In the days of digital photography people tend to equate the process of “Photoshopping” and image as altering the photograph in some way to make it better either by enhancing the photo’s color and hue, adding or subtracting objects, or generally creating something that did not exist when the image was captured. Yes, you can do all of that when you bring a photo in Photoshop or any other image editing software. All of the photos on my web site have been run through Photoshop. My goal when I bring a photo into the editing software is to make the image on my computer screen look exactly as I remember the moment when I depressed the shutter release. Camera sensors, like different kinds of film, react to different colors and light in their own way. A camera’s color profile, ISO setting, and other image settings can alter the way the sensor sees what is coming through the lens. I set my camera on the Adobe RGB color setting that usually results in a fairly color-dull image. The color information is locked inside the image, and I use Photoshop to unlock that color and bring it to the screen or print. Adjustments I make in Photoshop: Levels Saturation Color Sharpness Clone Stamp – Used to remove dust spots or hot pixels in night shots. The National Geographic Field Guide to Digital Photography walks you step-by-step through most of these basic processes and it does so in layman’s terms that even I could understand! Photoshop and other image editing software programs are powerful tools that will allow you to do alterations to a digital photograph that are only limited by your imagination and familiarity with the program. I probably use about 1% of the power of the Photoshop program to adjust my images. When you look at the photos on my web site, you are seeing the closest representation to the image I saw through the viewfinder – nothing more, nothing less.