PHOTOGRAPHY EXPOSED

PHOTOGRAPHY EXPOSED

by John Peters A.R.P.S.



  

CUT (AS IN CUT & PASTE) (EDITING)

There will be some of you that class yourselves as 'purist type photographers' who may frown upon what they regard as the alteration of an 'original' image. Quite often I find these so called 'purist' togs (photographers), simply don't know how to cut and paste, have never tried it, their job (e.g. press,) may restrict there use of cut n paste, or for some other reason, are against using cut n paste. Show me a successful photographer that doesn't clone, cut n paste or edit their images in some way - they are 'fairly thin on the ground'. This is not the place to argue for or against using cut n paste, so let's assume you wish to use it.

Cutting or a cut, for our purposes, can be regarded as selecting then copying or saving an area of an image that can be pasted or merged with a different image at a later point in time. Please see EDITING for a more detailed explanation of a 'cut'.

TOP TIP More so with digital photography as opposed to film photography, finishing off an image or editing is more important. You will be pleased to here that editing digital images is cleaner, more flexible and a lot easier than with film. With digital, I tend to think of it as more of a two stage process, the taking of a photo and the making of a photo (often done within editing). Editing (cut n paste) is entirely optional, at least be aware of the possibilities. So, stage 1 is the taking, stage 2 is the making of a photograph.

MIDDAY COWBOY. An example of replacing a bacground.
The first image labelled cut5, was enhanced with a 'cut' portion from a series of horse images, and in my opinion, gives a stronger image. Although an example of 'advanced' editing, it shows that the 'cut n paste' option can be useful, replacing the background with a suitably cut n pasted scene.

BEGINNERS CUT N PASTE

Seagull on post -before Seagull on post -after
A basic image taken on a smartphone, the starburst sun pasted in later using smartphone software (a cheap app) to provide a stronger image. A more detailed description of this and similar operations appears under PAINT.NET

This sort of image manipulation may not be everyones cup of tea, you can make the choice.

TOP TIP It helps if the object being pasted is of similar size, the direction of the lighting is similar to the main object, watch out for shadows too. A fuller description of cut n paste using free software appears under 'PAINT.NET'. The following images could be done in paint.net, see the tutorial.

Highland cattle
The Highland cows in their original setting. Notice the direction of the lighting. See the image below. Cut out the cows, paste into a new layer of the landscape scene, then combine the layers.

 Highland cattle
Recognise the mother and youngster? The footprints were the icing on the cake.

TOP TIP Learn to shoot with combinations in mind. The final image of the cows and winter scene was sold as a 'greetings card'. (advanced)