Traction engine
Discussion
There's only so many wrongly exposed photos of planes you can take - so at Rougham last Sunday I picked on this helpless traction engine instead: a much easier target! First one is roughly normal, second is spot colour, third has been 'nobbled':
There are two things I don't quite like: can you guess them?
There are two things I don't quite like: can you guess them?
It's amazing how people see different things - I suppose that's the wonder of photography as art.
My two dislikes were:
Pic 1: that the bottom row of bolts was cropped off, spoiling the composition.
Pic 3: the nameplate which had different colours from the rest of the image. I could fix this in PS but wondered if it would bug anyone else. Seems like the blue trees bugged you more!
My two dislikes were:
Pic 1: that the bottom row of bolts was cropped off, spoiling the composition.
Pic 3: the nameplate which had different colours from the rest of the image. I could fix this in PS but wondered if it would bug anyone else. Seems like the blue trees bugged you more!
chim_knee said:
simpo two... fantastic photo's IMHO
Clarity etc is stunning and what you've done with them really, really works.
Were they taken with the D70? If so, which lens are you using??
[hijack]Mine arrived today - won't have a chance to play until tomorrow but dead excited![/hijack]
. Yes, that's the D70 talking and the above pix were taken with an AF-S Nikkor 70-300mm D-ED (which is not one of those big bastard f2.8 jobs but relatively normal-looking) Enjoy your new baby - but don't just stick it on Auto. Go through the book from p1, learn every function and figure out what it does. You won't need them all of course but some are very useful.
indeed 
(are they Canon people peeking through the door?)
dcw@pr said:
It's just the background, as someone else said (maybe also the exposure on the brass bit at the top - but that is minor). How did you do the third one - looks like a "replace colour" to me?
Actually for Shot 1 I darkened the brass bit as much as it would reasonably go. The sky is blank, but I don't mind that as it throws attention to the dark metallic structure. Blue sky and fluffy clouds would be a distraction I think. The shot is almost monochrome but with a splash of pale gold as a highlight.
Shot 3 was done in PS CS with the 'Hue' slider. However you have to keep your wits about you as most of the results can be pretty grim. I had a red/green version as well but dumped it.
Damn I love this camera!
The problem with digital cameras, as I'm sure you have found out, is that they lose highlights much quicker than shadows, so on something like the brass in picture one, even if you darken it, there is still a largish blown-out portion. You can see in the transition from the blowout to the detailed bits a few funny colour artefacts caused by darkening it. If you have a proper version of photoshop then try converting to 16bit before doing heavy levels work like this, it can make a big difference.
regarding the third picture, I thought because some of the photo stayed with normal hues you had changed them with replace colour. But now that you mention it, I guess it's pretty obvious that there isnt a lot of colour in the metal itself, so that wouldn't be changed even with a global hue adjustment. Normally I'm not too keen on this sort of photo, but I think yours works very well.
regarding the third picture, I thought because some of the photo stayed with normal hues you had changed them with replace colour. But now that you mention it, I guess it's pretty obvious that there isnt a lot of colour in the metal itself, so that wouldn't be changed even with a global hue adjustment. Normally I'm not too keen on this sort of photo, but I think yours works very well.
simpo two said:
I see the rabble hordes have arrived...
Only to share wisdom
dcw@pr said:
If you have a proper version of photoshop then try converting to 16bit before doing heavy levels work like this, it can make a big difference.
Fiddling about with 16 bit in PS with a file that the camera has spat out as an 8 bit jpeg is closing the door after the horse has bolted. No amount of adjustment is going to retrieve detail that just isn't there, that the camera has already chucked away for you. If you want all the detail, shoot in RAW (Have I mentioned this before?) and process using a good converter and yes, if you want to fiddle further in PS, process into 16 bit for maximum control.
Bacardi said:
Fiddling about with 16 bit in PS with a file that the camera has spat out as an 8 bit jpeg is closing the door after the horse has bolted. No amount of adjustment is going to retrieve detail that just isn't there, that the camera has already chucked away for you. If you want all the detail, shoot in RAW (Have I mentioned this before?) and process using a good converter and yes, if you want to fiddle further in PS, process into 16 bit for maximum control.
That is simply not true, although I can see why you might think so. The reason for this is because when you convert to 16 bit and perform changes (such as levels) then you are giving yourself the chance of having more intermediate colours/shades between the original values, which were captured in 8bit (or 12 bit if you are using 12 bit RAW). When and if you then convert back to 8 bit, there is going to be less posterization. If you don't belive me try it for yourself...
1)Open any colour image you have in photoshop
2)Open the Hue/Saturation command box
3)Set the saturation to -97 and press OK
4)Go back into the Hue/Saturation box, and now set the saturation to +97
5)Save this file under a different name.
6)Go back to the file in its original state, and convert it to 16 bit
7)Repeat steps 2-4
8)Compare this image with the 8 bit one
9)Conclusion - 16 bit editing is worthwhile with heavy editing
Edited for spelling
>> Edited by dcw@pr on Saturday 28th August 22:34
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