What % of pics do you dump?

AndyWest

AndyWest

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I was wondering what sort of percentage of your pictures you take you would actually print out or show on the web. I'm taking a fair few images a the moment and am being happy with about 5% of them at the moment, but then I'm still learning. I just want every shot to be the 'money shot' but that ain't gonna happen!:D:lol::D:lol:

For those who have settled down to a regular amount of shots taken, what percentage do you think not worthy?
 
Been at this lark for ages, and really don't notice any improvement at all - Until I compare my current shots to those of last year or even better the year before....

Not sure if I've settled down with regard to the number of shots I take, but my retention rate is probably around less than 10% (The annoying thing is I never delete anything. The ones I should be deleting I just don't convert from RAW)
 
Well the shoot at Blackpool zoo at the weekend I think I had about 10-20 pictures That I liked and i`d taken about 500 so well over 95%

Im dumping most because of bad exposure, blurriness or just plain bad photos. as I get better Im guessing that i`ll be dumping loads of pics because i dont like them personally and not because of Technical reasons
 
I haven't been using the camera much for sometime due to a few issues, though this is something i intend to put right this year. I tend to keep the majority of mine, unless totally U/S.

I do intend to have a massive clear out soon.

Rob.
 
I've got around 67,000 images in my library (That is images supplied to clients)
Total shutter count on my cameras 470,000.
On my website there are around 100 images.
Not great at maths but that's a small percentage, and that's not including all the film I've shot previous to 1999.
 
I sometimes dump less than 40% ... other times Its back to normal. :D

Mainly because a shoot less thoughtless stuff than ever before and I'll document a shoot briefly as a memory and reference, but uppermost is I'll try and create interesting shots, many of which will be repeats of the same scene in an attempt to nail some aspect or other.

I know I'm gonna bin them when I look through the view finder, so i don't bother pressing the shutter any more ...My logic is, it gives me more time to find one that does work.
 
I'm a bit of a novice. Let's get that out of the way for starters :D

I probably keep about 10%, although there was one memorable shoot where I kept 2 out of 120 photos :help:

(And it was a nice, sunny day as well)
 
I reckon a good 95 -98 % of my work goes for a chop, then i end up regretting it !

That's the beautiful thing about digital, costs very little once cam paid for and most pics can be recovered from media anyway !
 
Anything from 25% to 75% depending! Out of the 8-10 photos of a rally car going round a corner say, I'll only show one, but keep them if they're not OOF, cropped, or just plain crap!
 
I shoot a lot of wildlife and will only usually keep about 10% of the shots I take. That's the animal's fault for not posing correctly though, not mine ;)

If you want to do an interesting experiment, think like a film photographer for a day. Pretend you've loaded a 24 exp roll of 400 ISO film into your camera and that's all you've got for the day. You'll be amazed as to how much you start to really think about getting the shot right 1st time "in camera". When every shot has to count you don't release that shutter until you absolutely know it's gonna be a good'n :)
 
yoby said:
Been at this lark for ages, and really don't notice any improvement at all - Until I compare my current shots to those of last year or even better the year before....

Not sure if I've settled down with regard to the number of shots I take, but my retention rate is probably around less than 10% (The annoying thing is I never delete anything. The ones I should be deleting I just don't convert from RAW)
Click to expand...

Me too. Keep far too much carp. If I get 5 out of 100 shots I'm happy with thats good. Very rare its more than that tbh. :shrug:

Andy
 
Holiday/Travel---25% discards. Family---90% discards.Serious shooting 75% discards.The ones that I print, put into folders and think are half decent----less than 1%.
Shocking isnt it ?
Pete.
 
TheWombat said:
Holiday/Travel---25% discards. Family---90% discards.Serious shooting 75% discards.The ones that I print, put into folders and think are half decent----less than 1%.
Shocking isnt it ?
Pete.
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This isthe same as me, I had never thought of it but it is shocking that in 18GB of photos on my computer (i'm new to this!!) I have only 20 or so that I have printed off and are 'on show' in my house!!
I will now set out to improve this!! A new year resolution no doubt!! ( I have yet to keep any!!!):bang:
 
SW said:
100% of my shots i dump lol atm as im only learning lol
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Same with me as seen i'm just starting, but i wouldnt say i dump all of them. I defo delete the blurry ones etc. The ones i dot like i do abit of editing and if i still dont like it after that it goes in the recycle bin.
 
Don't dumpa any of them if you have the storage space - keep the bad ones, use them as a learning tool and refer back to them to see what you did wrong.

You should see the amount of crap I have on my hard drive :lol:
 
I normally take 2 or 3 shots of the same composition to try playing around with exposure (but not bracketing).
Luckily I have a few people who nag me to print my photos off from my 6x4 Selphy printer so they have them in their rooms so plenty of people get to see and make comments - its just a shame none of them will pay a couple of quid for a print themselves :nuts:

Also a 1TB external harddrive combined with a desktop with over 300GB drive means I don't have to delete any ever :)
 
I don't use around 95% of what I take for anything, but I don't delete them.
While I've got the excess space I may as well use it! :D
 
Flash In The Pan said:
Don't dumpa any of them if you have the storage space - keep the bad ones, use them as a learning tool and refer back to them to see what you did wrong.

You should see the amount of crap I have on my hard drive :lol:
Click to expand...

Yep, I don't dump any either, you learn from your mistakes!
 
bieng new when i take my camera out i would take maybe 200 pic and am happy if one looks good :D
 
A pretty high proportion of mine are deleted within minuets of downloading them into my computer. I try very hard not to be over enthusiastic while pressing the shutter button at will ,but despite this i don't seem able to control my impulse to snap everything in sight from every angle.Maybe things will calm down when i pass my 70s.
 
Not sure what % I keep as it depends on what in doing, I tent to end up with a lot of the same shot so I will keep the best 1 or 2 of that shot and just bin the rest.
 
It really depends entirely on what I'm shooting, I don't delete anything but a lot of shots I don't end up processing is because they might be similar to another shot I also took. Usually in the region of 25% keepers if I'm just taking shots for myself often a lot higher for paid work as I actually concentrate more.
 
I never get rid of any I just put them all on my spare HDD and when I get time have a look and play
 
I've got every single digital photo that I've taken since I got my first Kodak digicam way back in December 2001!

The only ones that I delete are the ones that I delete on the hoof - usually if I've run out of camera space - and then it's only the ones that are clearly going nowhere i.e. rubbish angle or really bad lighting.
 
reddeathdrinker said:
Anything from 25% to 75% depending! Out of the 8-10 photos of a rally car going round a corner say, I'll only show one, but keep them if they're not OOF, cropped, or just plain crap!
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kissfoto said:
I keep all my shots, good, abd and indifferent and burn them to disc. Logic being you always miss something. Tend to go back over them again and always find shots that I have missed first time around. :thumbs:
Click to expand...

same as you two

i keep all of mine unless OOF

all backed up on external storage so nice and safe

i host over 4200 pics from just over a year in the hobby so i guess around 25% of my pics are online at a guess from the keepers
 
I dump 50% on first scan, then maybe 25% on second look,then maybe a few more when I`ve had a beer,then a few more when hungover,so all I am left with are world beating images.........if only...........:lol:
 
From a Pro PoV - I tend to show child photography clients about 75% or more

Wedding clients - where it's more about the expression so you tend to shoot each scene a few times - it's perhaps 25%

For my own stuff - where I'm the only judge - 10% at best - and I often bin a whole day's shoot in favour of doing it again in better light

DD
 
i used to be guilty of dumping loads when i first got my dslr but now ive gotten over the fad of being able to see images there and then i shoot alot more film again and because of that i have become alot more methodical about what i shoot. i try to plan out the shot in my head how i want it to lookdo a couple of test shots then fire away. i would never throw any away, there might be one that you miss but someone sees and wants (sort of thing, rather than the ones you show). i dont show most of the photos i take because they are normall repeats, when i shoot skateboarding for example i shoot until i feel satisfied and id say bar the 5% of test shots i would be happy to keep or use a further 90%.

this is purely down to shooting film, my attitude towards just pointing and clicking has changed dramatically in recent months. i think the fact that i am improving plays a big part also.
 
I tend to keep them all :) but 99.999999999% are crap and make a useful tool for learning from :D TBH I am hardly ever happy with my shots :lol: but hey ho :)
 
i keep them all on a HD, as for percentages. Last wedding i did, 1600 shots, the B&G got 300 proccessed.
 
Very interesting. I'm glad such a high percentage don't make the grade even if you do keep the images. I feel quite normal now :thumbs::lol:
 
Depends on what I'm shooting. I was on a walkabout in Glasgow and took around 150 pics and dumped them all, another time I would keep 10-20%.
 
I can remember my photography tutor at university saying that if you get one good shot for a 36-exp roll of film you're doing well. That used to make me think more about my shots, even more so when shooting 120 roll or 5x4". Polaroid backs were a Godsend indeed!! :)

These days I shoot in fits and starts, having a week of taking 100s and then a fortnight without really going near my camera unless it's for work.

I keep everything bar the shots that are totally blasted/dark (test shots when you're setting up) – they usually get deleted immediately after downloading them to the hard drive – and I'd say that about 5% if I'm lucky acually see this side of post-production software, let alone make it onto my website.

I suppose taking shots for work means I have 100s of useable shots printed every month but as far as personal shots go, then I'm much more limited to how much time I spend shooting therefore I have a lower amount of good shots to show for my efforts.

Still, I'm going through hard drives like nobodys business so must be doing a fair few!!!
 
Every shot I import into Lightroom is backed up on an external drive, then the obvious OOF etc shots are binned straight away, everything else is kept until I do a big clear out of my Lightroom library, where I go through all images older than 6 months, then if I've not used it, or it isn't the absolute best from the shoot I delete it (ut still have the back up if I need it).

Regarding printing/hosting online I take a quality over quantity approach, I'd rather see 1 good picture than 10 average pictures, so I'd guess for printing/posting online I'd be at say 1%...
 
I delete duplicates the nearlies + the rubbish ones.

I reckon I'm having a good day if 20% of the shots are keepers. Though as time goes by and I improve, quite often I'll bin a percentage of those too.
 
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