Project 52 by Frank Miller

[MilT0s]

Frank you have just crossed the borders between skills and magic...

[Donald]

Frank you have just crossed the borders between skills and magic...

Or mixed them gently together in an act of incredible skill. Quite amazing.

[FrankMi]

Thanks Miltos and Donald! It is starting to get easier so it must be time to move into a new area! LOL!

[FrankMi]

This week’s exercise is to try to express the vastness and grandeur of the Mediterranean Sea.

In this case I had shot three images using +2EV, 0EV and -2EV exposure bracketing at ISO 100, F4.5 and 1/200 sec for the 0EV exposure.

Tonemapping picked up the blues and yellows in the sky well enough but left the area around the sun blown out, some of the clouds too dark, and the sea too dark in some areas and too light in others.

To compensate, I used the -2EV image to feather back in the detail around the sun and the 0EV image to lighten the parts of the clouds that were overly dark. I then made a copy of the tonemapped image then dropped the brightness about 9% and increased the contrast about 23%. I then used the Gradient Tool on the mask for just the sea and smoothed out the inconsistencies caused by the tonemapping process. It was a toss-up as to whether the +2EV or the tonemapped image had better looking detail in the sea so I could have used either in this case.

I liked the sunset colours tones in the sky but wasn’t fond of the 4:3 ratio. Not wanting to crop out the sky or take the horizon too far off the 1/3rd line but wanting to better express the expanse of sea, I used Content Aware Scale to change the image ratio to 2:1 without messing up the original shape of the sun or sunbeams.

Before the suggested changes made by Dave in post # 208:



After changes described in post # 210:

[Donald]

In my opinion there are very, very few times you see an image that includes a blown sun that works. But, this one does. And that, I suggest and without trying to sound obsequious, is because its creation was in the hands of some one who had the knowledge, skill and creative vision.

It makes the point that a really good photographer just doesn't point the camera at something and press the shutter.

[Ryogenetic]

Frank I am really digging the shot. The contrast of sea and sky works really good for me. I esp. like what you did with the Content Aware Scaling. It took me a couple of re-reads to comprehend your process. What is really weirding me out is that you and I, on more than one occasion, have been working the same processing techniques during the same time frame. (Must be an East coast thing)

Keep it up
Ryo

[jprzybyla]

Well done Frank, as I said in a previous post...your post processing skills are to envy. I appreciate you posting your procedure, it is a learning experience for me.

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Frank,

What (and how) you have achieved this is amazing - and instructive, as usual.

I am therefore reluctant to say more, for fear of discouraging your efforts, but on the plus side, it may justify another purchase for you (e.g. that S100) (or tip you into trying CHDK)

The problem? - jpg artefacts - when I viewed this large in the Lytebox, I initially thought I saw a city skyline on the horizon, but alas no, it is multiples of 8x8 jpg blocks with different colour values - giving hard, straight edges where there should be none and once your brain has registered them, you begin to see them elsewhere.

I wonder if it is possible to hand blur the worst (on full size), re-downsize, and save again?


It is odd, I was just saying to Rebecca on MSN that I took only my recently acquired (jpg only) Nikon P510 out yesterday and left "the big Nikon" (my D5000) at home. Now I know why I'll need that, or at least the RAW capturing Canon S100, with me, for shots like sunsets, or anything else needing substantial re-working. I have yet to download and publish anything from the P510 yet, nor compare the P510 (at 1000mm jpg) with what I can achieve in RAW on the D5000 with and equivalent 450mm cropped to 1000mm.

I so nearly didn't say anything about this, but this has taught me an important lesson today and it feels wrong not to share that (i.e. an example of why we should all shoot RAW if possible - and I know you would have if the SX40HS did)

I'll be posting some S100 shots in my P52 thread later today if you feel like a bit of 'payback'
(except I know neither of us are like that)


In acknowledgement of all that has gone before, we have seen many of your SX40HS shots from the European vacation and this is the first where this problem has been visible. It also doesn't diminish the processing methods you went through to achieve the final image above.

I do hope this helps,

[FrankMi]

Thank you for commenting Donald, Ryo, and Joe.

Hi Dave, I appreciate your pointing out the artifacts. I had not noticed them. I'm going to have a close look...



...and see if I can determine where in the processing this crept into the image. If so, I may be able to process differently from that point forward. If not, the blur process you suggest is painless.

Ah-ha! you did get the P510! I can't wait to see what you can do with it!

[FrankMi]

OK. I checked the original layers used and the artifacts are very difficult to see. I did notice a subtle difference after the tonemapping process then realized that the horizon was several pixels low after blending the original sea back into the tonemapped image.

Now I realize that what we are seeing is a ghosted double horizon as a result. Man, oh man! Does Dave ever have sharp eyes!

To fix the issue, I duplicated the final image and made a rectangular selection of the sea but several pixels higher and created a mask. I then selected the bottom layer and with the Move Tool, used the UP Arrow several times to 'nudge' the second image higher, one pixel at a time, until the sea was as high as the ghosted copy thereby eliminating the gap between the two horizons.

By checking the new image size after cropping to fit, I found that the sea had to be moved up 3 pixels to eliminate the ghosted horizon.

I wish I could see as well as Dave! Fortunately, he was kind enough to not only observe this difference, but was also gracious to share his findings. I would have never noticed that subtle a difference. Thank you Dave!

[FrankMi]

I have some time impacts looming so I’m trying to get this week’s P52 done a little early.

The goal for this week is to try to compensate for multiple blown highlights in a situation where you can’t simply apply a global adjustment. I thought that this was going to be relatively easy. A little localized masking and adjusting the Brightness and Contrast and… well, it didn’t work out all that simple.

This is the SOOC 0EV image:



First I tried tonemapping but didn’t like the results compared to the 3 individual images of the bracketed exposure (-2EV, 0EV, and +2EV). No problem, just take the 0EV normal exposure and blend in, mostly from the -2EV, the blown highlights from the bright lights in the one-armed bandits. Easy! Right? Ah, maybe not so much as I’d like. <sigh!> That’s when the problems began.

For each section of the bandits, Head, Chest, Waist, and Skirt, I created a mask and, using Adjustment Layers, tried to get the best combination of colour, contrast, and brightness in these highly lit areas. So far, so good. This should work!

Decreasing the excessive brightness gave me the best colour, but the result tended to be muddy and way too dark.

Increasing the contrast brought out the detail gave better colour tone (reduced the muddiness) but tended to jumble the already high contrast text and numbers. Hmmmm….

The result was a best effort at a compromise of settings in each area. Overall, I am relatively happy with the colour tones and recovery of the blown highlights but not thrilled (to say the least) at losing some of the number and text detail.

I also toned down the busy background and yes, it would have perhaps been better with an odd number of bandits but the management wouldn’t let me move one of these into my room!

Here is the changes after post processing:



The easiest way to see the changes is to click on the image to open in Lytebox and click on the Forward and Back arrows to switch between the images.

Looks like I still have more to learn about this technique!

Thinking back to when I took these shots, I wanted to capture some of the action involved with the flashing lights so I thought I’d give my hand to creating an automated GIF that might add some of the excitement that is missing in the static image. Automated GIFs are a neat little trick availabe in Photoshop CS5 in the Window/Animation menu.

[Geoff F]

Well it appears to have eventually worked well, Frank.

One thing I have used when doing 'hand made HDR' is to vary the blend mode of layers. For example a Soft Light Blend, with suitable opacity, to increase saturation and contrast.

But it doesn't always work!

[Donald]

I'm getting to the stage of opening this thread fully expecting to be awe-inspired once more by another amazing bit of craft and skill ........ And, yet again, I'm not disappointed.

There was a debate going on in a couple of threads recently about whether it was right to do any post-processing. Well, here's the answer.

[Letrow]

Sweet Frank. Huge improvement on photo number 2. And the third one is plain fun.

[jprzybyla]

Frank, you continue to amaze me. If I were as good as you at post processing. Well done.

[FrankMi]

Thank you for the comments Peter and Joe!

For P52 images, do you prefer to see the 'before' and 'after' images when post processing is involved?

Is it worth while to show the steps taken to get from 'before' to 'after'?

[JPS]

Hi Frank,
Hope your well?
Great piece of work, I love it, but then again I am a big fan of your work.

I would always like to see the 'before and after' shots and if you have the time explain the steps getting there. Anything I can learn from you more experienced photographers the better.

Well done.

[FrankMi]

It has been a busy time with no opportunity to get out and shoot so I thought I’d try my hand at something different. This is an image I took before I got my DSLR and my goal for it this week is to try to make the doll look as realistic as possible.

Here is the original SOOC:



I opened it in Adobe Camera RAW, added some fill light for the shadows and some recovery to tone down the blown reflections, particularly on the doll’s hands and feet.

After opening in Photoshop, I used the Clone Tool to soften the shadows under her eyes and minimize the reflection glair on her hands and feet and touched up the paint chips on her fingernails and finally, used the common retouching techniques to brighten and give definition to her eyes and increase the presence of the catch-lights.

Next I applied noise reduction, mostly for the background and shadows and applied a very mild capture sharpening as this was a JPG image that had be sharpened in-camera.

I then brightened and added a hint of crispness to her clothing and hair and some subtle warming to just the skin tones.

I haven’t as yet developed a good sense of what makes skin tones look natural and portraiture really work well. There was no option to do anything about the lighting so I’m hoping that I am moving in the right direction with these changes.

After the changes:



If you click on either image to open it in the Lytebox, you can use the arrows to switch between the before and after to more easily see the changes.

As always, C&C is most welcomed!

[Kris V]

For P52 images, do you prefer to see the 'before' and 'after' images when post processing is involved?

Is is worth while to show the steps taken to get from 'before' to 'after'?

YES! Absolutely. I (and others as well I assume) learn a lot from your master teachings!

[Letrow]

I like your effort Frank and actually in the face it looks quite good. What I notice though is the hands and feet, especially the feet in fact. They look unnatural to me, too pointy or edged I guess. Maybe a bit of smoothing there would have made it more realistic. And the colour of the nails. Now they are in the same colour as the skin.