Is this a keeper - suggestions for post- processing

[ajohnw]

Definitely more artistic than photographic.
Not sure what its like on your monitor but it looks darn odd on mine, much prefer the more realistic dark original.

Noise Robin. In more ways than one.

John
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[ajohnw]

Revealing dark areas is often a balancing act between "showing something interesting" and "reducing local contrast". Usually I tend to err more on the side of clipping the blacks with images like this, although at times I'll leave a hint of detail in other areas, eg

Can't disagree but if the sky was a bland as the one the OP posted that wouldn't work at all. Personally though I feel it's best to bring it up so that it shows a bit of colour. eg in this shot I find the plain deep grey below the 2nd horizon off putting. It doesn't really do anything for the shot.

Robin's comment was interesting - artistic - but not photographic! And then what essentially is a pretty picture is posted. I still feel photography largely down to pundits especially the money making types has tied itself in knots. When studied the general impact of a shot is largely ignored.

In this particular case maybe the most important thing is that the shot pleases the person who took it. All that black or a long narrow strip is unlikely to do that. They could do this sort of thing with it that might please some but it's a bit different.


Hamburg harbour by mm mike, on Flickr

John
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[Colin Southern]

eg in this shot I find the plain deep grey below the 2nd horizon off putting. It doesn't really do anything for the shot.

I think your monitor might be crushing the blacks a little - it's actually rolling terrain of a golf course. Looks good in the 44 x 22" canvas of it on my wall

[jcuknz]

After more than a decade with digital I now have a bug-eye lens and have done dozens of panoramas, hand held, with just the camera .. and not just two or three frame panos either ... usually many more. So anybody with the nouce to work out how a pano should be shot could do it. For quite a time I only had a 35mm AoV lens and this in its way was a bonus.
Though as was demonstrated to me recently an I-phone does it wonderfully simply with just the sweep of the hand with a finger on the button

[ajohnw]

I think your monitor might be crushing the blacks a little - it's actually rolling terrain of a golf course. Looks good in the 44 x 22" canvas of it on my wall

There is no accounting for taste Colin. To be honest I can see a bit of detail in it but I feel too little. Suspect things would look different at a larger size anyway.

Your may be correct about the monitor. I still have it as calibrated by Dell. I should really find time to run a full house calibration including black point correction. I keep meaning to but they take rather a long time. It will be interesting to compare with the results from a calibrated ViewSonic however I'm pretty sure this one has more usable dynamic range from various grey scales.

John
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[Colin Southern]

Though as was demonstrated to me recently an I-phone does it wonderfully simply with just the sweep of the hand with a finger on the button

Unfortunately, unless you can keep the sensor parallel to the plane of capture it can introduce some horrid distortions.

[HMW12]

Thanks everyone for the comments - I agree that the UWA was probably not the best choice here - will have to practice multiple shots and stitching techniques.

[ajohnw]

Revealing dark areas is often a balancing act between "showing something interesting" and "reducing local contrast". Usually I tend to err more on the side of clipping the blacks with images like this, although at times I'll leave a hint of detail in other areas, eg

I've finally calibrated my monitor Colin. With black point compensation I can just about see colour and shape in the foreground providing I move my head to one side to avoid a slight reflection I get during the day. The grey strip doesn't really reveal any more. So far contrast ration is 1013:1 and I'm running with a white level of 129 cd/m^2, black level is 0.13cd/m^2. gamma 2.23, 6493k. As I have upgraded the software I can't get a full patch report at the moment but looking at the curves it's going to be pretty good.

John
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[Colin Southern]

I've finally calibrated my monitor Colin. With black point compensation I can just about see colour and shape in the foreground providing I move my head to one side to avoid a slight reflection I get during the day. The grey strip doesn't really reveal any more. So far contrast ration is 1013:1 and I'm running with a white level of 129 cd/m^2, black level is 0.13cd/m^2. gamma 2.23, 6493k. As I have upgraded the software I can't get a full patch report at the moment but looking at the curves it's going to be pretty good.

John
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Try 200cd/m2

You won't get any detail in the "gray strip" - that's a mountain range that's well and truly in shadow. The portion below that was set to provide enough detail to avoid looking like an area of completely clipped black, but dark enough to hide enough detail so as not to be distracting.

In reality it was just a grab shot taken while I was waiting for this aeroplane to land; some like it, some don't, but bottom line was some bought it -- and I thank them for it!

[ajohnw]

I'm fond of my eyeballs Colin. My ambient level onto the screen is low. 35.6 lux so a bit over a 1/4 of what the screen puts out. I did try other settings once but they were way too bright. I usually aim for around 120 cd/m^2 as tftcentral suggest in their reviews. Seems to work out as the rest of the room is more brightly lit than the direct illumination on the screen. That's around 140 lux in line of site.

Maybe the 1st shot is too minimalist for me. Prefer the aeroplane and no problems with that one even with the reflection. I also liked KR's aeroplane wing through the window. Not sure why.

This sort of thing makes me wonder how bright dark bits need to be. I'm not even sure that the software that is normally used with my colorimeter will even bother adjusting the black point. There is another option available as well deliberately offsetting it. I wonder about this sort of thing because peoples monitors will vary. Perhaps one thing that might help is posting eye filling shots say 1000 - 1200 px wide.

John
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