Post Production and Colour Correction
Post Production and Colour Correction

Every photograph that goes out to the consumer goes through a process called post production. This is true with even the photographs taken by even the most experienced professionals.

This is a process made complicated or simple, depending on how you look at it, by the advent of digital technology and computerized processing of digital prints.

Good because it can make even a bad photograph passable. Bad, for the same reason. Even mediocre photographers can come up with stunning pictures. For this reason, in many photography competitions, they do not allow processed photographs to be submitted as entries.

Post Processing in Wedding Photography

Well begun is only half done is the saying. When your wedding photoshoot is completed, it means the first step to receiving your photos is completed. Let us talk about the rest.

The most important process after the wedding photoshoot, is called post production. This is also the most time consuming and complicated process that culminates in your beautiful photographs.

How do we process the thousands of photographs that were taken during your wedding? Of these, only a few hundred will make it to the final shortlist or the album.

Digital post production

Culling of bad photos

Photographing a wedding, especially with many sessions, would mean that the photographer is left with many thousands of photographs from the event. The bad and ugly photos need to be removed from the collection so that only the good photos remain. This is a humongous task, considering a professional has to do it manually, profiling each and every photo individually.

Once this is done, the best 100 odd photos from each session have to be filtered out to the next stage

Choosing the colour tone

In the meantime, the client may be sent a sample set of photos with different colour tones, ranging from mild colours to supersaturated, since each of us like our photos differently. The colour tone of the photo chosen by the client will be followed for the entire set of client chosen photographs.

Colour palette based on events 

Based on whether the event happening is a wedding or reception and whether it is an outdoor or an indoor celebration, there may be a standard set of colour palettes that may be provided. The choice of palette will be used for all the photographs of the event. A sample set is provided here. In this case, we have chosen 3 events and 3 variations for the colour tone.

Your choice could be a natural understated tone for all events, a warm tone for all events or a custom tone for every event that captures the essence of that particular event. We suggest following the same pattern for the entire set of events for the sake of uniformity and aesthetics, especially if you are printing an album.

You may choose the colour tone of your choice for all your photographs.

Colour correction and enhancement

This technique improves an image, either by concealing a distraction or emphasizing a strength. The photo is further improved by cropping, eliminating noise, brightening the picture, optimizing contrast to maintain the right colour vibrancy.

Retouching the close ups

Some of these photographs may have close-ups of the bride and the groom. Any blemishes in the face, pimples and pockmarks, will be corrected during this process called re-touching.

Release of teasers

After these are done, the enhanced photos are then released to the client for their visual delight and exhilaration.

Wedding album

Like the video, the photos for the album that contains those photos need to be chosen wisely. Let us understand that the album is a compilation of photos captured during the event and placed sequentially. There is a story to be read and understood, when the album is seen. 
 
So, all those acquaintances who came for the wedding and who took group photographs with us; you need to decide if they will be relevant, 10-15 years from now. If not, they need not be present in the album.

Pick and choose those photos which are close to your heart, the people who matter to you most, now and forever; they need to be part of the album. Every photo that you choose for the album, will have a story to be told. Effectively, when your album is opened and seen, a flood of thoughts will be generated that will create a sense of nostalgia, every single time.

After placing the photographs in a sequence, you may wish to highlight a certain set of photos that are more important than others. They may be highlighted in the album appropriately.

Coming to the discussion of albums, there will always be fans for the physical album. There is nothing like holding the album in our laps, flipping through each one of the photos, remembering the scene and replaying it all in our minds. There is nothing that can beat that feeling!

But, we might also see a lot of people in the albums, whom we do not remember at all; there is no feeling of connect with them. So, it brings a question to the forefront; do we need that bulky wedding album any more?

This is where we have these compact magazines, which are smaller in size and eminently portable, weigh less and most importantly, look more elegant in comparison to the traditional album.

Of course, there will always be takers for the traditional album, but we see the trend moving towards compact albums, with only photographs of close family and friends, with each photograph, evoking that sense of nostalgia in our minds.

Typically, whether it be the regular album or the photo book or magazine covers come in a variety of options, including photo covers, leatherette covers and genuine leather covers. The pages usually lay flat, covering the entire page, with 1 or more photos per spread.

The photos are printed on professional photo paper and minimal design elements and are considered to be aesthetic more and for the photos to follow in sequence.

The albums are usually flush mounted, where each printed photo is mounted on to a durable cardstock. Material used for the albums are sturdier than those used for printing the photo books or magazines.

Generally, your chosen favorite photo will be used as the cover page for the album or magazine. The finish comes in glossy, matte or lustre finish.

Wedding Album Pages come in 3 variations and a combination of these, viz., glossy, lustre and matte.

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