious technical errors (clipping, haloes etc), then surely it's artistic, and therefore down to the artists' own style, rather than being 'sin'?

In my opinion a far worse sin is "HDR for HDR's sake" with sharp-edged clouds and brutally sharp colours and textures...

Of course it's about artistic impression Steven and it's certainly up to each person's opinions, but even by extreme standards the Plaza Hotel and Taxi shot are extremely overdone.

You can certainly create a high-contrast style to your work but my point is that for beginners this is often way overdone and viewing images only over the internet is probably one of the main factors. Over-done seems normal by comparison. This is not about not eventually creating a high-contrast style to your work, it's just noticing at first that it's so easy to overdo high contrast and saturation and other effects in creating good images and a lot of people make that mistake.

Where do you draw the line, though? I agree with Steven, I think the 'overdone' pictures are much better (except the vignette and sharpening), coming at it as a viewer. So, if I like it as a viewer, how am I to say it's too much as a beginning photographer?

interesting article, even if IMHO images in items "2" and "3" feel a bit "underprocessed". Maybe it's just the comparison that makes them flat, but I think a mixed version between the "base" and "extreme" could work better.
Cheers

It's definitely the comparison and the 600pixel wide size that might make them seem flat. If you were to open a photo book the 'flat' images would actually seem much more beautiful, moodier, and interesting. Even though it's a value judgement, the internet tends to make people over-processing and why those images seem flat to you.

Great article, thanks for the advices!
In my case, I am just getting started in digital post processing and it is very helpful to read about self contention when modifying some basic parameters.

My pleasure Robert. I suggest trying Lightroom and when in doubt aim on the subtle side of editing.

In essence bringin the power to do everything to your fingertips has not done any good in any field in human endeavors! The same has happened to music, movies,photography in this case.
Maybe it's best to leave these to the experts but now it is too late!

Great read, I try to stay away from doing a lot of post processing and work on getting the shots right in camera.

Today, a lot of people do too much processing and to some it looks like "wow" but it looks so fake. Grass looks like plastic, over saturated colors, totally unnatural look.

Hi. Thank you for this very informative, eye opening even, article. Most of the time, I’m guilty 😊.
Is over sharpening same as over clarity? Do you have any tips or suggestions as to the max level of sharpening or clarity, that if you go beyond those levels, the photo is just not good enough? Or is this just my illusion?😊
For example, a portrait, how do i see if it’s over sharpened or over clarity?
Thanks again!

Guilty of oversharpening and colour. Some good points about the monitor too. I'm colour blind, so always struggle with the small differences

Good article! I think the reason most of us photographers over process our images when we first start out is, as you stated, because our images do not look good enough straight out of camera. The camera settings were off when taking the shot and we try to pull a good looking image out of a mediocre exposure. As you get better, your exposures get better in camera, but we tend to hold onto our old processing habits. I think the key is to reach that point where you realize your images are finally, truly good straight out of the camera (it takes a while). At that point, you can really reap the rewards of very subtle editing. As you mention - A perfect image out of camera, needs very little post processing. Basically it comes down to taking enough pictures to get get good enough to take a good picture! Once you can finally take a good picture, it's time to stop using all your old (bad) processing habits and concentrate on where you want the viewers eye to be drawn in the image. Use refined, simple adjustments...... It can take years to reach that point because people often think their images are perfect in camera, when in-fact they are not. If you've been editing images that were bad out of camera, for years, you've gotten too used to having to add or remove too much of just about everything (contrast, sharpening, saturation, clarity, shadows, highlights). After that, its hard to stop! :o)

Hi there! I've been thinking about this issue for quite some time and have realized that most of the people (non-photographers here, I mean) do prefer the over-processed images, esp. those that include extra sharpening. I even wanted to conduct a study to try and find out what is it about over-processing (what exact parameters, and why) that people find so appealing.
It seems that the majority of photographers and photo enthusiasts try to produce images that are close to reality and only slightly corrected / enhanced. I include myself in this, I post-process images quite a lot but nowhere near some of the stuff I see online. But then I exaggeratedly play with a parameter while someone happens to be walking from behind my computer screen and they will go like "wow", and I will be like "really???"
What I am trying to say is: why would it matter if in the end most people (clients) will love the over-processed images? :) Who is right and who is wrong? Is it about capturing or about creating? :)

Yes, a very good article and quite timely for me as I have just recently figured out the same thing about sharpening, and that is that most of my photos really don't need any sharpening done and especially like I used to do and that was automatically push upwards of the 50's to 70. I shoot birds and other wildlife that hang out in the dark shade of the tree canopy and I have to mention how too much noise reduction can ruin an image and sometimes it's hard or just impossible to remove it all and still maintain a sharp photo. I have only had a budget Sigma Telephoto, but decent for the money, I guess, for less than a year and had never actually dealt with noise until I started shooting telephoto lens in low light while chasing birds in the woods. But, then, they will jump one branch over and be in harsh light or something that is challenging for me, but fun. But, I was guilty of most of all these bad habits at some time or another. And, yes, I finally learned that you can pull back on the saturation, clarity, contrast and the other sliders a lot of the time but I used to never even consider it. I suppose you learn more as you grow but you have done a very good job in writing this article and the previous article that I just read by keeping it fresh and also a very educational tutorial for where I am in my photography. I think a good measuring stick for how well received a tutorial is, is by the number of people that are not only commenting but also sharing their experiences that I also find very educational. Well done!

There is not such thing as over process, it is called different taste

Thanks James and DPS. Yes I was absolutely into this over-processing trouble, at first because I was looking for an "artistic" look to bring to my images, but now I'm almost totally disappointed with my portfolio. Thus I'm concentrating only on light, subject and composition, no more than 5 minutes of editing for each photograph and often I try to practice to view the image in b&w BEFORE taking the photo itself. Photography is far more beautiful, interesting and storytelling than over-photo-processing-fake-art.

Overprocessing is a concern - I don't want to do that. I took some photography school classes which helped me tremendously. My goal was to be consistent & to get as much right in camera, to do minimal editing.
Great article.

I admit that on some of my photos I deliberately overprocess to get the effect I want, particularly on art shots. I take photos of discarded and found objects in situ, and I like to make them look deliberately high contrast and oversharp and saturated, however for other pictures - landscapes and people I like to use the bare minimum. It does depens on context, and I would say that if it is what the photographer intends then it isn't an issue.

Just like everything else in life, you have to do it and learn from it. If a little bit of contrast looks better, then a lot of contrast looks great! Everyone has to go through the process, no pun intended...

Try switching to colorpriority in stead of highlightpriority when adjusting vignetting in lightroom. Much more subtle. Btw, I even adjust my camerasettings considering what I know I will do in post processing. Underexpose for instance. To keep colors alive.

Yes! And over processing the eyes should be in here as well. As a portrait photographer I try hard to find the light and get natural catchlights in the eyes. I rarely do any processing on eyes after the fact unless they are too shadowed, but too many times photographers are editing eyes to the point where they look like laser beams or alien eyes. They do NOT look natural.

I always used medium-to-high contrast (that is, in Canon's Photo Professional program, contrast was always around 4, I never used more however). Now that I read this post, I played around with the shadows, highlights and contrast sliders to see what difference it makes and it makes a HUGE difference. Although sometimes contrast at 4 works quite well, there are some subjects when shadows at -5 (and contrast at 0) makes your photo pop (especially flowers and street photography). Not only does it darken the shadows, it also somehow ups the saturation in a subtle way.

Thank you for this post! I've never paid much attention to the shadows slider, but I will use it more often now and play with contrast, shadows and highlights to achieve this POP-effect that I so desperately needed for my photographs. (I have always been so dissatisfied with my photos because they looked so flat.)

Thanks, a really useful article, guilty of all of these!

I kind of feel like a lot of these are subjective. Most of the "overdoing it" photos don't look bad to me. In a couple of the examples I actually like them better.

the over contrast image is much more interesting,

Then this article is meant for you Shani. This stuff is personal opinion, but even by overdone standards, the contrast is extremely overdone.

I read once (unfortunately I just can't find who and the exact words) something along the lines of : adjust saturation until it is just right and then reduce it a little. This works for me and I now often do this as a matter of habit on some of the RAW adjustment sliders. Usually after I have done it, the reduced image does appear to be subtly better than my first bolder attempt.

Completely agree Brett - I often bring the saturation down a little bit after I am happy with the image.

Good article. Only a couple of minor differences:

1. Nobody else's monitor is calibrated the same as yours so the only point to it is if you are printing to paper. If the only other viewers of an image are going to be on their own screens, no need to go nuts about monitor calibration. Most of us own several screens in our own homes that show the same image wildly differently regardless what we do.

2. Photography is split between highly composed and planned shoots, where the idea is to get it right in camera, and the opposite sheer good luck of just happening to be there at the right place and time to capture an unrepeatable event. In the latter situation, the shot will rarely be right in camera and god bless Photoshop or whatever.

Thanks Albin. I agree about the calibration comment, which is why it is so important to have your monitor calibrated. Otherwise you will work your image to look good on your monitor but when printed or shared the image will look completely different.

It's certainly not possible to get the images correct in camera every time, and when it's not Lightroom and Photoshop are indispensable, but the point that I meant to make was to try as hard as you can to get it right in the camera.

There are not right and wrong when comes to many things, including taking photos. If things are under controlled, then it must have some reasoning why the photographers do so; otherwise (if things are not under controlled), then it could be technically deficiency or error, or uncontrollable environments. Something errors could be inviting. If here are right and wrong in final result (photos) and processes (photo taking processes and post-processing processes), then every photo will be have same patterns, will they look dulll and uninteresting? Assume every photo is beautiful in same way, same lighting, angle, composition, color, depth perception, shadow etc.. ;}. And if there are right and wrong in phototaking, perhaps it could be a great mistake to have Manual Mode and handcarry capable cameras... Blame the manufacturer for not creating "right" cameras. Just that, my technique and output may not fix your taste.. that's all ;)lol. If people keep saying you can't do this you can't do that, it ends up with no innovation to solve new problems.

Cameras are just tools to do thing. Not only photographers use them, but health therapist, artists, comics and many other people use them for many other purpose. They may need different output of photos to meet their different needs. I could not agree with "you can't fix it" based on ur need.. Setting limits limits the innovation / creative idea / new exploration..

When it comes to infrared photography, after removing some component physically inside the camera body, you add another infrared filter tot he camera. It ends with very high contrast photos, the white means white, the black means black, and no grey. Without the physical modification of camera, we may need to fix our photos.. This way, we fix our camera to fix our photos...

And, when I try to creating live motion in still photography to fix my photo, or when i am combining video with still photos, or when i am creating virtual world using both photo and video in virtual CAVE (find it if you don't know), to fix my photos, or when i do computational photography to enable real-time focusing on my still photos.. all are fixing photos using software to get what I want.. there is no right and wrong. I fix my photos to be overlapped so people could use special filter glass (either passive or active) to get 3D illusion..

Overdoing vignette for example, give totally different semantic to viewers. Could it means "spying a girl via telescope from very far"? rather "following the girl behind very near"... So, there is no right/wrong in phototaking, it casts different semantics and syntax.