How Do I Know When I Have Finished Editing A Photo? It's Taking Forever!

If it is taking forever editing photos I can help you. If it feels like it is taking forever to edit photos there might be a problem. There comes a point in photo editing when you are getting very little more for the effort you put in. If you are spending 20 minutes editing a photo you might have finished it 15 minutes earlier.

And if you want to know how you find this out then listen on – this is good stuff. Well, I would say that wouldn’t I?

Hi and welcome to Episode 128 of the Photography Explained podcast.

I’m your host Rick, and in each episode I will try to explain one photographic thing to you in plain English in less than 10 minutes (ish) without the irrelevant details. What I tell you is based on my lifetime of photographic experience. And not Google.

You can listen to the episode here

Or you can read on - it’s entirely up you!

Want me to answer your photography question? Get your thinking caps on, more on this at the end.

Edit one photo, and spend as long as you want.

Sit down, relax, and give yourself the permission and the time to spend as long as you want to edit one photo. Yes, I am back to the one-photo thing again. If you don’t know what I’m talking about check out the last episode. A particularly fine one it was too.

Indulge yourself, give yourself the time and do whatever you want to a photo.

And let me tell you this, just by doing this you will think about what you are doing. Giving yourself permission to take as long as you want should take away the frustration of feeling like editing photos is taking forever.

Now we have removed that frustration you can concentrate on editing that one photo and no more.

When you are done, take note of how long you took. And then do this.

• Edit a copy of the same photo, but give yourself 5 minutes and no more.

Then

• Edit another copy of the photo, but give yourself 2 minutes and no more.

And then

• Edit another copy of the photo, but give yourself 1 minute and no more.

Ok – we are done

Now, look at the four photos. And be completely honest with yourself.

Can you really tell the difference? Which is the best photo? Does the one that took the longest look the best? Or is there not that much difference?

I know, there is a potential problem with this. By the time you edit the last photo, you will have an idea of what you are doing, of what you are enhancing.

No sweat, I have the answer to that.

Do the same but in reverse. Choose another photo, and do 4 edits. But for the first one do it in less than a minute. Then another one in less than 2 minutes, then in less than 5 minutes, and finally take as long as you want to.

And what has happened here? Well, this is what I hope has happened. You might have done each edit much quicker, and you might well have found that you did not need more than 5 minutes after all.

Try this and see what happens – it is well worth it.

The talky bit

It’s ok to spend endless time editing photos if that is what you enjoy doing. Of course it is. I am not saying that it is not. But if you feel like it is taking forever editing photos, and that this is frustrating you, then you might need to take a different approach.

Get the best photos that you can, sure. That is the number one priority. But try what I suggest and see what happens. Just doing this thing will hopefully show you what is possible.

This is not just an exercise in saving time for time’s sake. This is not about creating rubbish quickly and moving on. This is about learning when an edit is done, this is about you learning how much time you need to spend editing photos.

I will say it again, if this is your thing, if this is what you love to do then great. But if you do not want to spend forever editing photos, if you are frustrated and do not know when a photo is finished try this.

And once you have tried it, apply this to other photos and see what happens. If you are happy with the photo that you created in 1 minute, 2 minutes, 5 minutes, whichever, it doesn’t matter, whichever, try to edit other photos in that time. Let’s not be silly about this, this is a rough time, giving you a target time for editing a photo.

Just try it and see how you get on.

And yes, what I am writing about here is based entirely on my own experiences. I have been here. And what I found was this.

The photos that I took forever over were actually worse than some of the ones that I edited quickly. I had overdone them, thinking that this is what I needed to do.

And I know that the time it takes to edit photos depends on your experience and knowledge of the software that you are using, but the principle still applies.

But once I made myself work more quickly I became much more efficient and my photos improved. The frustration of never knowing when I was finished went away. And I have never looked back.

There is no right time, no specific time that you need to edit photos – you just need to be aware that there is a point in photo editing where you are in danger of overdoing things. There comes a time when a photo is done.

And that is the hard bit to know. I get that. But try what I suggest and see how you get on. At the very least it will get you thinking, which has to be a good thing right?

What do I do?

I edit photos quickly. I have an amount of automation in Lightroom – more on this in future episodes, and spend a couple of minutes and usually no more on photos from a shoot for clients. And most of that is getting the verticals and horizontals perfect. But don’t tell anyone, please!

And for personal work, travel photos, probably less time than that.

When I edit photos I am enhancing what is there and no more.

The last word

Try the 4 photo edit thing twice and be honest with yourself. And ask yourself this question – what do you want to do with your time?

Next episode

Photography Explained Podcast Episode 129 – How I Save Time Editing Photos - 11 Top Tips Just For You. Now I have had a couple of chatty episodes, but now I want to get into some actual things that will save you tons of time.

A quick plug for me and what I do.

Well, why not? If I can't plug myself on my podcast, where can I?

You have found this podcast, so why not check out my splendid website, where I write blog posts about my photographs of buildings and other good stuff. On my courses page, you will find my course, How to Become A Real Estate Photographer.

You can also find me on YouTube talking about my podcast and my blog - just click here to get straight to my channel.

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Whatever you do, it’s always lovely to hear from you, my dear listeners.

This episode was powered by, wait for it, a cheese sandwich and a bag of roast chicken crisps. Not home crisps I know, all washed down with a lovely cold Diet Pepsi sat in my homemade acoustically cushioned recording emporium.

OK - I’m done

I’ve been Rick McEvoy, thanks again very much for listening to my small but perfectly formed podcast (it says here), and for giving me 10 (ish) minutes of your valuable time. I look forward to hearing from you and answering your questions in future episodes.

Take care, stay safe

Cheers from me Rick