Does using Lightroom or Photoshop mean you’re faking a photo?
In an era where modern cameras boast incredible resolution, dynamic range, and ISO performance, you might wonder: why do photographers still spend hours editing images after shooting? The answer lies in understanding how digital cameras, especially when shooting in RAW, are designed to capture data, not final images. Unlike your phone’s camera, which processes images on the fly to deliver vibrant photos instantly, a professional camera gives you the raw ingredients. To turn those into a finished dish, post processing is not optional, it’s essential.
To fully comprehend this, one must first understand that the human eye possesses an extraordinary dynamic range, estimated at around 21 stops (where each stop means doubling of light intensity) when accounting for its ability to adapt to varying light conditions through pupil dilation and neural processing. It does take time to see inside in the darkness in cinema theatres when entering from the brightness outside. However this range allows us to perceive details in both bright highlights and deep shadows simultaneously, a feat that surpasses the capabilities of most digital cameras. In comparison, high end digital cameras, offer dynamic ranges of approximately 15 to 17 stops. While these figures are impressive and continue to improve with technological advancements, they still fall short of the human eye’s adaptability. This discrepancy underscores the importance of post-processing in photography, where techniques like exposure blending and tone mapping are employed to bridge the gap between the camera’s limitations and the eye’s perception, enabling photographers to create images that more closely resemble the scenes as experienced by the human observer.
When you take a photo with your phones camera, it doesn’t just record an image. Without your knowledge it has immediately applied sophisticated computational algorithms, enhancing highlights and shadows, boosting saturation, sharpening details, and reducing noise. It’s done all the heavy lifting for you. In contrast, professional cameras, to preserve the full dynamic range, bake in all the unprocessed information in the RAW file. It’s your job, as the photographer, to decide how that image should look. This is where artistic license comes in.
Photography is not just a science, but an established and powerful form of visual art. In photography, capturing reality is only the beginning. The person behind the camera is not merely a technician, but an artist. Because every step, from choosing a subject to deciding on light, colour, and composition, is part of this creative process. The final image is not just a record of what was seen, but an expression of how that moment was interpreted and how the photographer chooses to communicate it. The story which started out there, this is where it finalises.
Artistic vision is deeply personal. No two photographers are the same. One photographer might favour bold colours and exaggerated contrast, while another may prefer soft tones and subtle textures. Since part of the story starts in the minds eye, choosing to stylise their images, even embracing surreal edits or painterly effects in their work is part of the visual narrative. Others lean toward a more photojournalistic or documentary approach, aiming to share the scene as they ‘experienced it’, while still making intentional decisions about light, framing, and mood. More so in nature photography, artistic expression plays a vital role in shaping how a moment is felt, not just how it is seen.
There are no rules, only choices. Each photographer brings their own inclinations, intentions, and visual narrative into the frame. This is where the emotional richness and diversity of photography stems from, artistic license. Whether it is a minimalist black and white landscape, a richly detailed bird portrait, or an abstract play of shadows and form, all are valid forms of expression. Each reveals not only the subject in front of the lens, but also the eye, heart, and mind behind it.
Ultimately, it is not about how the world looks, but how the photographer sees it. That perspective is what transforms a photograph from a simple image into a work of art with a story behind it.