Choosing Just One
The process of making the images you see on this site doesn’t stop the moment I leave a photo spot. In fact, that’s just the beginning. When I am out in the field, I take hundreds of photographs at a location, varying the composition slightly, experimenting with different long exposures, watching the changing light, capturing the unfolding of a sunset, and reminding myself to turn around because the best photograph isn’t always in the direction I came to shoot. All of that means that I have my work cut out for me when I get home. With that in mind, I thought I would give you a little glimpse behind the scenes into what it takes to get a photograph onto my website.
When I return from shooting, I can’t wait to go through the day’s creations. It’s a mixture of excitement to see what my results look like combined with the need to quickly cull any bad shots so that the number of files I am storing doesn’t become unwieldy. From there, sometimes the same night, but more likely days or weeks later, I review the photos again, picking out anywhere from a couple to ten or more of a given location to edit. The raw output from the camera is intentionally neutral and doesn’t yet reflect how the scene appeared to me. During editing, I make deliberate decisions about color, contrast, and sharpness to produce a photograph that more closely matches my experience in the field. In some cases, I also combine multiple images taken at different focus distances so that the entire composition appears sharp from foreground to background. One thing I’ve learned is how tough it can be to judge color in isolation. I often don’t notice that an edit is slightly too warm or too cool until I put two versions side by side. Seeing them together makes the differences obvious and usually leads to one final round of refinements.
Lastly comes the most challenging part. By this point, I’ve spent hours with a scene. I hiked to it, waited for the light, edited several versions, and refined each one until it felt finished. It’s almost impossible not to become emotionally attached, and that’s exactly what makes the next step so painstaking. I now have to force myself to look at them objectively and decide whether each truly represents portfolio-quality work. That isn’t just a matter of a compelling subject or accurate color balance. It’s assessing whether the image tells a story and whether I’ve given the viewer a reason to spend time with it. If I can’t answer "yes" to both of those questions, I have to eliminate the photo. From there, if I still have similar shots of a location, I narrow them down to just one. Every photograph that makes it onto this website has to earn its place. If two images tell essentially the same story, I would rather show the one that tells it best. Sometimes when I am stuck at this step, I have to call in my art consultant (aka, my mom) for help.
The remaining edits don’t simply become throwaways, however. I use them on social media, where what catches someone's attention in a few seconds isn't always what makes the strongest portfolio addition or fine art print. Sometimes they also serve as a way to see whether others agree or disagree with my final selection.
To give you a real example, the following is my portfolio photograph of Vancouver Island’s Elk Falls, “Elk’s Way”. Below it are several alternate edits that I seriously considered. See if your choice matches mine.
