damnit, baron, you're making me want to go buy a roll of portra and get it, gulp, professionally processed. i'm assuming you were using the 160 stuff?
@Prospicience 'The Three Tree' is a great photo. the colours are spot on and the deep depth of field really makes it - not to mention the flawless composition. good work!
Gotta say I prefer 'Out Of Place' to 'The Three Tree' -- I think the subject in TTT gets a bit lost, while OoP has really striking contrast and, to my eyes, a stronger composition.
@bsjezz, you really should! This was 160, but I've also got a few rolls of 400 to scan. I didn't take much 400 on the trip with me because I was concerned about airport scanners, but I needn't have worried.
I like the second one there the best. The first seems a bit flat, and the third doesn't really jump out at me -- I think it needs more context, because right now I don't think it works as portraiture, but that seems the intention.
i lost a roll of film yesterday. usually caffenol is good to keep and use again - i've never had problems - but this time, nup. blank slate. not really sure why. that stung a lot - there would have been some good shots on there.
Japan was really nice. Not just for all the sights and scenery, but also for the little things that made the country vastly more pleasant -- brilliant public transport, extended opening hours for shops and restaurants, and everyone dressed so very nicely. I live in a big city but it feels like the sticks compared to Tokyo. And there were so, so many places to shop for camera gear, but I was being good (and short on luggage space).
Have you been?
@bsjezz, sorry to hear that! I'd be devastated to lose a roll of film like that. But yeah, all the more reason to get back out and take even better shots.
D-double post! Trying out the ProPhoto RGB colour space. How does this look, colour-wise? I realise I'm taking a risk not using the sRGB standard, but I figure most people using Flickr will be using a browser that supports embedded colour profiles.
Japan was really nice. Not just for all the sights and scenery, but also for the little things that made the country vastly more pleasant -- brilliant public transport, extended opening hours for shops and restaurants, and everyone dressed so very nicely. I live in a big city but it feels like the sticks compared to Tokyo. And there were so, so many places to shop for camera gear, but I was being good (and short on luggage space).
Have you been?
I have and had a great time. Fantastic place to shoot.
Turns out iOS isn't colour-managed, which was throwing me off. Is this an improvement? I'm seeing much more green in the trees, slightly more obvious detail in the lake, and a less violet-tinged sky.
@muninn that's right, forgot you posted that pic from Meiji Jingu (and also met the Prada security guard, if memory serves).
Fuck, I am so far behind in this thread. I think I mentioned in the other thread that when my work gets busy, the rest of my life gets severely sidetracked. This is one of those cases. I'm still working on rounding out my vacation photos and I haven't picked up my camera in a few weeks. Here's one to keep my head above water in the thread:
Thanks, @electricmeat! Glad you're enjoying the shots. I really need to take more long exposure shots, especially now it's getting dark so soon.
I think your latest shot has run afoul of Flickr's excessive sharpening algorithms, as the shot linked here is wayyyy too sharp, at least for my tastes. Looks much better in the large size, though. I agree with muninn that it's a bit flat, but I enjoy the composition.
@muninn, the perspective on that shot is doing my head in, but I like it. Feel like there could be more contrast, though. I need to shoot more HP5 myself...
Hand made by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Not sure how I feel about this one. Colours seem off but it was an overcast day there too, and I'm hoping to reflect that. I also realised I accidentally uploaded the full-size JPG, so have fun pixel-peeping, I guess.
Colors are definitely funky, and the soft lighting definitely reflects the overcast weather. Something about the composition bugs me. Maybe if you included more foreground to extend the leading lines of the road. Cool shot though. There is something really awesome about the quality of light in Japan for some reason. Its hard to take a bad shot there (although I have tried my best, and probably succeeded).
Yeah my shot lacks a bit of contrast. I think its a combination of Flickr doing weird things (I have a firm belief that the Flickr service mangles all photos in subtle and confusing ways), and me viewing the original image at large resolution which in my mind makes you focus on local tonality instead of global contrast.
Here is another shot from that day. Had to do a lot of local fixing to get weird flaring from the photo. The lens I am using seems to flare up in strange streaks and patters. Anyone ever experienced anything weird like that before?
Also, people need to post more here, so this thread doesn't turn into a private conversation between 4 people. Post photos, critique, comment etc. We are all here to learn and have fun!
So, I got a new lens for my camera today (and a tripod!) for my camera today. This cat always climbs in boxes the moment you turn your head. I managed to capture this using the new lens:
What do you folks think? Camera is a T3i, lens is the Canon EF 50mm 1.4/f
Steam - Synthetic Violence | XBOX Live - Cannonfuse | PSN - CastleBravo | Twitch - SoggybiscuitPA
Yes, the sharpening is stark when it's posted here. I recently felt I didn't quite know enough about sharpening, so I did a little reading. I have a better understanding of how it works in LR now, but I think I'm in the "a little new knowledge can be dangerous" phase of it. I'm getting a little too fancy with it. It was an overcast day, muninn, and I avoided saturating the colors too much to compensate. I'm trying to keep the tones in my photos even these days and probably erred towards that approach in that shot.
Muninn, your propane tank shot works on several levels. I like the light/dark contrast from left to right. The placement of the tank is very good and I like the way it's processed. I like the grain. The abandoned building covered in ivy doesn't grab me like the propane tank does. I like the technique and the slight sun-flaring at the top. I guess I can't quite figure out what the subject is and what I should be looking at.
Baron, there's a bit of dissonance between the color of the umbrella and the color of the shingles. I'm not very good at spotting color problems, though. I don't think the colors are wrong or off. It seems that you were going for a bit of a leading line with the road but, like muninn's building photo above, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be looking at.
Soggybiscuit, you did a great job. Focus is key when you're shooting 1.4 and you nailed it here. The cat's nicely framed by the box and the tones seem to match. Strong shot.
Electric, I agree that my building shot lacks focus. As soon as I have developed it I wished I had a model standing in from of it. But in general I was interested in showing the reclamation of a building by nature. Probably should have gone a bit wider. Maybe a wider square crop.
Speaking of square, soggy, did you entertained the idea of making your photo a square crop? I think that stuff with strong central subject look good in a square, but then again I seem to have squares on my mind. Like electric said, well done on nailing the focus. I might have added a bit mode contrast and reduced the very light yellow tint (mixed lighting?), but thats a matter of taste. Very cool picture.
@electricmeat and @muninn, thanks for the thoughts. I've re-edited the shot and the new version is thus: Hand made by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Nothing dramatic, and maybe not even an improvement, but the original had a green cast in the shadows that this version makes very apparent.
@electricmeat, I have a real problem with taking more casual street photography, because I'm never sure where / how to emphasise a subject -- often I'm focused on the scene itself, as in the mood / atmosphere. I believe at the time (this was taken about a month ago) I was trying to emphasise the street-side signage and iconography -- those ice-creams in particular were everywhere. I wasn't trying to do anything with the road, that's just unfortunate framing on my part. I have a lot to learn about composition!
Also, re: sharpening, I've lately begun using unsharp mask in Photoshop, as what seems a necessary step in digitising negatives. I don't know if LR gives the same options, but it seems to work wonders in PS at the expense of getting very unrealistic, very quickly. It's also made me think more in terms of 'contrast' than 'sharpness'.
@Soggybiscuit, I'm more of a dog person, but that shot looks good to me! Hope you have fun with that lens -- I'm a big fan of the 50mm focal length.
One of the nice things about playing photographer is that it gets you access to areas where you normally would be shooed off. In this case, the makeshift kitchen at a benefit dinner of a local community art center.
Another benefit is that you can snag some extra servings of the dishes that are top-notch.
Note: I was informed the focus was supposed to be the food, so my penchant for razor-thin depth of field resulted in sharp plates and slightly blurry subjects.
Even the food isn’t perfectly sharp. The bright light on the woman’s face and her being out of focus are EXTREMELY distracting from the food if that was the intended point of focus. Even if the woman was the point of focus the odd shadow is also distracting. Were you pointing a flash at the wall behind you?
No, I am not really communist. Yes, it is weird that I use this name.
Yes, the sharpening is stark when it's posted here. I recently felt I didn't quite know enough about sharpening, so I did a little reading. I have a better understanding of how it works in LR now, but I think I'm in the "a little new knowledge can be dangerous" phase of it. I'm getting a little too fancy with it. It was an overcast day, muninn, and I avoided saturating the colors too much to compensate. I'm trying to keep the tones in my photos even these days and probably erred towards that approach in that shot.
Muninn, your propane tank shot works on several levels. I like the light/dark contrast from left to right. The placement of the tank is very good and I like the way it's processed. I like the grain. The abandoned building covered in ivy doesn't grab me like the propane tank does. I like the technique and the slight sun-flaring at the top. I guess I can't quite figure out what the subject is and what I should be looking at.
Baron, there's a bit of dissonance between the color of the umbrella and the color of the shingles. I'm not very good at spotting color problems, though. I don't think the colors are wrong or off. It seems that you were going for a bit of a leading line with the road but, like muninn's building photo above, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be looking at.
Soggybiscuit, you did a great job. Focus is key when you're shooting 1.4 and you nailed it here. The cat's nicely framed by the box and the tones seem to match. Strong shot.
@electricmeat and @muninn, thanks for the thoughts. I've re-edited the shot and the new version is thus: Hand made by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Nothing dramatic, and maybe not even an improvement, but the original had a green cast in the shadows that this version makes very apparent.
@electricmeat, I have a real problem with taking more casual street photography, because I'm never sure where / how to emphasise a subject -- often I'm focused on the scene itself, as in the mood / atmosphere. I believe at the time (this was taken about a month ago) I was trying to emphasise the street-side signage and iconography -- those ice-creams in particular were everywhere. I wasn't trying to do anything with the road, that's just unfortunate framing on my part. I have a lot to learn about composition!
Also, re: sharpening, I've lately begun using unsharp mask in Photoshop, as what seems a necessary step in digitising negatives. I don't know if LR gives the same options, but it seems to work wonders in PS at the expense of getting very unrealistic, very quickly. It's also made me think more in terms of 'contrast' than 'sharpness'.
@Soggybiscuit, I'm more of a dog person, but that shot looks good to me! Hope you have fun with that lens -- I'm a big fan of the 50mm focal length.
Thanks! Surprisingly, the only thing I had in automatic on that camera was the focus for that shot. It took me about 5 minutes to get her to cooperate enough (after I made some camera adjustments) to get that shot. I managed to get her to cooperate a couple of times before that but I found that I need to adjust the shutter speed.
Electric, I agree that my building shot lacks focus. As soon as I have developed it I wished I had a model standing in from of it. But in general I was interested in showing the reclamation of a building by nature. Probably should have gone a bit wider. Maybe a wider square crop.
Speaking of square, soggy, did you entertained the idea of making your photo a square crop? I think that stuff with strong central subject look good in a square, but then again I seem to have squares on my mind. Like electric said, well done on nailing the focus. I might have added a bit mode contrast and reduced the very light yellow tint (mixed lighting?), but thats a matter of taste. Very cool picture.
I think a square crop would look good with that picture. The lighting was natural, but all of it was coming from a sunroom
on an overcast day.
Steam - Synthetic Violence | XBOX Live - Cannonfuse | PSN - CastleBravo | Twitch - SoggybiscuitPA
Note: I was informed the focus was supposed to be the food, so my penchant for razor-thin depth of field resulted in sharp plates and slightly blurry subjects.
I have to agree with CommunistCow on this: your razor-thin DOF isn't doing the photo any service, and I don't feel the food is a prominent-enough subject in the shot. It looks like there's a far more interesting shot happening about two feet away, with the two men plating up another dish -- did you get any shots like that?
I'd also question your lens choice. It's hard to tell without EXIF, but at a guess I'd say this was shot at 35mm or even wider? I think food photography would benefit from a longer focal length, similar to something you'd use for portraits, or even a macro lens.
This guide is fairly old (seven years! wow) but nothing's changed, really, except model names and probably prices. Note she shoots 50mm on a crop body, so we're talking 80mm equivalent. The longer focal length would really help to fill the frame without suffering from lens distortion, and also helps to separate the subject from the background.
[edit: for content:
Sakura by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Here's a picture I took of some cherry blossoms in Japan. It was taken with a 50mm equivalent lens, so not as long as I'm advocating here, but it was paired with a 21mm extension tube which has the benefit of allowing me to focus much, much closer than otherwise possible. (My lens has a minimum focus distance of about 3ft, otherwise.) Fun to play around with!
Maybe the key to casual street photography is including people? I'm a big fan of Shoot Tokyo and that guy's casual street shots often have people in them. In your photo, it's almost like you've created a set or staged background and you're waiting for something or someone to show up. When I take street photos, I actively try to avoid including people, so my advice is a bit hypocritical. Maybe we both need to let some human beings into our street shots?
Regarding PS and Unsharp, PS is still unknown territory for me. I told myself that I'd master LR before moving onto PS. I *might* be getting to the point where integrating PS into my workflow makes sense. I'd also be lying if I said that PS didn't intimidate me a little. LR does have some relatively sophisticated sharpening tools. There's a Masking slider that can help control where sharpening is applied. But it doesn't have the fine control of Unsharp. I want to start dipping toes into the HDR, Panoramic and Blending worlds and that will require PS. Once I get into it, I'll probably also figuring out Curves in PS instead of using LR's Contrast sliders.
The Sakura photo has great light. Did you warm it a little? I think it's right, but I'm curious.
Maybe the key to casual street photography is including people? I'm a big fan of Shoot Tokyo and that guy's casual street shots often have people in them. In your photo, it's almost like you've created a set or staged background and you're waiting for something or someone to show up. When I take street photos, I actively try to avoid including people, so my advice is a bit hypocritical. Maybe we both need to let some human beings into our street shots?
Yeah, I'm conscious of the fact very few of my pictures include people. To be honest, I'm nervous about shooting people because they make any slight error in focus much more obvious -- I have another shot at the same scene, but looking further down the road, and there's a couple in the shot that are just out of focus. With scenery it's less obvious, and with a static subject I feel more able to take my time and nail focus.
Regarding PS and Unsharp, PS is still unknown territory for me. I told myself that I'd master LR before moving onto PS. I *might* be getting to the point where integrating PS into my workflow makes sense. I'd also be lying if I said that PS didn't intimidate me a little. LR does have some relatively sophisticated sharpening tools. There's a Masking slider that can help control where sharpening is applied. But it doesn't have the fine control of Unsharp. I want to start dipping toes into the HDR, Panoramic and Blending worlds and that will require PS. Once I get into it, I'll probably also figuring out Curves in PS instead of using LR's Contrast sliders.
It's funny how you find PS intimidating, as I have the same response to LR. I do find it helpful that the 'develop' tab basically lists all the tools in sequence of use, but I find the sheer array of tools intimidating. I much prefer using the two or three tools I know in PS and having less space taken up by the interface.
The Sakura photo has great light. Did you warm it a little? I think it's right, but I'm curious.
Following on from above, I've changed my workflow slightly and now use curves almost exclusively. Here's the curves layer on the photo -- all I did was set the white, black and grey points, and then applied a slight s-curve to boost contrast. I did boost the highs slightly, which I'm pretty sure would account for the warming. (I also had a version where I boosted the lows, but I think the image needed the contrast to highlight the detail of the flowers.) Perhaps I could be doing more, colour-wise, and perhaps if I were using LR I'd be experimenting more with colour balance and hue/saturation, but this approach seems to yield useable colours very easily, while being more than enough rope if I'm feeling reckless.
I think there's room for unfocused persons in street shots so I wouldn't worry about that too much. Or maybe even shoot at a shutterspeed of 50 or some such - focus on someone who's not moving around people that are etc, etc. Play around with it maaaan, don't be scared. Just have some fun, don't always have to think too much and you'll have some happy accidents which you can later recreate.
I have been busy as balls lately, one of the cool parts about doing real estate photography is that I'm traveling basically everywhere in a 2hour radius in/around Denver. So I am tagging a lot of great spots, which, once I actually have time, I can go back to shoot.
And then every once and a while I have time to stop on the side of the road and get to photo as well. Field of Wheats by Prospicience 101, on Flickr
I agree with Prospicience; street photography allows for a little blur. Baron, you'll hopefully be pleased to know that I watched a few Curves videos, but applied them to LR. It turns out that LR has a fairly robust RGB ToneCurve tool that does much of what PS's Curves tool does. I like the effects I'm able to get, but I can see how powerful it is. I'm in the same moment as I am with Sharpening: a little knowledge that I'm too eager to apply.
Speaking of Pros, I like both shots as usual. "Ment 2" really excels in the use of blacks. So crisp, too. Were you on a tripod for it? The composition and subject of "Fields of Wheat" is top notch, but the green of the field feels a bit too saturated/vibrant in relation to the sky. If that's how it really was, then kudos to Mother Nature. The clouds feel a little magenta, though, so I have a feeling you tweaked the colors. If I'm right, would it be worth desaturating and shifting the hue of the wheat to match the sky a little?
And to keep the photos rolling, another holiday shot. I can tell that Flickr's over sharpening it. It's not that bad when I see it in LR:
soggybiscuit, with your last two i feel like both are actually overexposed. in 'invaders' we lose the searching quality of the beams of light coming through the trees, because even the stuff outside of those beams is illuminated muddily over the long exposure; in 'campfire' detail is lost by a searing point of light in the centre, and attention moves from that into the colourful and perfectly exposed - but incredibly boring - foreground. this is one where i'm drooling over the 1.4 lens' potential - get it right up around that fire and the people there, to capture the scene intimately. long exposure is hard because you're looking at large windows of time and "enough light, good enough!" isn't actually good enough - you need to hit the sweet spot of exposing your subject while retaining some of the scene's natural darkness.
soggybiscuit, with your last two i feel like both are actually overexposed. in 'invaders' we lose the searching quality of the beams of light coming through the trees, because even the stuff outside of those beams is illuminated muddily over the long exposure; in 'campfire' detail is lost by a searing point of light in the centre, and attention moves from that into the colourful and perfectly exposed - but incredibly boring - foreground. this is one where i'm drooling over the 1.4 lens' potential - get it right up around that fire and the people there, to capture the scene intimately. long exposure is hard because you're looking at large windows of time and "enough light, good enough!" isn't actually good enough - you need to hit the sweet spot of exposing your subject while retaining some of the scene's natural darkness.
Thanks! Invaders is entirely my fault (I believe); I messed around with it in post processing too much. I'll post the original tomorrow (it's on another computer).
As for Campfire, you think I should get closer for shots like that? That's something I'll try for sure next time. I'm fairly new to this and I'm doing it to learn something new. I'm still not the best at picking my shots. That being said, please provide criticism; I can't get better at it unless people tell me what they think!
Steam - Synthetic Violence | XBOX Live - Cannonfuse | PSN - CastleBravo | Twitch - SoggybiscuitPA
sure. i guess what i'm saying is what you don't necessarily want (or need) to know - that getting a f1.4 lens and using it for long exposures is defeating the purpose a bit. get up there and capture the light on those faces! that said, you can still use the lens's depth of field qualities, and work with longer exposures - this, for example, uses a lens practically the same as yours - but it's closer, and much more restrained in the exposure time (5 seconds). and in the end it does the unique quality of firelight much more justice.
I agree with @bsjezz about the 50/1.4 being wasted on that shot -- a lens that fast is crying out to be used close-up, wide open, and as fast a shutter speed as the extra light will afford.
Also, four minutes seems like wayyyy too long. This long exposure I shot would have been under a minute, at something more like f8. The lights themselves have blown out, but that's to be expected -- everything around them still has colour and detail. In your shot, the chairs and the man's face have blown out, so it looks very unnatural.
The sparks and embers coming out of the fire are very cool, though. It'd be nice to see a close-up long exposure with that more prominently in the frame, though I understand it might not be very practical!
Up next: more home-developed Ilford. I'm already thinking it's time to upgrade to C-41 processing, as the nearest local lab want $6 a sheet to develop 4x5 colour negatives. (And $8 for b/w! I'm pretty sure my chems have already paid for themselves.)
Thanks! Invaders is entirely my fault (I believe); I messed around with it in post processing too much. I'll post the original tomorrow (it's on another computer).
As for Campfire, you think I should get closer for shots like that? That's something I'll try for sure next time. I'm fairly new to this and I'm doing it to learn something new. I'm still not the best at picking my shots. That being said, please provide criticism; I can't get better at it unless people tell me what they think!
For the record, I agree with bsjezz and Baron, Soggybiscuit. You definitely needed to be closer. The subject(s) of your photo were the fire and the people. To the extent possible, and allowing for some artistic leeway, you need to fill the frame with your subject. Much of the space surrounding your subjects in Campfire obviously has nothing to do with the subjects. It's wasted space and it makes the photo feel empty. There are times when a photo can feature a small subject surrounded by lots of empty space. For that approach to work, the empty space must itself be interesting. Your empty space in Campfire isn't. "Filling the frame" is a problem I often suffer from, so you just need to be conscious of it and think to yourself, "Can I get closer?"
As for the technical side, the focal length and aperture often aren't as important as the shutter speed in long exposures. There are boundless exceptions to that statement, of course, but usually it's the shutter speed that will have the largest impact on the image. 4 minutes is *way* too long for what you were doing. 4 minutes is the sort of exposure you might consider when you're shooting stars on a moonless night. I'm talking about conditions where there's almost no light. In the case of Campfire, you had plenty of light to work with. The fire is a tremendous light source. You correctly set the ISO to 100, so you just needed to dial in the right shutter speed and aperture. When I do long exposures, I always start with a 5 second exposure to see how it turns out and adjust from there.
There's more to get into with long exposures, including putting filters on lens in order to create daytime long-exposures. Most of the stuff I'm discussing now applies to night shots like Campfires.
Thanks for the advice folks! I should have a few more chances this year for campfire related photos. So you'll see a few more of those for sure. I found the original for Invaders and it's definitely over exposed. As soon as the weather cooperates I'll try that shot again.
EDIT: Cat + keyboard.
Soggybiscuit on
Steam - Synthetic Violence | XBOX Live - Cannonfuse | PSN - CastleBravo | Twitch - SoggybiscuitPA
Posts
@Prospicience 'The Three Tree' is a great photo. the colours are spot on and the deep depth of field really makes it - not to mention the flawless composition. good work!
Low Sun Over Coastline by jeremy-o, on Flickr
Egg and Ocean by jeremy-o, on Flickr
Above the Wash by jeremy-o, on Flickr
Gotta say I prefer 'Out Of Place' to 'The Three Tree' -- I think the subject in TTT gets a bit lost, while OoP has really striking contrast and, to my eyes, a stronger composition.
@bsjezz, you really should! This was 160, but I've also got a few rolls of 400 to scan. I didn't take much 400 on the trip with me because I was concerned about airport scanners, but I needn't have worried.
there's a bbcode section on the link section of the sidebar
Here's some Portra 400.
Takeyama II by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Takeyama I by rstop bstop, on Flickr
This one pleases me immensely. I just wish you would include a bit more foreground.
How did you like your Japan trip?
gotta get back on the horse, though.
Japan was really nice. Not just for all the sights and scenery, but also for the little things that made the country vastly more pleasant -- brilliant public transport, extended opening hours for shops and restaurants, and everyone dressed so very nicely. I live in a big city but it feels like the sticks compared to Tokyo. And there were so, so many places to shop for camera gear, but I was being good (and short on luggage space).
Have you been?
@bsjezz, sorry to hear that! I'd be devastated to lose a roll of film like that. But yeah, all the more reason to get back out and take even better shots.
One more from the fires and an old one.
Midagahara Hotel by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Lodge by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Frozen Lake by rstop bstop, on Flickr
I have and had a great time. Fantastic place to shoot.
Frozen Lake by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Turns out iOS isn't colour-managed, which was throwing me off. Is this an improvement? I'm seeing much more green in the trees, slightly more obvious detail in the lake, and a less violet-tinged sky.
@muninn that's right, forgot you posted that pic from Meiji Jingu (and also met the Prada security guard, if memory serves).
Quickly, I'm digging Baron's long-exposure night photos of the scooter and delighted to see Obiwan and Bubby jumping in with some strong stuff.
Some things were salvageable.
Electric, your last shot seems a bit flat. Seems like quite an overcast day.
I think your latest shot has run afoul of Flickr's excessive sharpening algorithms, as the shot linked here is wayyyy too sharp, at least for my tastes. Looks much better in the large size, though. I agree with muninn that it's a bit flat, but I enjoy the composition.
@muninn, the perspective on that shot is doing my head in, but I like it. Feel like there could be more contrast, though. I need to shoot more HP5 myself...
Hand made by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Not sure how I feel about this one. Colours seem off but it was an overcast day there too, and I'm hoping to reflect that. I also realised I accidentally uploaded the full-size JPG, so have fun pixel-peeping, I guess.
Yeah my shot lacks a bit of contrast. I think its a combination of Flickr doing weird things (I have a firm belief that the Flickr service mangles all photos in subtle and confusing ways), and me viewing the original image at large resolution which in my mind makes you focus on local tonality instead of global contrast.
Here is another shot from that day. Had to do a lot of local fixing to get weird flaring from the photo. The lens I am using seems to flare up in strange streaks and patters. Anyone ever experienced anything weird like that before?
Also, people need to post more here, so this thread doesn't turn into a private conversation between 4 people. Post photos, critique, comment etc. We are all here to learn and have fun!
What do you folks think? Camera is a T3i, lens is the Canon EF 50mm 1.4/f
Yes, the sharpening is stark when it's posted here. I recently felt I didn't quite know enough about sharpening, so I did a little reading. I have a better understanding of how it works in LR now, but I think I'm in the "a little new knowledge can be dangerous" phase of it. I'm getting a little too fancy with it. It was an overcast day, muninn, and I avoided saturating the colors too much to compensate. I'm trying to keep the tones in my photos even these days and probably erred towards that approach in that shot.
Muninn, your propane tank shot works on several levels. I like the light/dark contrast from left to right. The placement of the tank is very good and I like the way it's processed. I like the grain. The abandoned building covered in ivy doesn't grab me like the propane tank does. I like the technique and the slight sun-flaring at the top. I guess I can't quite figure out what the subject is and what I should be looking at.
Baron, there's a bit of dissonance between the color of the umbrella and the color of the shingles. I'm not very good at spotting color problems, though. I don't think the colors are wrong or off. It seems that you were going for a bit of a leading line with the road but, like muninn's building photo above, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be looking at.
Soggybiscuit, you did a great job. Focus is key when you're shooting 1.4 and you nailed it here. The cat's nicely framed by the box and the tones seem to match. Strong shot.
Speaking of square, soggy, did you entertained the idea of making your photo a square crop? I think that stuff with strong central subject look good in a square, but then again I seem to have squares on my mind. Like electric said, well done on nailing the focus. I might have added a bit mode contrast and reduced the very light yellow tint (mixed lighting?), but thats a matter of taste. Very cool picture.
Hand made by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Nothing dramatic, and maybe not even an improvement, but the original had a green cast in the shadows that this version makes very apparent.
@electricmeat, I have a real problem with taking more casual street photography, because I'm never sure where / how to emphasise a subject -- often I'm focused on the scene itself, as in the mood / atmosphere. I believe at the time (this was taken about a month ago) I was trying to emphasise the street-side signage and iconography -- those ice-creams in particular were everywhere. I wasn't trying to do anything with the road, that's just unfortunate framing on my part. I have a lot to learn about composition!
Also, re: sharpening, I've lately begun using unsharp mask in Photoshop, as what seems a necessary step in digitising negatives. I don't know if LR gives the same options, but it seems to work wonders in PS at the expense of getting very unrealistic, very quickly. It's also made me think more in terms of 'contrast' than 'sharpness'.
@Soggybiscuit, I'm more of a dog person, but that shot looks good to me! Hope you have fun with that lens -- I'm a big fan of the 50mm focal length.
One of the nice things about playing photographer is that it gets you access to areas where you normally would be shooed off. In this case, the makeshift kitchen at a benefit dinner of a local community art center.
Another benefit is that you can snag some extra servings of the dishes that are top-notch.
Note: I was informed the focus was supposed to be the food, so my penchant for razor-thin depth of field resulted in sharp plates and slightly blurry subjects.
Thanks! Surprisingly, the only thing I had in automatic on that camera was the focus for that shot. It took me about 5 minutes to get her to cooperate enough (after I made some camera adjustments) to get that shot. I managed to get her to cooperate a couple of times before that but I found that I need to adjust the shutter speed.
I think a square crop would look good with that picture. The lighting was natural, but all of it was coming from a sunroom
on an overcast day.
I'd also question your lens choice. It's hard to tell without EXIF, but at a guess I'd say this was shot at 35mm or even wider? I think food photography would benefit from a longer focal length, similar to something you'd use for portraits, or even a macro lens.
This guide is fairly old (seven years! wow) but nothing's changed, really, except model names and probably prices. Note she shoots 50mm on a crop body, so we're talking 80mm equivalent. The longer focal length would really help to fill the frame without suffering from lens distortion, and also helps to separate the subject from the background.
[edit: for content:
Sakura by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Here's a picture I took of some cherry blossoms in Japan. It was taken with a 50mm equivalent lens, so not as long as I'm advocating here, but it was paired with a 21mm extension tube which has the benefit of allowing me to focus much, much closer than otherwise possible. (My lens has a minimum focus distance of about 3ft, otherwise.) Fun to play around with!
Maybe the key to casual street photography is including people? I'm a big fan of Shoot Tokyo and that guy's casual street shots often have people in them. In your photo, it's almost like you've created a set or staged background and you're waiting for something or someone to show up. When I take street photos, I actively try to avoid including people, so my advice is a bit hypocritical. Maybe we both need to let some human beings into our street shots?
Regarding PS and Unsharp, PS is still unknown territory for me. I told myself that I'd master LR before moving onto PS. I *might* be getting to the point where integrating PS into my workflow makes sense. I'd also be lying if I said that PS didn't intimidate me a little. LR does have some relatively sophisticated sharpening tools. There's a Masking slider that can help control where sharpening is applied. But it doesn't have the fine control of Unsharp. I want to start dipping toes into the HDR, Panoramic and Blending worlds and that will require PS. Once I get into it, I'll probably also figuring out Curves in PS instead of using LR's Contrast sliders.
The Sakura photo has great light. Did you warm it a little? I think it's right, but I'm curious.
It's funny how you find PS intimidating, as I have the same response to LR. I do find it helpful that the 'develop' tab basically lists all the tools in sequence of use, but I find the sheer array of tools intimidating. I much prefer using the two or three tools I know in PS and having less space taken up by the interface.
Following on from above, I've changed my workflow slightly and now use curves almost exclusively. Here's the curves layer on the photo -- all I did was set the white, black and grey points, and then applied a slight s-curve to boost contrast. I did boost the highs slightly, which I'm pretty sure would account for the warming. (I also had a version where I boosted the lows, but I think the image needed the contrast to highlight the detail of the flowers.) Perhaps I could be doing more, colour-wise, and perhaps if I were using LR I'd be experimenting more with colour balance and hue/saturation, but this approach seems to yield useable colours very easily, while being more than enough rope if I'm feeling reckless.
I managed to capture some extraterrestrial visitors of the High Pressure Sodium species:
Invaders by synthetic_violence, on Flickr
I have been busy as balls lately, one of the cool parts about doing real estate photography is that I'm traveling basically everywhere in a 2hour radius in/around Denver. So I am tagging a lot of great spots, which, once I actually have time, I can go back to shoot.
And then every once and a while I have time to stop on the side of the road and get to photo as well.
My Portfolio Site
Speaking of Pros, I like both shots as usual. "Ment 2" really excels in the use of blacks. So crisp, too. Were you on a tripod for it? The composition and subject of "Fields of Wheat" is top notch, but the green of the field feels a bit too saturated/vibrant in relation to the sky. If that's how it really was, then kudos to Mother Nature. The clouds feel a little magenta, though, so I have a feeling you tweaked the colors. If I'm right, would it be worth desaturating and shifting the hue of the wheat to match the sky a little?
And to keep the photos rolling, another holiday shot. I can tell that Flickr's over sharpening it. It's not that bad when I see it in LR:
Campfire by synthetic_violence, on Flickr
So what do you folks think? It was the Canon 50mm f/1.4 lens @ f/3.2 and ISO 100 on a 4 minute exposure.
Thanks! Invaders is entirely my fault (I believe); I messed around with it in post processing too much. I'll post the original tomorrow (it's on another computer).
As for Campfire, you think I should get closer for shots like that? That's something I'll try for sure next time. I'm fairly new to this and I'm doing it to learn something new. I'm still not the best at picking my shots. That being said, please provide criticism; I can't get better at it unless people tell me what they think!
Also, four minutes seems like wayyyy too long. This long exposure I shot would have been under a minute, at something more like f8. The lights themselves have blown out, but that's to be expected -- everything around them still has colour and detail. In your shot, the chairs and the man's face have blown out, so it looks very unnatural.
The sparks and embers coming out of the fire are very cool, though. It'd be nice to see a close-up long exposure with that more prominently in the frame, though I understand it might not be very practical!
Top-notch stuff from @Prospicience and @electricmeat, too.
Up next: more home-developed Ilford. I'm already thinking it's time to upgrade to C-41 processing, as the nearest local lab want $6 a sheet to develop 4x5 colour negatives. (And $8 for b/w! I'm pretty sure my chems have already paid for themselves.)
For the record, I agree with bsjezz and Baron, Soggybiscuit. You definitely needed to be closer. The subject(s) of your photo were the fire and the people. To the extent possible, and allowing for some artistic leeway, you need to fill the frame with your subject. Much of the space surrounding your subjects in Campfire obviously has nothing to do with the subjects. It's wasted space and it makes the photo feel empty. There are times when a photo can feature a small subject surrounded by lots of empty space. For that approach to work, the empty space must itself be interesting. Your empty space in Campfire isn't. "Filling the frame" is a problem I often suffer from, so you just need to be conscious of it and think to yourself, "Can I get closer?"
As for the technical side, the focal length and aperture often aren't as important as the shutter speed in long exposures. There are boundless exceptions to that statement, of course, but usually it's the shutter speed that will have the largest impact on the image. 4 minutes is *way* too long for what you were doing. 4 minutes is the sort of exposure you might consider when you're shooting stars on a moonless night. I'm talking about conditions where there's almost no light. In the case of Campfire, you had plenty of light to work with. The fire is a tremendous light source. You correctly set the ISO to 100, so you just needed to dial in the right shutter speed and aperture. When I do long exposures, I always start with a 5 second exposure to see how it turns out and adjust from there.
There's more to get into with long exposures, including putting filters on lens in order to create daytime long-exposures. Most of the stuff I'm discussing now applies to night shots like Campfires.
EDIT: Cat + keyboard.
Bench by rstop bstop, on Flickr
Itching to get out again and shoot more. I've missed you, Ilford.