Lens Flare Removal

[arith]

I've given up trying to avoid lens flare, you can't point directly into the sun if your doing a panorama. Does anybody know the best method for removing it. Cheers

I took this today and cloned and desaturated what I couldn't clone.

[arith]

This is the end image that I couldn't use. How do you get rid of the horrendous and unbelievable lens flare.

[Dave Humphries]

This is the end image that I couldn't use. How do you get rid of the horrendous and unbelievable lens flare.

Hi Arith,

Taking a leaf out of the TV/film industry, have you consider buying or making a "french flag" device?
See http://www.filmtools.com/frenchflagsaks.html or http://www.dvuser.co.uk/content.php?CID=72 for ideas.

Perhaps something that goes in the hot shoe?

Of course, if the camera is on a tripod, can you not nip around the front and hold something shading the front element during the exposure (use self timer if necessary)? Or get a helper to do it if shooting hand held.

Just ideas to prevent the problem at source; hope they help,

[Terry Tedor]

I wonder if something like DxO Optics Pro would help?

[arith]

The French Flag is a bit like bellows, good idea as is DxO Optics Pro. Cheers.

[Dave Humphries]

The French Flag is a bit like bellows

Not in my experience, I'd say the french flag is the single plate (usually) above the lens, the bellows lens hood is just that.

See the first link. Think of it as a single 'barn door' (e.g. on a theatrical stage light).

Cheers,

[pwnage101]

if you're stitching these in photoshop, you can just modify the levels/curves of each layer. otherwise, a hood or a hand is the best i can think of

[arith]

Still got the same problem and now it's annoying. The first is NOT HDR but just 8 frames stitched. A GND 8 was used for the ones with the sun. The second is HDR but without any filters and 3 x 8 at 2 stop difference.





One had more noise and the other more flare. I don't want to spend the rest of my life trying to get one right.

[Blazing fire]

Such veiling flare occurs mainly at large apertures and with older lens using older lens coating. The only solution which allows you to shoot directly into the sun is to buy another lens. Post-processing is usually of limited effectiveness. Perhaps colin/McQ could help you on this one.

Are you by any chance using a really old lens?
Have you tried removing the filters?
Have you tried renting or using another lens?

[arith]

The MTF shows this lens around 95% for 10 lp per mm at f8 and good throughout up to 13.6 mm, only lenses costing thousands are better.Photodoto rating 3.8 but that is for the whole range.
However I have had an idea but I need an influx of energy to try it out. It involves taking a couple of images close together say one degree apart but needs experimentation to move the flare. Then I need every device to cut down chromatic aberration so that I can use the scene cleanup function in PSE.
These are all f11 using the canon ef 28mm f2.8. All the filters were removed for the HDR version which has less chromatic aberration, and Cokin GND 8 hard grad used for the non HDR.

[Blazing fire]

Yes, only lens costing thousands eg L series would not have such bad flare problem. I know that my 17-35mm nikon does not flare even when pointing to the sun. However, it cost about $1800.

[arith]

This lens is not supposed to have such a bad flare problem, pointing at the sun is fine but a panorama requires different angles. I know that pse7 can remove flare using its latest feature but required is at least two images of slightly different perspective taken with exactly the same settings; I had two images but one with filter and one without. The flare was removed but replaced with parts of the other image with a different white balance. Then we have extreme chromatic aberration or is it flare which is impossible to remove, I don't understand why this happens because my camera has only 6 million pixels on the same size CMOS sensor as a 12 million pixel camera, and is f11 diffraction limited and it is f11.

[Michael Bailey]

This is my first posting on this forum. Thanks for all the civil and knowledgeable discussion I've seen so far.

As for the lens flare problem, may I recommend... If the sun is just out of the frame, by all means flag it with a card or well-fitted lens shade. Your hand will work in a pinch, too.

When the sun is in the frame, shoot it once as-is. Then shoot it again with your finger sticking into the shot just enough to block the sun. Take another shot like the second, but with you finger coming in at a different angle. (You will be careful looking through a viewfinder at the sun, won't you?) Between them, the three versions will show all parts of the view in the way that you want.

After that, mask and combine the exposures with Photoshop, PT Gui or your program of choice. I'll leave it to better minds to tell you more about that.

MB

[arith]

Now that is a good idea. I have thought about using the thing that takes out unwanted objects or scene cleaner and tried it because I took images with a filter and without. Although a different perspective you couldn't tell really after scene cleaner was applied, the only thing that was wrong and very wrong was differences in white balance.

Another thing I tried even more successfully was to use the colour replacement brush, and this worked much better on this image than cloning. cheers

[arith]

Welcome to CiC, I just noticed this is your very first post.

[Radu Dinu Cordeanu]

This is the end image that I couldn't use. How do you get rid of the horrendous and unbelievable lens flare.

Hi,
If you told about rounded area,I used healing brush.
Cheers
Radu Dinu

[Blazing fire]

This is my first posting on this forum. Thanks for all the civil and knowledgeable discussion I've seen so far.

As for the lens flare problem, may I recommend... If the sun is just out of the frame, by all means flag it with a card or well-fitted lens shade. Your hand will work in a pinch, too.

When the sun is in the frame, shoot it once as-is. Then shoot it again with your finger sticking into the shot just enough to block the sun. Take another shot like the second, but with you finger coming in at a different angle. (You will be careful looking through a viewfinder at the sun, won't you?) Between them, the three versions will show all parts of the view in the way that you want.

After that, mask and combine the exposures with Photoshop, PT Gui or your program of choice. I'll leave it to better minds to tell you more about that.

MB

This is an excellent idea!

...Then we have extreme chromatic aberration or is it flare which is impossible to remove...

You could try Adobe Camera RAW to remove some chromatic aberration. It's fast and rather effective.

Guide: http://www.photos-of-the-year.com/articles/adobe-raw/

[arith]

I've been looking for a new lens with regards to sharpness and flare and came across this which is pretty complicated stuff but shows the lens I have got to be a poor performer with regards to CA.

http://www.photozone.de/canon-eos/15...review?start=1

I'm even more confused by the MTF data which shows it to perform better at wider apertures than f8 or my now favourite f10, how can this be since I assumed the middle of the lens to be better than the outside, and a wider aperture includes the middle?
It gets more confusing still;

Example of using the table: My Canon EOS-10D has MTF50 = 1335 LW/PH (corrected; with standardized sharpening). When I make a 12.3 inch high print on 13x19 inch paper, MTF50 is 1335/12.3 = 108 LW/in: "very good" quality; fine for a print that size. Prints look excellent at normal viewing distances for a print this size.

This approach is more accurate than tables based on pixel count (PPI) alone (though less refined than SQF, below). Pixel count is scaled differently; the numbers are around double the MTF50 numbers. The EOS-10D has 2048/12.3 = 167 pixels per inch (PPI) at this magnification. This table should not be taken as gospel: it was first published in October 2004, bandit may be adjusted in the future.

[arith]

For some reason the post above became a moving target so continued:

Does this mean that quality will not be improved by lenses showing MTF data greater than 1335 LW/PH? If this looks like a stupid question it probably is, the quote is taken from this lot of complicated stuff and I feel I need about a week to read it.

http://www.imatest.com/docs/sharpness.html