5 Most Common Photo Editing Mistakes and How to Avoid Doing Them
Photo editing can be really fun. Whether you are a professional or a beginner, there is always lots of scopes to experiment, learn, and grow. When it is done right, it can add vision to life; however, just a few mistakes can ruin the beauty of your collections.
If you are eager to make photography your career, you might be curious to make your photos stay on the top among competitors. But to achieve this goal, you have to avoid some editing mistakes so that your work looks more professional.
Here we have listed the five most common photo editing mistakes and tips to avoid them; it may help you to become a professional photographer soon:
Mistake 1: Cropping too much
Let us start with the first and most common mistake. Many photographers end up ruining their photos just by overcropping them. When photographers have some specific compositions in their minds, they often try to achieve them through editing. While doing so, they often make poor framing choices and plan to remove them during editing. But this is not a good strategy for a professional photographer. When you take such vague shots while leaving all the hopes on editing, the chances are that you will end up getting blurred images out of the camera. Moreover, while improvising, you may end up cropping the details too much.
In order to fix this issue, you should always keep some extra space around the focused subject. Experts advise using a three-point rule, or you can plan the portrait as per the picture you are going to click. The surroundings must be captured carefully to ensure the image does not get blurred.
Mistake 2: Too much skin smoothening
Sometimes photographers get too excited to deliver photos with clear perfection on the looks of the subject. But in order to achieve this perfection, the photographers sometimes go overboard. Even while editing portraits, people end up turning a real person into a barbie doll with a messy plastic appearance.
Well, there are very few people who would like such kind of editing; but for most of the clients, it may look offensive. The extensive skin smoothening leads to unrealistic appeal with a lack of real factors. It doesn’t mean that you should not remove those blemishes from the skin to make it look clearer. After all, the beauty enhancement tools are meant for this only. But the editing should not create some unrealistic touch; rather, the originality must sustain in the edited picture. Just do everything in the right amount so that it looks normal and natural.
Mistake 3: Sloppy background edit
One more common mistake that photographers make while editing photos is poor background removal. Probably you are skilled enough to capture target subjects perfectly, and then using editing tools, you could enhance it. But many times, people end up ruining their images while removing the background, and ultimately, the picture may start appearing unattractive.
One of the toughest things about adjusting the background of the image is dealing with the shadows and lights and get them tuned with the subject. Well, it may appear a little bit easier when you are shooting in front of the green screen; but otherwise, it can create trouble. In order to fix this problem, you should plan ahead. In case if you are already having some specific background in your mind, you should capture the subject in such a manner that the background can be aligned with ease. Prefer to capture images in such lighting arrangements that appear close to the expected background. Advance planning can help you to achieve perfection.
Mistake 4: Messing up with HDR
Well, there is one more mistake that photographers and editors make more often, and it ends up ruining their images. Here we are talking about HDR, which is the abbreviation for High Dynamic Range. This feature can basically assist you in adjusting the details of your image while adjusting the ratio of whites and darks. The idea is to reserve the effect of some destroyed images and highlight the details more clearly.
But many editors end up using too much HDR effect, and the images turn out to be unrealistic. Hence, experts advise to stay more careful while using HDR more and try to create a balance between dark and bright details. Things should not get too highlighted that they end up destroying the actual impact of the image.
Mistake 5: Playing with contrast
Contrast is responsible for adding definition to your images. But if it is too high, it may darken the dark areas of the image by considering level, or it may whiten the whites above the threshold. In this way, you are likely to lose the actual details of the image, and they cannot be brought back. Such unappealing images may have no use anymore.
At the same time, the reverse of the above can also ruin your images. The fact is that contrast should not be too low as well; otherwise, the essential details may not be visible on your image. Although the market is influenced by the matte trend these days, too much magnification can also lead to an unrecoverable loss of details in images.
The editors should know how to use contrast to the best extent in the images and make it more appealing and original. You should prefer making layer by layer adjustments to avoid unrecoverable losses.
Key Takeaway
There is plenty of editing software and tools in the market; your selection must be careful and thoughtful enough. Make sure you know how to use the editing tools to get the best results. Avoid over-editing on images so that you do not lose the actual details.
Photo editing requires continuous practice, and it can lead to perfection with time. It is good to capture more and more pictures and then work on different compositions using the latest editing tools. It may help you to lead your photo editing company with Homiesfoto and serve the clients with utmost satisfaction.
