My first attempts, please crit :-)

Glad you like the moonscapes! And I and whoever is currently logged on hereby do witness that you promise to back up faithfully... :rules: ;)

Bit too technical for me your f-stops query, but I think you caught him just right. I think I'd have a go at white balance and temperature to get the colours right but don't have time to try it out first as I'm off to the Lakes to get rained on for a couple of days (but with crossed fingers for clear skies and meteor showers).

Happy post-processing,
Swatcher
 
Forgot to mention, Wookie (great crop, btw) is right about Portrait mode. None of the program modes give you much control. It might be an idea to make yourself use Manual mode for a few days. It just a matter of getting used to half-pressing the shutter to get the meter going, then turning the knurled wheel to change the shutter speed. Holding down the top button on the back with your thumb at the same time changes the aperture. Stopping up or down is now a doddle, no menus required. You can do all this in the view-finder and will find it very familiar from the old SLRs.

Cheers,
Swatcher

PS Have you considered Sports mode for the kids?!
 
Wookie, thank you, I will do that. Swatcher, did you have a good time being rained on ;-) I am trying to use manual as much as poss, also tried out some sports mode as per your suggestion (didn't get great results but that's prob more me than sports mode!). I didn't realise I could play with manual mode as you describe here, only via the various menus :)
 
ps if anyone is still checking on this thread - how is my edit? I have been getting to grips with DPP:

20nj0n.jpg
 
Hi, First impression is that it actually that looks pretty good! I think the face is a little burnt out but the background - the bluish chain against the warm leaves - looks great. Maybe he has a slight blue cast on him. The trim and logo look a bit that way and so do the whites of his eyes. However, there doesn't seem to be much blue in the shadows so maybe you just need to back the top end of the blue channel off a bit.

I've come across a couple of free editors, which are unlike the usual suspects. Lightbox has some useful sliders for ephemeral things like backlight and fill. Most features you have to pay for but there is plenty there for nothing. The other is PhotoScape. Loads of handy presets. Both are a bit different.

Well, good luck as ever, you're definitely getting somewhere.

Swatcher
 
kitschenalia said:
Swatcher, fantastic, thank you :) I don't think DPP does what you suggest here, but will look into those others - also hoping to download GIMP which I hear is free - but the site for the download was playing up y.day :)
Click to expand...

DPP does that on the RGB menu tab, you can select individual colours and drag the diagonal line into curves for all colours together or as individuals. Great for psychodelic 60s effects too!

generally find because I've got raw files I can use the RAW tab on the DPP tool and so use the white balance settings to sort out the general colour balance. It makes a big difference. Have a play with the presets for cloudy versus sunshine versus shade, also flash, its quite interesting, not sure they've got it 100% right for every occasion of light conditions we actually get, so sometimes when I am desperate for just a bit better the colour temperature slider is useful.
 
Hi kitschenalia,

First of all, your enthusiasm shines through all your posts and it's great to see.

Quickly on the topic of RAW/JPG, there's no right or wrong answer on this, but I would agree with your friend here:

kitschenalia said:
Wookie thanks so much, I'm really glad you've said that, as at the party on Saturday I was merrily shooting away in RAW and a friend (who has a similar DSLR, the EOS 400, and has been doing photography for years) said "for goodness sake get it off RAW, the files will be huge, and that is just for professionals really" so I turned it back to a more basic setting.
Click to expand...

The pros I've spoken to don't use RAW very often. They get it right in the camera. They shoot so much they haven't got time to fiddle converting RAWs, clogging their card and hard drives with masses of unnecessary data. Of course there will be pros who do use RAW for certain things but it's not cut and dried. I don't like RAW because of the vast file sizes, I'm a skinflint when it comes to storage space, because I'm always running out, even when using JPG.

In many cases, I consider RAW to be something of a crutch - yes it's true there's a bit more latitude to rescue an overexposed image with RAW, but it would be better not to overexpose in the first place. There are subtle improvements in image quality available with RAW, and when you know what they are, you might want to use RAW for certain images (one-off landscapes, anything you intend to print big and hang on your wall), but in my opinion at this stage, RAW is an extra complication you don't need. As we have seen from the rather accomplished post-processing of the images you've shown so far, a JPG can be manipulated in much the same way as a RAW. (White balance, exposure, et al.)

The best way to learn how to expose properly is to examine the histogram after every shot. This tutorial is a good introduction to how histograms work:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understanding-histograms.shtml


If you're overexposing, look at the right side of the histogram to check if it's gone "off the scale" as it were (the far right bar on the histogram is all the way to the top of the histogram scale). If so, adjust exposure compensation (or shutter/aperture/ISO if in manual) to bring the histogram to the left slightly. Take another shot and try again. Try a bit of negative exposure compensation if you are routinely overexposing.

And keep posted your work so we can see how you're progressing. Happy shooting!
 
Wookie, do you mean presets on the camera or DPP? Thanks for the link to the freebie software.... treated myself to Digital Photo and I was SHOCKED to see that Photoshop is over £500 - almost as much as the camera itself.... maybe I'll treat myself to Elements at some point, but I also would love a tripod, and maybe some lighting of some sort...

martsharm, what a lovely comment, thank you! I am feeling already slightly obsessed despite my lack of so-far talent ;-) I didn't mention, but I have a PhD to complete in the next 3 or 4 months so I had better be careful.

Thanks for the link to the histogram tutorial, I'll take a look when there are no children swarming around me (heeeelp....). I was starting to think actually that I'd better be careful to actually take good photos and not compensate too much in editing software, so it's interesting what you say about that. Also interesting that there are differing viewpoints on the RAW thing!
 
kitschenalia said:
Wookie, do you mean presets on the camera or DPP?
Click to expand...
They're basically the same.

RAW is the raw data off the sensor with absolutely minimal processing
If you or the camera produce a jpeg image from it, or display it on a screen, it needs to be processed.

Your camera converts the same raw data according to the camera presets to make the Jpegs it saves.

If you output from the camera as CR2 raw files than the current camera settings are saved with the file but in DPP you have the choice to use the camera setting or alternative presets on DPP (which are equivalent to the ones available for in camera processing)


take some raw shots and have a play


yes Raw takes up more disk space, but disk space is cheap now, a 1TB external drive is only about £70. Raw has a lot more processing options beyond ONLY what the camera was set to when you took the shot, and it covers a wider range of brightness values allowing you to tweak the exposure in post processing.

If we were all perfect photographers and camera metering was perfect and we had infinate time to achieve the perfect shot and the kids would hold that great expression while we achieved perfection and we didn't want lossless editing . . . then all photos could be jpegs, but I'm sticking with raw :LOL:
 
Last edited:
Let's try posting these properly this time...

Hi K, I just stumbled across these edits I did of your Buddha and then forgot about when I went to the Lakes. Hope you like him. S

showphoto.php


showphoto.php
 
Don't think so, I can't see them either. Bloody technology. Right...

2n9ytsn_edited.JPG


Capture14-11-2009-16_47_33.png


Ok, I know what I did wrong now.

It's worth having a fiddle with the settings as all sorts of different "inner glows" present themselves and there's only a click or so in them.

I'm also thinking it would be worth investing in a graphics tablet as my shoulder does ache after a session of this on the mouse. Anyone got any recommendations?
 
generally not a good idea to be so brutal on the sharpness slider. Just enough, no more, and then maybe a little less.
 
Know what you mean, Wookie. There's always a tendency to crank it on at first, until one gets used to the subtleties. Thanks for the reminder.
 
EEK

sharpness is done by exagerating the contrast difference across edges. Effectively it puts a slightly darker band along the darker side of the edge and a slightly paler band along the paler side of the edge.

Its a destructive one way process on jpegs.

It needs to be done to suit the image size and how it will be viewed.

It should be the last thing you do to an image after final resizing, and always needs to be redone after resizing (playing with the pixels destroys the subtle thin band) .

Best done with the image at 100% on the screen, you should then be able to clearly judge the shapening effect without teh PC's resizing for the screen interfering.

Overdo it and you get wierd edges, usually a sort of washed out streaky halo effect just outside objects (usually the pale side is more noticeable). It also over-emphasises (I think that's enough isisesises) any surface blemishes or noise on a photo making it more grainy - try it on a high ISO shot and you'll see.

There's quite a lot on sharpening around this forum, try searching the tutorials section. Often its confusingly called "Unsharp Mask" or "USM" as it originates from an old film darkroom trick.

There's a lot about how to achieve it by effectively replicating the good old fashioned darkroom way, and variants theron, using layers in photoshop (or gimp). They're worth having a quick (?) look, to get your head around the principle. The layers methods are good for the photoshop demons as they can tailor the type and amount of sharpening, especially when using masks to selectively apply different amounts of sharpening to different areas. The classic use is to sharpen eyes in portraits - look for the tutorial on making eyes really pop.

The fancy layers method is great for those who have the time and expertise. I managed using Gimp, eventually, but to be honest 99% of it can be achieved in DPP, its only when you have a tricky shot that needs special treatment, or needs to be selectively applied, that the PS and Gimp layers system become really useful

using RAW in DPP allows you to play with sharpness non-destructively. With jpegs you save the sharpening as the image and its committed and final and never to be removed. With the raw file on DPP you can set sharpening roughly (on the raw tab) while you tweak the other aspects of brightness, contrast and curves, as it does make a big difference to the contrast and vibrancy of colours in the image. Remove the sharpenning if you want to convert to jpeg then load the final jpeg in and correctly apply sharpening to that.

The important thing is just enough, no more, and maybe a little less.
 
Amen to that. Thanks from me too. I'll have a look at those tutorials, I'm always happy to do things the old way, even if I end up going back to the easy!
 
Umm, at risk of hijacking your thread, kitschenalia, I wonder what you guys make of these? It's the first time I've managed to get a reasonably sharp image of feathers, which was a big relief. There's some lovely pearly light to be brought out in the feathers on the left, but also on the head. I'm trying to brighten it a bit - it was late on a cloudy day - without losing these. Anyway, this is where I've got but I'm not that happy; the last one feels too gloomy. Would appreciate first impressions and any thoughts.

Thanks, Swatcher

PS: All with RAW sharpness set to 0!

As shot:
Martin_Mere_Whooper_Asleep_06_shot_-_w_500_sh_0.JPG


Version A - like something about it but a bit bright?
Martin_Mere_Whooper_Asleep_06a_-_w_500_sh_0.JPG


Version C - pearlier but maybe a bit to dark on the right (been fiddling with the RGB curves)
Martin_Mere_Whooper_Asleep_06c_-_w_500_sh_0.JPG
 
playtime!

take a copy of the top as shot jpeg
open the copy in DPP

set sharpness at a rough value for now, say 150

set saturation to 148, a bit of a boost here often helps but can be overdone

to make the pearly bits more prominent and glowing try adding some warmth, a bit more red, but only for the bright bits. The bit you want is the low plateau to the right of the peak, it needs to be moved to the right slightly, but the peak and everything to the left held where they are. Select the red channel and stitch along the diagonal with a series of holding points to keep the darker areas as they are, a point on each grid line intersection, plus one between the 1/2 & 3/4 lines to stop the curve 'S'ing below the diagonal, then midpoint of the last quarter drag the curve up just a fraction and you'll see the bright areas of white gain the faintest hint of warmth of sunrise / sunset light. Don't let the red graph slide out of the side of the window, it just needs to move towards the side, not to touch it.

sharpness slider: first make sure you are looking at the photo at 100%
and look at the eye, that should be the focus point of the shot, it should be sharp, but as its such a high contrast black vs white surrounding , plus the yellow to the bottom right, it actually is one of the most sensitive bits to sharpness on this shot (ignore the ragged feather bottom left)
sling the slider over to full sharpness 500, watch the white halo appear around the outside of the eye. Now drag the slider back and hunt up/down on the slider as you work the sharpness back to judge when the halo has just disappeared. Yes the shot will look incredibly soft after full sharpness, but ignore, you're trying to find the spot where the halo dissappears. I reckon 120 is pretty good, but actually about 65 is better. Look away at something else, then look back and the apparent softness after full sharpness will have dissappeared and the image will look acceptably sharp

click on view, and select before/after comparison . . . better, is that what you were trying to achieve?

I think that's probably made the bright areas on the left a touch too bright as they've lost some feather detail but life's full of compromises, maybe with some more playing it could be better but I'll leave that to you.
 
Just noticed, you're talking about sharpness on the RGB tab. Do you ever use the sharpness on the RAW?
 
I always do a rough sharpness on the raw tab for while I'm doing editing, the sharpness affects the apperent colours, but that's because I've got raw files. For final edit on finished size jpegs you've got to use the rgb tab.

Here it was a jpeg so I had to use the rgb tab

I'm only slightly enlightened at this stuff, so don't take my word as gospel.
 
Slight enlightenment will do fine for now or my poor head will spin. Anyway, I like the way you describe it - just enough then a bit less. I've started reading through the tutorials and as usual it's paying - enlightening, even - to understand the nitty-gritty. Long way to go on this but looking forward to the journey.
 
Hello and welcome :wave:

You've had lots of helpful crit on the shots you've posted so I'm just going to say a few general things:

1. Less is more - try to limit the amount of shots that you put up for C&C. People are much more inclined to comment if there are only three or four photo's and it will also make you a bit more brutal with which shots you cull yourself.

2. Experiment to your hearts content - pick an aspect e.g. depth of field, and try lots of different things until you think you completely understand whats going on and have achieved what you wanted to... then move onto the next thing. It can all get a bit overwhelming at times and it's great to have lots of little eureka moments rather than trying to do everything at once.

3. Keep posting and keep the attitude that you have shown so far - all crit taken on board and taken in a positive way (y)

Good luck, have fun!
 
Hi Daysleeper40, welcome to our little thread. Thanks for your encouragement and advice. As you say, all welcome. It's great this place, I've only been on a month or so (actually, I can't remember) and I've found all the help I've needed and plenty more where that came from. Beginning to feel I'm beginning to know what I'm doing even if I can't all the time yet. Much happier with the shots I'm taking - even if I've now got to go and desharpen them all...***&^%!!!!! ;)

"Thousands of years ago, cats were worshipped as Gods. Cats have never forgotten this."

Neither have many humans.
 
Hi Daysleeper, thanks for the welcome :) I'm feeling a bit demotivated at the moment because a) I'm ill with a horrid flu and b) I have (thanks to missing several days with being ill) got to rewrite my thesis in about 6 working days, ha! Anyway, I think my "mojo" will come back when we arrive at my Father in Law's for Christmas on 19th Dec - not taking any work with me so it's family and camera time :)

Swatcher, I'd agree definitely about how helpful people are here, it's fantastic - I love your swan by the way! (but I don't get the bit about the cats!).
 
important thought . . have you folks calibrated your monitors in any way?
 
If you're getting eye strain go to an optician.

Most screens come supplied as "buy me I'm brighter and my colours are more vivid than the screen next to me in the shop" settings. It applies to LCD & CRT monitors, but the really bad ones are tvs. The result is many out of the box screens on standard settings have poor colour reproduction.

The proper way would be to buy / beg / steal / borrow a proper calibration device that measures the screen and runs some super software to fix your screen at the press of a button, or two.

One day I'll afford that, however you can get pretty close without spending big money

If your mionitor came with a disk it may be worth looking to see if it's got calibration software with it, or downloadable from their support. Video cards sometimes have calibration facuilities in their drivers too (nvidia)

The calibration devices and calibration software generally produce a tweaked custom ICC file, but your starting point is to ensure that you have loaded the correct stock ICC colour (remember everything is in american english so "color") profile for your monitor model onto your system and have it enabled on the operating system and in your photo editing software.


You then need to adjust the display. I'll make a wild guess and assume you've got an LCD monitor and some flavour of Vista.
First make sure your display drivers are correct (it should quote correct make and model number of the monitor on the display settings popup). Worth doing a driver update check as well.
Make sure that the resolution is on its max setting. LCD monitors work best in their native setting, anything else is going to be fudging the display control to produce the resolution selected.
In advanced settings on the monitor tab look at the screen refresh rate. Make sure that it is on the maximum valid setting available (do not untick the "hide modes that this monitor cannot display" box or you'll cause big trouble)

Then you need to set brightness properly, and its time for me to point you at this link: http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1A.html

worth a good read but awfully heavy going. Halfway down is the important bit: "Gamma and black level chart" with some wierd stripy lines on the page. That basically is the core of the calibration, and in an ideal world is done separately for red green and blue.

go have a good read

also particularly useful is this page: http://www.normankoren.com/makingfineprints1B.html#Gamma_3color
which has the 3 colour gamma setting patterns on it

a quick and simple means of brightness and contrast levels check is the test pattern at the bottom of this page : http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canoneos500d/ its a band of grey shades labelled A to Z
 
One of my posts seems to be missing...

Nothing stuffs your sight (or wrists) quicker than a computer. I'm on varifocals now and they're okay. I have a window nearby I look out of and turn down the brightness when the room lights are on, which helps. Which will no doubt upset the careful calibration we are about to do...

Thanks for that, Wookie. A friend of mine, not the first, mentioned it to me the other day and I knew he was right but have been putting it off. In any case, I don't think my monitor (CIBOX LW1922C) is up to the job. 800:1 seems to be a common contrast ratio. Anything to add?

Hope you're back in the land of the living, kitschenalia. The bit about the cats was that I know several owners who still worship cats as gods!
 
eye tip .......for every hour you spend on a computer take a ten minute break to rest your eyes it stops you getting head aches.(y)
 
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