Nature Photography Section Six Recap

            The sixth and final section of our natural photography book was titled "Digital Processing."  The first area focused on "Digital Darkroom Equipment: Storing images in the field and processing them in the studio."  In nature photography you are most likely going to be adventuring in the field, no where near a computer or back up device.  This is why nature photographers typically do what they can to carry multiple smaller memory cards so they are not "putting all their eggs in one basket."  You always want to be prepared for a malfunction or the possibility of losing a card.  By having multiple, you always have a back up just in case. 
             If you are working somewhere where you might not have a computer available for some time, you may want to consider having a portable storage drives.  This will allow you to move all your images as well as see what your battery level and space available is.   If you are only looking for backup storage for your computer you may consider just using an external hard drive.  These are best if they are small and portable and can power and get their data from the computer.
             The other major tool you need to be a nature photographer is a computer and the software to go along with it.  You want something that is made for this type of work and will be able to deal with the constant storage of photos and software.  Adobe Photoshop is the most common type of photo editing software and is the best start out for anyone considering a career in digital photography. 
              Next the book focused on "Preparing Images for Presentation: Professional art print, website or print media display." This section focused on what you need to do to prepare your photos for display.  Not only do you need to know how to take the picture but you also need to know what you need to do to make the most out of the photo and how you need to go about that. 
             The book started out by focusing on the common way photographers take pictures which is in the RAW mode.  This allows the picture to be saved the exact way the picture was taken and does not make any adjustments or tweaking to the image.  You then need to convert this RAW image into a TIFF or PSD format before you open the photo for editing in Photoshop.  From there on the book began focusing on exact adjustments that may be done to a photo to make the best out of it. 
              When adjusting a picture you can adjust basically anything about it.  The common adjustments are; Brightness levels, levels curve, color saturation, color balance, contrast, sharpness,etc.  All of these adjustments have there own tools and ways to go about them and they all allow for freedom when creating the image you want. There are also many other adjustments our tools that may be used to basically build the image you desire.  Retouching allows for you to maybe correct those flaws you accidently got while shooting and can allow for you to maybe fix a flaw that was present in the subject no matter what.  You also have the ability to place something you possibly desired into the picture to add contrast or patterns in your images.  Overall the possibilities are endless and you really can do pretty much whatever your heart desires when editing your images.