What I Did on My Vacation—Part 5 Revisited

Friday’s photograph drew a couple of comments—there was no way to tell the individual was a drummer without my comments and there were distractive elements in the photograph. I agree.

But, I would like to point a few things out. The photo was processed only in Lightroom (Camera RAW) and I do not have the skills to make the same type of localized corrections that I am capable of making in Photoshop. I have recently started reviewing Jack Davis’ “Lighroom: A Creative Approach” at Kelby’s Online Training. Who knows, after studying this course, I might never use Photoshop again—yea, right!

Second, in street photography, you get what you get. You cannot manage the background or the subject. I found photographing the bands at the Spearfish Art Festival to be very difficult because of all the equipment around the subject and the fact that I was often shooting up at the performers.

Tonight, I have taken the photograph into Photoshop and made some of your suggestions. I wanted the photo to be about his expression. So, I tried to eliminate as many distractions as possible and used a boarder to focus the viewer's attention to his face. Without a doubt it is a stronger image without all the junk growing out of the drummer’s head. I also did a better crop and used the high pass filter method to sharpen the drummer.

Lightroom is an outstanding product, but, I do not see me abandoning Photoshop anytime soon.

Enjoy.