When I was first starting to learn about wildflowers, I came across the concept of a composite: a flower that itself contains many other flowers. A sunflower is a composite; its center is filled with numerous tiny flowers.
Cutleaf coneflowers are also composites. See all the tiny flowers that make up the center of the coneflower above? Not to mention all the little buds that haven’t even opened yet?
The same word means something entirely different when used in connection with photography. A composite is an image made of two or more individual photos. For example, a photo of a dog’s head on a person’s body is a composite. I think that’s the kind of photo most people would recognize as “photoshopped.”
Photoshop has many other uses. Each photo you’ve seen in my emails has been adjusted in Photoshop1 despite the fact that, until today, none have been composites. That’s not because I’m opposed to compositing; it’s just that it’s an extremely time-consuming process.2
I started using Photoshop before I became a photographer. I took a lot of really bad photos at first because I kept thinking, “I’ll just fix it in Photoshop.” That didn’t work out so well. Eventually it occurred to me that maybe — just maybe — if I took the photo well in the first place, I wouldn’t have to do nearly as much work to get it to look … acceptable. I credit Photoshop with making a decent photographer of me.
I generally make color, contrast, straightening, and cropping adjustments to my photos.
There’s also the small detail of my lack of skill: see how wobbly those butterfly antennae look?
I know that feeling of "lack of skill", but it's not that, in my opinion. It's just a part of the damned aging process where we tend to get a bit less steady, especially with hand-held cameras. It's tough to get a decent macro of a moving object or one with super-fine detail - like the butterfly antenna.