I've rarely seen such helpful, constructive feedback - bravo Moose!
jez
On 18/12/2012, Moose <olymoose@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On 11/7/2012 5:32 PM, Brian Swale wrote:
>> Wayne, Jim and Chris, thanks for your comments.
>>
>> Chris, that photograph of the rhododendron is the best I have done of
>> that
>> colour.
>>
>> In the last couple or so years I have discovered that a certain hue of red
>> (or
>> zone of red) in tulips, roses and rhododendrons is the very devil to
>> photograph. The red colour seems to bleed all over the place.
>>
>> I don't understand it, but I do seem to recall Moose writing about it
>> several
>> times some years back, with a cure ... :-)
>
> Well, if it's been some years, And you have just posted 20 images for your
> 'slide' show ...
>
> Your problem with the reds (and yellows, elsewhere), are symptoms of a
> larger problem your images regularly display. You
> complain separately about loss of detail in bright clouds.
>
> You let highlights clip quite often. When all channels clip, you get
> undifferentiated white. When just one channel
> clips, you get undifferentiated washes of that color. Far the most common
> channel to clip in natural surroundings is
> red, in red, orange and yellow flowers and foliage.
>
> Full solution of this problem for your work would involve several steps, in
> ascending order of cost and/or learning.
>
> 1. Bracket your exposures. At first, take tests with five shots as a test,
> from - 1/3 EV to -1 2/3. Look first at the
> histograms and images themselves for highlights. There will be an exposure
> in which the clouds, skies, whatever will
> look quite natural and there will be no little stack of pixels up against
> the right edge of the histograms
>
> Then look through them at the shadows. In the darker ones, important shadow
> detail will most likely be lost, at least
> without processing. When shooting at base ISO, you may find an exposure for
> some images which both retains highlight
> details and shadow details. With other subjects, and at higher ISOs, that
> won't be the case.
>
> My impression is that you are hesitant to deviate from the Exposure that the
> knowledge of the engineers who created the
> camera dictates. Exposure is a situation where experience must overrule
> authority. Perhaps this essay from an
> independent, professional authority will help.
> <http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/09/why-iso-isnt-iso.html>
>
> 2. Much as the simplicity, and perhaps ascetic minimalism, of shooting JPEGs
> may appeal to you, it is not helping your
> cause. Forcing a wide dynamic range into 8 bit data is a real problem.
> Excellent as Oly's JPEG engine is, it has to make
> compromises at the ends of the range to maintain a natural look in the mid
> tones.
>
> Shooting Raw offers all sorts of expanded possibilities for retaining
> details important to particular images, that would
> otherwise be lost. This particularly applies to the highlights you have
> trouble with. Shooting Raw costs you essentially
> nothing other than a couple of pennies of storage.
>
> 3. FastStone is a wonderful image viewer, I use it all the time. No matter
> how much you love it, for whatever reasons,
> it would be a mediocre Raw converter in any case, and is poor for the simple
> reason that it only converts to 8 bit.
> Likewise, it would be a middling simple image editor - if it could work in
> 16 bits. I'll bet a worldwide survey of
> successful photographers who sell images of the kind you would like to make
> would find none who use such a primitive editor.
>
> Oly's Viewer 2 is a far superior raw converter and image editor to
> FastStone. It's free for your camera, if you don't
> already have it. Yes, I know, it's more work, takes more time. I recall
> reading over your comments on deciding to try
> watercolor (a very difficult medium) because it looked easy, then
> discovering it is more difficult than you thought.
> Well, good technical photography technique, including after the exposure,
> takes time, good tools and practice, too.
>
> 4. A cheap, old computer and second rate software are like cheap art
> supplies and tools. You can draw, paint, sculpt
> with them, but it's more difficult, and likely avails less success.
> Unfortunately, the situation is even worse of
> nature/landscape photography. It's like a temporary darkroom in a closet in
> film days, with a cheap enlarging lens. You
> can print stuff, but it's hard work, takes too much time and effort and is
> generally not as good as one would like.
>
> I don't recall what your computer set-up is now. I do recall you talking
> about something far less than what you need.
> You don't need bleeding edge, but you don't need something at least middle
> of the contemporary road.
>
> 5. Through only a partial fault of your own, you have a camera that is below
> average in dynamic range and particularly
> prone to highlight blow out. Ignoring brand loyalty in favor of careful
> research would have revealed the problems to come.
>
> In any case, it's also unfortunately true that Oly Viewer 2 doesn't do
> anything to recover highlights. I've tried it
> with the same images against Adobe's Raw converter (ACR) on E-PL1 and E-M5
> files. ACR is FAR, FAR superior for
> handling/recovering highlights. You don't have to pay for PS, the same ACR
> is in LightRoom, for much less, and even in
> Photoshop Elements (PSE), for even less - perhaps less full featured, but at
> least 16 bit. And PSE is a more more
> capable editor than FastStone, too, with 16 bit support for basic editing.
>
> 6. Finally, as hinted above, the E-3 is not particularly good at wide
> dynamic range subjects, which very many of yours
> are. Unfortunate, but just what is. If you want to understand more of why,
> even more of why ISO is a rubbery number and
> why a good Raw converter is crucial, read this.
> <http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/10/raw-is-not-raw.html>
>
> If it gets too technical later, at least look at the first graph. The E-3 is
> a lot like the E-P1, the curve shooting up
> sharply until it goes BANG against the top, clipping highlights. This quote
> from Ctein's review talks to the practical
> result of the softer shoulder of the E-M5's curve.
>
> "The OM-D has an excellent 12-stop (give or take) exposure range, with a
> very attractive roll-off in the
> characteristic curve highlights
>
> <http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/10/raw-is-not-raw.html>.
> ... In Figure 1 the
> direct reflections of the sun in the glass of the greenhouse and the
> cars of the Ferris wheel are far beyond the
> exposure range of any medium, silver or silicon, but they fade out
> gracefully without looking artificially clipped."
>
> He also echoes couple of things I spoke of above. This is a recognized
> technical expert who has made his living for
> decades with photography.
>
> "That's Raw of course, but I only do Raw photography, so that's all I'm
> gonna be writing about in these two posts.
> ... Still, given the uncontrolled lighting situations I photograph
> under, there are often times when I want to
> bracket exposures to hedge my bets or to be able to merge frames later
> for an extended exposure range."
>
> I don't want to take away from you joy in presenting a series of images to
> the public successfully. But I do want to
> make what I hope will be some constructive criticism of their technical
> aspects, particularly regarding exposure. You've
> got a good eye for landscape, flowers still life, etc., but you could do a
> better technical job of capturing them.
>
> So here, buried in a long post, are some comments on your Pecha Kucha
> presentation images, focusing on the above issues.
> There are visual illustrations of many comments here.
> <http://galleries.moosemystic.net/MooseFoto/index.php?gallery=Others/Brian_Swale>
>
> 1. *North Hagley Park trees.* I've commented on this before. Blown
> highlights in the foliage and grass. There's just
> something wrong in the mid tones. They don't have the strong local contrast
> I actually see in this kind of light. Flip
> to it from other images. Doesn't it look flat? And oddly unsaturated, in
> spite of the foliage color? Possibly the result
> of pulling up shadows in a simple editor?
>
> 2. Rose. Perfect!
>
> 3. Street scene. This is nicely exposed and processed. In spite of the wide
> dynamic range, the cloud looks fine and
> shadows hold most details. There are a few spots of blown highlights, but
> it's a good example of how natural that looks
> when they are small and widely separated. It's large areas that are
> trouble.
>
> 4. *There is the road itself.* Badly clipped cloud detail. The clouds have
> a yellow tint, especially around the edges.
> I'm guessing that is an artifact of uneven channel clipping. There is a
> small amount of black clipping, but as small,
> scattered points, it isn't obvious. Significantly less exposure would
> probably look great after lifting the shadows a
> little. Bracket!!
>
> 5. *Mount Cook over Lake Pukaki.* Wonderful! The contrast compression
> effect of long distance shots has brought the DR
> right in to the camera's range. I could see it also with a bit of LCE in the
> mountains but it's great as it is.
>
> 6. *Cluden Hill*. Absolutely beautiful light, marred by the wildly
> overexposed upper right. Same problem as #4, but more
> of a shame, as subject, light, composition and the crocodile in the clouds
> are so nice.
>
> 7. *Clyde cemetery. *Good subject and light. Good exposure. The E-3 seems to
> be doing a good job without large expanses
> of brightness. Do you use it with only the central spot for exposure? I'd
> think ESP exposure (or whatever they call it
> now) would do a better job on all those blown skies. The original ESP on the
> OMPC does a better job.
>
> Something about the long branch reaching out reminds me of St. Ansel's
> famous shot of the Sentinel Dome Jeffery Pine.
>
> 8. *Young Lane.* Man, that's beautiful! And yet, it could be a little
> better. Some of the leaves in the foreground have
> gone white from clipping. - 1/3 or -2/3 EV would look a little better. Shot
> in Raw and processed in ACR would also
> probably fix it.
>
> Or crop to 35 mm proportions, losing the very bottom. Actually, I think that
> tightens up the composition and makes it
> stronger. Still some blown leaves, but not as many.
>
> 9. *towards Waikerikeri Valley Road*. There went the sky again, no detail
> but yellowish bits. Nice composition. The flat
> light means it could use a little punch added.
>
> 10. *Clyde Dam. *Look! You can do it! This is a high dynamic range subject,
> perfectly exposed, sacrificing a tiny bit of
> shadow detail for perfect highlights and mid tones. Whatever you did here,
> expose other landscapes the same way. (And
> bracket, at least as you learn how to do this regularly!)
>
> 11. *absolute size of the dam.* Moderate DR, and exposure if fine. Doesn't
> do much for me, though. I think a more
> vertical crop is stronger. The water in the shade could use some help, too.
>
> 12 & 13. Lake landscapes. I encounter a number of natural subjects that just
> knock me out in person, but seem to defy
> capture in an image that conveys what I saw. some, I think I will never
> capture to my satisfaction, but I keep trying.
>
> These seem to be in a less difficult category. I imagine they are just
> lovely in person. To me, on my screen, the are
> just kind of blah. That's where a quality editor and some skill with it can
> help.
>
> 14. Composed at an angle. If there was such a convention, St. Ansel killed
> it off with his famous images of the winding
> Snake River, river below the Tetons and elsewhere. Very nicely composed. A
> little less exposure would have helped the
> upper right.
>
> 15. Mirrored reflection. Great subject and composition. Blown highlights in
> the sky. Stepped tonal transitions in the
> water, rather than smooth, the result of 8 bit editing and/or over
> compression of the JPEG.
>
> 16. Brutal enduring cliffs. Somehow, I imagine that in this direct light,
> there would be more contrast in those
> interesting surfaces. Lots of interesting imaginary creatures and faces to
> be seen in the rock!
>
> 17. Brutal enduring cliffs. Well here's turnabout, and a possible lesson.
> The sky is properly exposed, but the bright
> rocks on the left are badly blown out. can be improved a great deal, but
> will never be technically first rate without
> Raw and negative exposure compensation.
>
> 18. Italian Gully. Nicely composed and exposed. No real DR challenges.
>
> 19. Lake landscape. Nice view! A good example of sacrificing shadow detail
> for the more important highlights. As
> outlined above, both can be captured at once, with the right technique and
> equipment/software.
>
> 20. Favorite Hill. A tough one. As taken/presented, highlights are blown AND
> shadow detail is poor. The shadows can be
> brought up a little. Only solutions for the sky are to make it all blue or
> graft one on.
>
> D. R. Moose
>
> --
> What if the Hokey Pokey *IS* what it's all about?
> --
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