What is most important. Subject matter, lighting or editing?

Felix Baird lighting is be considered, imho. whether it's just how you adjust it position the subject or set the camera. Not just light.

Subject matter....needs a good idea....a good idea needs to be lighted correctly....and then your edit...the perfect triangle

There's an adage:

- Beginner photographers think it's all about the camera
- Good photographers think it's all about the lenses
- Experts know it's all about the light.

I'd go further and extend that

- Retouchers know it's all about the enhancement
- Artists know it's all about what you point it at
- Professionals know it's all about the customer.

MacMaghnuis - imho - honest or humble? 

It's fun question. 

Remove the subject and you have an empty frame. Remove the editing and you have a lot of time on your hands to do something else. Remove the light and you have nothing.  

Just the light is essential. 

Simon Carter said

There's an adage:

- Beginner photographers think it's all about the camera
- Good photographers think it's all about the lenses
- Experts know it's all about the light.

I'd go further and extend that

- Retouchers know it's all about the enhancement
- Artists know it's all about what you point it at
- Professionals know it's all about the customer.

lol... so true...

Simon Carter might steal this Simon. Lol

In the order of your title ...

(Or) to some extent, even LIGHTING, SUBJECT MATTER, EDITING

-

Putting editing further up the pecking or means you are less capable in the basics of photographic capture : 'seeing an image' ... and subject matter in advantageous light (that exists already AND/OR you create yourself).

The most important thing is to always keep perspective...

Aardvark🎯VonEssfolk said

[...]

Putting editing further up the pecking or means you are less capable in the basics of photographic capture : 'seeing an image' ... and subject matter in advantageous light (that exists already AND/OR you create yourself).

Or more capable of seeing the potential in an image capture. I've seen 'sooc' proofs of a couple of Ansel Adam's prints. and almost none of the impact was present. Hollywood glamour legend George Hurrell had extensively retouched negatives--required due to the sharp angle of relatively small light sources on human subjects. And Jerry Uellsmann's career was built around photographs of scenes that never actually existed.

There's almost always another way to do things and still be a 'pure' photographer.

indemnity said

In an attempt to answer this, let's consider a scenario...

a photographer photographs a model and the light is perfect

another photographs a model and the style/composition is perfect

a third photographs a model and the image is edited and finished to perfection

So which image will be the best?

On here, probably the image with the least clothes and biggest tits.

Perhaps that should be added as a fourth most important option?  :-)

I’ve been trying to do a blog on what makes a good image, personally I think off the bat, the question here is wrong. I think it’s very difficult to answer and I’ve slightly given up on it myself! Basically I think the answer is way more complex than this question you’ve put, to think critically 99% of the time the questions just wrong.

Subject matters a bit odd, the image is a 2d graphic, if you shoot a beautiful woman, your just left with a 2d graphic representation of her lit by light, so the viewers connection to her is just mentally inferring what it feels about such beautiful woman back onto the 2d graphic.

I think composition, specifically the arrangement of major of masses of tones and contrasts and the graphic design of them, is more important to creating an effective image. But then abstract shapes rarely elicit a high emotional response so then you need those human elements that can stir the human soul like beutiful woman or mystery or nature etc. then all this package needs to be wrapped up with very refined taste in all aspects in order to elevate it above a simply effective image.

Photography is a game of light: too much light, and you lose data; not enough, and you obscure detail. Cameras have come a long way in the last 30 years, for sure, but Mother Nature does not always cooperate. To complete our vision, we have Photoshop and Lightroom. With these extra tools, we can even replace, swap, or move pixels to repair the damage that light has done. 🙂 like studio lights or backdrops - photoshop is just a tool but it’s the most powerful one photographers have behind the camera imho so my answer would be both to complete an image journey, but not everyone is on the same journey 🙂

Edited by Retouchguy

Simon Carter said

There's an adage:

- Beginner photographers think it's all about the camera
- Good photographers think it's all about the lenses
- Experts know it's all about the light.

I'd go further and extend that

- Retouchers know it's all about the enhancement
- Artists know it's all about what you point it at
- Professionals know it's all about the customer.

It's usually done as a rule of three and/or a contrast as that's the ideal rhetorical device, I was given Amateurs think about equipment*, Pros think about payment, Masters think about light.  

*And when it comes to equipment amateurs think about spec and pros think about reliability / availability.  Show me a person with service centre/rental companies in their phone who doesn't know the max ISO / fastest shutter speed / FPS of their camera and I'll show you a pro. 

No subject matter, no shot. 

Simon Carter said

There's an adage:

- Beginner photographers think it's all about the camera
- Good photographers think it's all about the lenses
- Experts know it's all about the light.

I'd go further and extend that

- Retouchers know it's all about the enhancement
- Artists know it's all about what you point it at
- Professionals know it's all about the customer.

Yep, it’s all about capturing those pesky photons…

And to the original question posed, a great subject gets you most of the way…