I've been developing a new editing technique in Camera Raw, and I must say that I'm quite getting obsessed with it. The technique is giving so many old photographs a brand-new life. The amount of details hidden in some photographs that I took over many years is mindblowing. It's quite interesting as well. It is as if I'm finding new treasures in my directories. This is a great thing, but this also comes with adding a bit more challenge to the choice that I have to make. It has been my task for quite some years now to clean up my directories full of photographs. Deleting photographs. If you've been reading some of my latest blog posts, you might have learned that I had 400,000 photographs sitting on my hard drive (12 years of photography), and now I have around 100,000. While this still may seem to be a lot. Fractions are being used, and some are being kept for potential future reference for artwork and such.
Whenever I blog about and include old photographs, I have to scan my blog to see if I have published them. It's stupid. Do you know why? I always think that I've 100% sure published these photographs, but then came to the realization I didn't publish them on Hive. Lulz. Scanning may not be a stupid thing to do. I try to keep everything as exclusive as possible. This often includes re-editing, re-inventing the photograph that I took, and writing as I go. For example. I have written a tiny bit about the longest art exhibition in the world, which is also located in Sweden (the reason why I went to Stockholm the first time), it is part of many subway stations. If I take a look at that blog, and the current blog posts that I write, there is a huge difference between providing information, sharing photographs, and including more photographs. It kind of gives me the time and opportunity to reflect on myself.
You see, when I first started on Hive, I had zero experience in writing personal blog stories or writing long-form blog posts. Yeah, I had enough experience in writing case studies for some clients, or writing in-depth project briefs/proposals, but never the personal thing. It's awesome to see how much I have grown (if I may say so myself) as a content creator. Writing has always been a challenge for me, but right now; as I'm getting more comfortable with stuff "not perfect for Ruben" I kinda gave myself some more room to breathe in and portray my blogs more as myself. Of course, I still have to think a lot harder, be much more precise with translation, and show more patience when it comes to things such as the case study for HBD that I did. Not everything has to be professional, and I think that writing about my stuff is a perfect way to vent.
Not sure what happened there, but I might have taken off a different path in starting this blog than I wanted, which happens most of the time. Also in real life. Lol. So, let's get back to it. The technique that I've been developing is quite impressive. I had yet to find a way to cheat and hack the "Dehaze" option in Camera RAW. I thought it was too destructive in a way. But, what I usually did with Color correcting, was try to reverse-engineer color correction. For example, I wanted a blue-toned picture, so I started with more orange. Then I had to brute force it to get back to the original colors. This is a great practice to understand colors, but you'll learn even more about the boundaries of your photographs and how to color correct them with much more control.
So, I did the same with Dehaze. While you usually slide it to the right to "dehaze", I thought... let's "dehaze" the other way around, and make a flat image. I was super surprised at HOW MUCH DETAIL is recoverable. It also gave a super smooth touch overall to these photographs. Keep in mind that this may not always work for some photographs, but I guess if you're photographing in cinema style (SLOG3), which is removing contrast and a bit of saturation. One must-have is shooting in RAW files. I'm afraid that JPGs don't store as much data as RAW files do. Another note is, that it will take quite some tweaking to get back all that contrast, and stuff can get pretty sensitive here, so it requires some additional post-processing afterward. All these photographs from Sweden are almost edited with this technique. Quite a lot of fun!
How do you process your photographs? And since I mentioned that I noticed the progress that I had made with blogging. Do you have problems with writing a blog? If so, let me know if you have questions (maybe I can write a blog with some tips about it). And, if you're a long blogger and you noticed the same, give yourself a compliment! Blogging can be challenging as well!
Cheers,
Ruben
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That last rock looks like the tin deposit rocks on the coast in Valheim! hahaha I think it's cool you have found a way to renew your old stuff and in photography, i don't think it's uncommon to find new things in old photos that were overlooked before. I think the way we look and see changes over time, just like our skill sets and interests.
I'm glad that you realize that even if you demand perfection out of yourself, that your audience and friends here don't have the same level of expectation. So, the more you relax and let go and just express yourself with no regrets... the more free you will be. I don't think you should lower your standards... just perhaps your expectations. Just my two cents browski!
This is why we're homies. Thanks a lot Terry. This means a lot!
I remember when I started with Hive I thought that there is nothing I can say that would be interesting for others to read. I actually still feel the same 🙂 but I keep overcoming this fear with writing each of my posts. My account quickly became a travelling account and I found my passion in it. As I said, I still doubt myself but it's always only until I click on submit.
I edit my photos with Lightroom since many years. I used to take pictures with my Nikon D750 which was so great but the camera with lens is way too heavy for me as I have some issues with my arm, so now I only take pictures with my phone but it's not ideal. I hope to heal my arm soon, so that I can start walking around with my camera again 🙂
Great photos! Thank you for sharing them as well as your 'vulnerability'.
Have a great day!
PS: My favorite photo is the 3rd one. I enjoy the focus on the rock with the sun reflection. I also love the warmth that is coming out of this picture. It makes me feel safe and cozy.
Hey! I saw you at HiveFest, didnt I! Thanks for taking the time to comment. We all have our demons to fight, and after checking out your blog myself after reading the following:
Yeah... your blogs are amazing! And inspiring to others. Please let me make my point; I also thought Interlaken was a city (it isn't a city? what? huh (confused now)), and you also taught me something new, and actually, I wanna go back to Switzerland now to take photographs at the top of the Jungfraujoch or visit the Ice Museum (@lackofcolor sounds like a plan?).
But yeah... I know exactly how you feel, I also have the same thing, until I hit submit the feeling goes away. First I just wanted to say something like "knowing that no one cares, and those who do care will show up eventually", but you don't need this, you just need to write and hit submit ;). Hopefully, your arm will heal soon!
Have you gotten the chance to visit Mt. Zermatt / Matterhorn yet? It's still on my bucket list.
Yes! We saw each other but we didn't talk together. Let's make up for it next time 🙂
Thank you for the compliments 🙂 It's really rather a small town or a big village, I was surprised to see it. But it's still worth to visit as it's the starting point to plenty of hikes. You should definitely go to Jungfraujoch. It's amazing. And I've heard that you can actually take a guided tour along the glacier with fantastic views of Eiger, Mosch and Jungfrau. I hope, we'll get to do it soon.
I have never been to either of them as it's quite far away from where we live, so we need to take a weekend to go there. But it's definitely on my list too. This year, we plan to travel even more around Switzerland so I might get there.
I agree, I think we all have our doubts about what we want to say but once it's out there, it's gone. It's been ages with my arm but it's getting better now as I'm spending less time on the computer than I used to 🙂
Thank you for getting back to me! 🙂
Sounds like a plan! If I can make it to HF of course :P
Oh my, I've been to Interlaken twice, and haven't visited the Ice Museum both times xD! I also stayed twice at Aeschi bei Spiez, with a incredible view of Niesen, and the Jungfrau I believe. But I haven't been on top of the mountain(s), so that might be a great thing to do when I visit Switzerland again.
Matterhorn is at Zermatt, it's a pretty famous movie location as well. Maybe you'll recognize it if you check this, or this view. The road to get there is unfortunately long and mostly on foot, so quite a challenge to get there.
Anytime, and enjoy the rest of your day :))
Wow I love sunset and you clicked some aesthetic photos of rocks it's beautiful.
Thank you Sandeep :)
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Cool write-up.
thanks