The Dilemma of Choice
‘I take too many photos because I don’t want to miss any moment’
‘I waste too much time in selecting photos to edit’
‘I get discouraged by editing due to the backlog of photos I have to get through’
These are some very common problems among creatives.
I used to have a lot of problems with selecting my best photos. I’m not saying I don’t, but I have gotten much better at it.
As a result, I have been able to save time and mental energy so that I can focus fully on creating the best photos possible.
I’m here to simply state what has worked for me, take what you can!
The Dilemma
As humans, we like the freedom to make our own choices. This makes us feel like we are in control of our lives and destiny.
The problem, however, comes when the choices are too many.
Rather than focusing on the big picture (pun definitely intended), we get overwhelmed when there are too many options to choose from.
Either there are many good options or all of them are bad.
The problem with too many options is that it has very few solutions, and they’re all bad:
Forcing yourself to make an uninformed choice
Avoid the problem
How do these relate to photography?
Forcing yourself to select any random photo might make you overthink about the other photos, and you get stuck again between selections.
Avoiding selection and letting the photos relax on your hard drive will keep adding to the pile. Then, you’ll start feeling you’re not making the most out of any trips.
How the dilemma affects creativity
For many people, creativity comes from random bursts of excitement.
You’re excited to come back home to edit some great photos so that you can show them off
You’re feeling inspired and are already coming up with editing ideas.
But then, you have spent so much time selecting the photos, and by the time editing comes, you are tired.
It’s important to realize that creativity requires a lot of energy. Your mind takes time to come up with ideas, and it needs to be completely relaxed to produce the ‘Aha!’ moment. (Read more on creativity here)
Creativity requires a lot of mental energy. If you waste your mental energy in choosing from thousands of photos, your editing creativity is bound take a dip.
But, fortunately, you can maximise your mental creativity with some simple steps:
How to narrow down selection
1. Take less photos
Yup, that’s right. If you take less photos, you’ll have less to choose from.
But wait, is that dumb? Absolutely not!
Turns out we strive when we set limits on ourselves.
You could place a limit on yourself when you go out on a trip. For example, take 100 photos in a day rather than 200.
Once you mentally set a limit, your mind will subconsciousy try to get the best out of your limit. This will make you a better creator, as it trains your eye!
It really is so simple, but not easy.
Apart from taking less photos, train yourself to be okay with FOMO (fear of missing out).
Rather than focusing on quality, focusing on quantity is what compromises a creator’s ability in the first place.
I personally never use burst mode UNLESS I need to. Shooting a stationary subject 10 times in one second simply doesn’t make sense to me.
2. Delete before you select
Sounds crazy to most, but I actually delete bad photos on the field. Literally, sometimes, you can see me delete photos when the lion is sleeping infront of me.
Of course that depends on the battery and time I have left, but I am constantly trying to minimize my selection process before I get to selecting.
It goes without saying, don’t delete photos you feel 50/50 about. They could turn out to be incredible after editing.
But what I mean is: on the field, you should delete photos that you know will absolutely not be used later.
This will help save a headache in your selection process.
3. Importing process
After I delete the bad photos on the field, I’m left with all decent photos on my memory card.
Now, if the decent photos are in the 100s, I am definitely not going to import all photos to edit.
Instead, I start by importing the photos that I absolutely love. These are probably about 10-20% of all the photos (make sure they are not many!).
Then? I leave the rest on my hard drive and start working on the best ones. The idea behind this is that you want to save that excitment for the photos you love, so that it isn’t wasted on the other photos.
This will lead you to be able to create better photos.
After you’re done with your best photos, then you can get to the other ones and start filtering the best ones then edit. Keep this cycle going and watch how it significantly improves your editing game!
4. One at a time.
When editing, you want to try focus on one photo at a time. Getting mixed up between photos won’t help you find the right edit for your photo.
Also, please start with your best photo! You want to capitalize your energy into the best photo.
However, if you feel like you have spent too much time on one photo without any results, feel free to jump to another one and come back later.
5. Set up an easy & accessible workflow
Believe it or not, 95% of my photos are edited on the Lightroom Mobile app.
Why? I find it very easy and acessible.
I can be lie in bed and edit, I could wait for my doctor’s appointment and edit. Whenever an idea sparks in my head, boom, I start editing.
Not everyone likes editing on the phone/tablet, but you should try it simply for the accessibility!
In summary
Take less photos
Delete bad photos on the field
Quickly import the best photos, leave the rest until later
Edit from the best photos, one at a time.
Set up an accessible device to edit
If it helped, let me know 🙂 @spotclickpost
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Dhir
PS:
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