Is Photoshop knowledge required for professional photography

[chabu]

Hello chabu is here I want to know about professional photography. We know that there is great photo manipulation software is available on Internet. Does Photoshop knowledge is mandatory for professional photography.

I am interested in doing diploma in Professional photography not for making money but for my love for taking photos.

[dan marchant]

1. Most areas of professional photography will require that the images are post processed (be it art, commercial, food, fashion, glamour). That doesn't mean the photographer has to do that PP. There are many professional retouchers you can hire to do it.
2. There are exceptions. Professional news photographers are usually forbidden from editing there image so as not to distort the "truth"of the image.
3. If you aren't going to be a professional why take a professional photography course? One would assume that such a course would focus, at least in part, on how to run a photography business - something you don't need to learn. You would be better just doing a standard photography course.

[Manfred M]

Welcome to CiC. Would you mind clicking the "My Profile" tab at the top of this page and filling in at least your first name and where you are from? We are a fairly informal group here at CiC and go on a first name basis.

Short answer to your question is YES.

I have taken a number of advanced photography courses at the local community college that trains people who want a career in photography and the going in assumption is that people taking these courses have a working knowledge of Photoshop. Photoshop is the standard tool in the business and if you want to work at this level, you should be a competent Photoshop user.

[Mike Buckley]

I am interested in doing diploma in Professional photography

Simply determine the requirements of obtaining the diploma you are seeking. If mastering Photoshop is a specific requirement, as opposed to mastering post-processing capabilities using any software application, be sure to determine whether the diploma requires mastering Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom or Adobe Photoshop Elements.

[rpcrowe]

Welcome to Cambridge in Color...

My answer agrees with the above responses. YES, you do need to do some, and at times extensive, Post Processing (PP) in order to end up with the best imagery.

But, NO! you do not specifically need Photoshop in order to do your PP, especially for non professional use. There are several, perhaps many, photo editing programs which will allow you to do a very decent job of PP at a greatly reduced price (some are actually free).

OTOH, I would expect that if you were to enroll in a course leading to a diploma in professional photography, Photoshop would be the program of choice since Photoshop is still the standard PP program for most professional photographers...

I agree with Dan, above, that a course leading to a diploma in Professional Photography "might" not be the very best allocation of money and time resources for a person who wants to do photography on a non-commercial basis.

Donald, one of our members and coordinators, is presently enrolled in a off-campus program leading to a bachelor's degree in photography. He might be a good resource for you.

However, we will be better able to advise you, if we know a bit more about you. Where you are located is especially important,

[flashback]

A very quick search of the internet got me to here which is the page for the Professional Photographers of America. A quick search through this site shows that one can earn a PPA Certification as well as Degrees, the two being independent of each other.

In either case there appears to be a working assumption on the part of PPA that those people desiring of Certification or Degree programs are in fact working photographers. For an applicant to complete the Certification program they need first to take the exam and, completing/passing the exam then need to submit their portfolio which follows certain standards. Interestingly under FAQ's for the portfolio submission is this question: "Can I use "Painter" images in my submission?" Part of the answer to this question is: "The certification program is geared specifically toward showing solid, professional, fundamental photographic skills, not digital manipulation skills." I found neither a total ban on digital manipulation nor did I find any requirement for its use. One could in fact deduce if one is a good enough 'Certified' photographer one needn't be too concerned with fixing any 'mistakes.'

There is a compulsory image component in the portfolio submission requirements and then there are 9 other images that need to be included in the submission. I find this requirement most interesting: "The remaining nine (9) images must be representative of your
purchased work from nine (9) unique photographic assignments in the last 24 months."

So this particular certification route seems to meet the industry standards set forth by a professional association. It seems to me that, unlike taking classes at a local community college, which likely works to broaden one's horizon, the PPA Certified seems more in keeping with an organization of working professionals.

[chauncey]

Speaking personally...learning to take pictures is really easy...ask any kid with a phone.
Learning to take/create images is a whole other ball game, one that requires vision...whatever that is.

IMHO, learning that vision is primary, whereas, Photoshop is usually required to achieve that vision.
Do be aware that PS can have a rather lengthy learning curve.

Flashback's links are informative.

[chabu]

1. Most areas of professional photography will require that the images are post processed (be it art, commercial, food, fashion, glamour). That doesn't mean the photographer has to do that PP. There are many professional retouchers you can hire to do it.
2. There are exceptions. Professional news photographers are usually forbidden from editing there image so as not to distort the "truth"of the image.
3. If you aren't going to be a professional why take a professional photography course? One would assume that such a course would focus, at least in part, on how to run a photography business - something you don't need to learn. You would be better just doing a standard photography course.

Hmm well good i like the way to express your comments against my question.

[chabu]

filled my details

[chabu]

Speaking personally...learning to take pictures is really easy...ask any kid with a phone.
Learning to take/create images is a whole other ball game, one that requires vision...whatever that is.

IMHO, learning that vision is primary, whereas, Photoshop is usually required to achieve that vision.
Do be aware that PS can have a rather lengthy learning curve.

Flashback's links are informative.

i understand

[Shadowman]

You could always get someone else to edit the images for you.

[chabu]

You could always get someone else to edit the images for you.

Thanks shadowman for participating in the thread, yes indeed i think professional image editor should edit images rather I digg into Photoshop or other image editing program.

[chabu]

A very quick search of the internet got me to here which is the page for the Professional Photographers of America. A quick search through this site shows that one can earn a PPA Certification as well as Degrees, the two being independent of each other.

In either case there appears to be a working assumption on the part of PPA that those people desiring of Certification or Degree programs are in fact working photographers. For an applicant to complete the Certification program they need first to take the exam and, completing/passing the exam then need to submit their portfolio which follows certain standards. Interestingly under FAQ's for the portfolio submission is this question: "Can I use "Painter" images in my submission?" Part of the answer to this question is: "The certification program is geared specifically toward showing solid, professional, fundamental photographic skills, not digital manipulation skills." I found neither a total ban on digital manipulation nor did I find any requirement for its use. One could in fact deduce if one is a good enough 'Certified' photographer one needn't be too concerned with fixing any 'mistakes.'

There is a compulsory image component in the portfolio submission requirements and then there are 9 other images that need to be included in the submission. I find this requirement most interesting: "The remaining nine (9) images must be representative of your
purchased work from nine (9) unique photographic assignments in the last 24 months."

So this particular certification route seems to meet the industry standards set forth by a professional association. It seems to me that, unlike taking classes at a local community college, which likely works to broaden one's horizon, the PPA Certified seems more in keeping with an organization of working professionals.

These resources are helpful

[Black Pearl]

Hello chabu is here I want to know about professional photography. We know that there is great photo manipulation software is available on Internet. Does Photoshop knowledge is mandatory for professional photography.

I am interested in doing diploma in Professional photography not for making money but for my love for taking photos.

If you are doing this for the love of taking pictures and not as a profession then you won't be a professional so the question is somewhat moot.

If you are wanting to learn about photography and how to better create images then a course could be a great starting point. You don't say if you have been interested for long, what camera gear (if any) you have, what your interests in photography are or might be and whether you have tried so far but are struggling. If you have tried then posting some images here with a little detail about why you took them, what you took them with and what you hoped to achieve then I'm sure members here will give you some rock solid pointers and heaps of advice on getting better.

[Mike Buckley]

If you are doing this for the love of taking pictures and not as a profession then you won't be a professional so the question is somewhat moot.

I agree to a point but only to a point. Chabu wants to "know about professional photography." Perhaps the best way to do that without becoming a professional is to complete a program that prepares one for professional photography.

[IzzieK]

We all have to start somewhere...many newbie photographers here as well as people who can help to supplement what you do not know. Please do not be afraid to upload a photo. If you have any question about uploading a photo, here is the link to the how to:

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/fo...faq_postimages

Go from there...and welcome to CiC. And thanks for filling up your details. Now we can refer you as Chabu in all our posts.

[chabu]

I agree to a point but only to a point. Chabu wants to "know about professional photography." Perhaps the best way to do that without becoming a professional is to complete a program that prepares one for professional photography.

Yes Mike Buckley this is what I am thinking

[Rob Ekins]

Thanks shadowman for participating in the thread, yes indeed i think professional image editor should edit images rather I digg into Photoshop or other image editing program.

Chabu,
You need to learn how to edit your images full stop. No third party is going to see what you saw in your images in this early stage of your journey.

If you get to the stage where your work is occasionally in high demand and your standards start slipping, then yes think about employing an editor.

I can tell you from experience though that finding a retoucher with the same vision for the final image as you, with the same work ethic as you, with the same attention to detail as you is hard. I have personally tried four different sources and I still do all of my own edits.

But, I love the process and it is not hard work..

[Manfred M]

Chabu - Let me add a it more to this thread to see if this helps clarify. I don't know what the other members of this forum have done, but I might have come closest to taking the approach you are thinking about.

I was a pretty decent, largely self-trained photographer. I first got into serious photography when I was in my late teens and was mentored by a former commercial photographer for a couple of years. University, a career and family obligations meant that my photographic skills really didn't evolve that much, but I was already working at a fairly decent level (behind the camera and in the wet colour and B&W darkroom).

In 2009, with the family growing up I started to find I had more time and the cost and quality of a decent DSLR had finally gotten to a point where the switch to digital made sense to me. I decided that I wanted to up my game a bit and started attending workshops, using online courses and eventually started taking courses that were part of the photography diploma program (i.e. people who took the program wanted a career in commercial photography).

This was the best move I could have made from a skill standpoint. I had no interest in a career in photography, so in my discussions with the professors, I ended up taking only the advanced courses. This meant I did not take the basic photography / camera use and image editing courses (these were all of the first year courses), but jumped straight in to the final year ones. The professors were all active and former commercial photographers who were well known locally and in a couple of cases nationally and even internationally.

They pushed me very hard and my technical and compositional skills improved immensely. For one of the courses, the professor insisted on working jpeg only (only minor image editing was possible for the assignments). That forced me to "get it right in the camera). Another insisted that no cropping was allowed and all submissions had to be the full frame image (although content editing was possible, alignment and crops had to be perfect).

The program assumed a basic understanding of Photoshop and I did take a couple of advanced Photoshop courses as part of the program. Photoshop was the only mandatory image editing tool; ACR / Lightroom, in fact any raw converter was allowed. We had to buy the student version of Photshop (at the time CS6 and got the full discount from Adobe).

I don't think you can lose by going this approach. Workshops are a lot of fun, but you really only add to your existing skill set. The course work was high pressure tight deadline stuff and professors were super critical when they marked the assignments. We had a number of students drop out because of the pressure and workload.

When it came to Photoshop, the professor teaching that aspect had two distinct views. One was that some of the students would probably become retouchers and not photographers. The other was that a photographer couldn't understand or direct a retoucher unless he or she understood that aspect of digital photography really well. I feel he was 100% correct in both of his directions / assumptions.

I hope that my ramblings help...

[rpcrowe]

Chabu, Welcome to Cambridge in Colour!

I did a quick Google Search using the search parameters "Internet Photography Education" which resulted in these hits...

https://www.google.com/search?q=Inte...graphy+courses

There are many choices here but, the choices seem to be pretty much restricted to the U.S.A. market. Perhaps doing a Google search with the same parameters from Pakistan would give you a more local selection.

We don't know your present experience or skills but, IMO, before thinking about further education, a photographer should be able to handle his or her camera effectively and be certain of achieving well exposed and well focused images virtually all the time. Until a photographer reaches that level of competence wit the equipment, any further education would, IMO, be wasted.

In thinking about photographic training, there are many facets to photography. Just a few of these are photo journalism, commercial photography, sports photography and fine art photography. Each of the fields has a separate path leading to proficiency but, IMO, all of them require proficiency with your camera and some proficiency with post processing...

I also did a search using "free Internet photography courses" as the search parameters. These are the results...
https://www.google.com/search?q=Inte...graphy+courses

I cannot recommend any specific course or even guarantee that the courses are actually free of charge.

Not knowing your present skills, I did a Google search with these parameters "free online photography courses for beginners"
These are the results of that search..
https://www.google.com/search?q=Inte...+for+beginners

There are another ways besides formal training to master photography. One of the best is to join a photography club if there is any in your area.

Finally, there is a large amount of information to be learned from this site, both through the tutorials and through the forums. Even the photo contests can be a learning tool. Looking at the images submitted and guessing which one will be preferred by the voting members is a game that can pay rewards.

Some Camera companies also offer training in the use of their equipment. Here is an example of just some of the training offered by Canon...
https://www.eostrainingacademy.co.uk/index.php