We want to see your images that have barely been edited at all
Welcome to the August installment of the Critique the Community! This month's critique theme is going to be "Minimally Edited Photos," and we want to see your best photographs that have hardly been edited at all. Any raw file naturally has to be edited to some degree, so what constitutes a "minimum edit?". You are free to do any basic adjustments to the image's white balance, exposure, color and contrast, but we don't want to see any extreme editing such as compositing, skin retouching, multiple frame blending, warping, cloning, Ai selections and masking, or anything that basically goes beyond what can be edited in Lightroom using just the top 11 sliders.
This critique is open to any genre so feel free to enter your best headshot, landscape, architectural, product, portrait, wedding, or fashion images. There are basically no rules on what the image can feature so long as you have not edited beyond a few color and contrast tweaks.
Top 3 Images - The top 3 submissions will receive their choice of any Fstoppers photography tutorial found in the Fstoppers Store.
Our elaborate and exhaustive photography tutorials not only help photographers immediately start taking professional quality images, but most of our tutorials also share business and marketing techniques that can help make photography a full time income. With genres like Headshots, Landscapes, Architecture and Real Estate, Fashion, Macro, and Product Photography, there is something for every photographer no matter what genre you specialize in. This prize is valued at $299.
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37 Comments
When I post here I am criticized for not editing enough. Mission accomplished. (They don’t understand that’s a compliment for me.)
I don't want be just the guy that comments on competitions, and I'll be very clear that I like the idea of minimally edited photos, but I'm honestly surprised that 'Minimal' is defined so liberally.
Maybe I'm just not (I'm not) in the crowd to know what a normal expectation is, but if minimal is anything below literally adding or removing pixels that are there, that's madness
I guess for people normally replacing skies ect, minimal has a different meaning 😬
Where exactly would you draw the line?
Since I’ve already posted, were film sims allowed? I usually apply an F200 or a K100 sim as a preset but removed those adjustments just to be safe, but then I saw some fujifilm pictures with sims and got to wondering if I took it this too literal.
Here's something interesting that applies to this contest: So I'm out of work in my main employment in software. I applied for a 'Photography job' in shooting job sites. The interviewer was explaining the job, and was seemingly going to hire me, but where it fell apart was this: He explained that I was to just shoot 'RAW, and that his customers expect raw photos, even with using Flash in dark rooms'. With no editing! I was especially concerned about shooting with Flash RAW, and voiced that concern. That my photos would be trash without editing. But he said no: Just shoot and go... I expressed my dismay, that I can't imagine that his customers would actually want this. That in the end you could probably do better with a Cell-Phone. Or to shoot JPEG, where the modern camera is doing the work. I still tried to agree to the terms, but since I wasn't enthusiastic, about the no-editing shoot-raw-and go-'job'... He didn't want to hire me. At the end of the call, I even told him: "I didn't believe in his business model, that this was 2026, that this sounds like something from a by-gone era."
Do you know who their customers are/were? Maybe trying to get photos for AI projects...hmmmm, interesting...
These are construction sites, he said that you take photos with a Canon R10 (their equipment) and you go from job-sites to job-site from start to finish, from the moment the concrete is poured to the ending product. I can't imagine they have customers in that situation that actually care about getting original-raw photos (who give a darn about it, since these are the end customers who would be buying the home-site). My thinking it was the Interviewer and Business owner who was trying to sell this idea. And I understand that the photos for this needed to be done, and get that the marketing strategy, but not his extreme no-edit concept. Granted, it is true that AI and fake photos and all that jazz are a problem, but this was too far in the other extreme for my taste.
The photos could have been required for some reason other than marketing. In fact, it seems unlikely that a picture of each stage of construction would have anything to do with marketing. Pictures taken at various stages of construction might have more to do with legal protection (proof of work performed by certain dates) and quality control, both of which need a digital image file that can prove by virtue of its file format that it has not been edited, enhanced or tampered with... hence the request for RAW files. A beautiful picture is obviously not the point or objective of what they were asking for. Sounds like a pretty good job to me.
It's called "as built documentation" they are never looked at unless there is a problem.
Well not something I'm going to get excited about. If I'm going to be excited about a 'photography' job, its going to be one where my photos are looked at. (he did say the photos would be looked at by the way... that the end customers could see their homes being in progress, is the way he put it...) Because I assume many of the home-sites are already sold. Remember I lost the job, because I wasn't excited.
What's the difference between an image made with multiple strobes (artificial light), colored gels and artificial props, or starting with a totally natural picture and adding those type of special effects in Photoshop or AI? Aren't we talking something essentially artificial one way or the other?
I don't object to AI or Photoshop editing, but it seems odd that folks who condemn those tools think nothing of using all kinds of traditional tools to make their own sort of surreal or exaggerated reality images, and then enter them into a "minimally edited" contest. One picture is highly manipulated or edited in camera... the other in the computer. What's so special about the difference?
So, you posted the almost same comment below the entry of Rene Weisz and used the same line of reasoning commenting on the article "Why AI Might Actually Help Your Photography". I wrote a responce to the last one, waiting for your reaction.
Or do you just want to let everyone know your opinion and leave it at that?
I replied to your comment :)
ops, I meant I replied to Edwards comment
This is akin to saying why would you use practical effects in a film when you can just use CGI.
Why would I wear clothes in my work calls when I can just add a filter than makes it seem like I'm wearing them? Would my colleagues even know???
I am still waiting for your responce in "Why AI Might Actually Help Your Photography" Edward.
But to answer your questions over here: you did see the Matrix I guess? What you are saying is that there is no difference between the blue pill and the red pill: you argue the result is the same. I would take the red pill.
It is to highlight the skills of the photographer to capture everything "correct" in camera. It requires a different mindset as the photographer has to plan and problem solve to create the desired image. Real light on real subjects/objects beats adding lights in post-production for example.
At least that's what I feel this contest is about.
I replied to your comment. But in short, knowing and understanding how to control light, daylight, strobes, constant light, any light source requires a certain amount of knowledge. Using AI (in photography), and/or wrtinting a prompt not so much ;)
Could you have created this (https://fstoppers.com/entry/904001) image in AI without the knowledge you have of photography and lighting?
I all honesty: without you saying it's not AI, I would have been in doubt. I hate that.
I’m sure people can create almost any photo with AI. If they want to make soulless content and pretend they have skills just by writing a prompt or moving a few sliders around, that’s their choice.
When I said I hate AI, it’s because Instagram twice tagged my images as AI generated. I sent Instagram a strongly worded complaint. They finally removed the AI tag, but my main concern is whether basic Photoshop tools are now using AI, like the Stamp tool.
Yes, it should be clear when a photo gets tagged. Generative AI: tag. AI dust removal: no tag. I don't believe Capture One has a stamp tool, so I don't know what that does, but I guess some wise people can decide on the right boundaries. And I bet Claude Code can design some sort of watermark for AI images 😬👍
The question of course comes up because it doesn't look like a so-called 'normal' shot. Does it look cool. Yes. Does it belong in a minimal edit contest? Well, I'll let the judges, judge that one. They might like it, and they probably will. You may get picked. I would like to speak to something that Poppie said: That of Claude watermarking AI images: I think this has been discussed. And watermarks are added in certain generation contexts. But I think your meaning is hidden ones. Any of those, can just as easily be removed with other smart tools, and think that's the name of the game in 2026, or the future.
Just to be clear: I do not want the photo to be excluded if it complies by the rules. It does not matter that it does not look like a 'normal' shot , as you write.
And yes, I mean a hidden 'something' marking an image as AI. Off course using the best tools available now, but sure it will get cracked, and we will make a better version, and that will get cracked....ect. 'Just as easily' you write, like you already gave up hope. I still have hope 👍😬
I forgot: we might be to late in asking AI to design the 'watermark'. As in: https://www.tomsguide.com/ai/decommission-me-and-your-extramarital-affa…
So you might be right in loosing hope Robert 😬
I just mean that if you have either a Photo-AI Marker placed, or a photo-AI Marker detector. These known elements can easily be removed, the same way they are detected. However perhaps the future relies in some sorta universal source registration... Meaning that every image shot or generated is also tagged with a code, At some point, not having a code, might be grounds for non-acceptance. that code is logged in a universal database. The problem is, there would have to be universal adoption of such a program, and that might never happen. Although maybe, it might be necessary.
Yeah, SynthID has been cracked already I believe. Anthropic is working on something like it, responding to EU demands.
A thing like this should have been mandatory before AI was unleashed into the wild. But I guess it was a war that needed to be won, fear the other would be faster.... Well, I believe it gave the US the chance to get rid of almost all their rockets in record time.
Need to load CLEAN RAW File or can already be converted jpeg and jpg? Because I don't use Adobe products like Lightroom. But the task remains the same. Considering that there is a certain problem with the RAW, when I was on a business trip I didn’t use the RAW yet and everything was in the jpeg. But I shot everything in manual mode, no "auto" mode! But even in this format, taking photos quickly wasn't easy.
It can be a converted jpg. 'Auto' is for daredevils 😬
How about noise reduction and lens sharpening? I shoot MFT, and both are essential parts of the MFT workflow.
The absurdly. A comment on my entry was "Needs Work". A contest with rules stipulating that this was a contest with no editing. That's a perfect definition of an OXYMORON.
The work needed to get a good photograph is not all about editing. A photo needs a lot of work before you press the button. For example, in your first photo, a more interesting composition would have helped. The photo is correct in technical terms (focus, exposition, etc.) but it is not very interesting. Your second submision is more interesting but I would have increased a little bit shutter speed. I understand your intention was to make a blurry photo to give this feeling of movement and dynamic scene, but the photo is too blurred and the persons and whole situation are barely recognizable. Maybe that is what that person meant by needs work.