Rethinking My Post Processing

Some of dA Crazies and I did a little exercise this week where we all processed the same photo (an image I took at Sandy Beach) and it was really interesting to see the different interpretations of the same image. Some of the guys talked about why they made certain adjustments and some delved into the different processing techniques they used. There were differences in colors and tones and you could almost get a hint of the individual personalities of the photographers who were processing the images.

I processed the image by doing my normal set of adjustments in LR3 and then I used the NIK plugins in CS5 to finish the image and this is what I came up with...

While viewing my image next to the others I noticed that mine seemed to have a kind of cold souless quality to it...it was definitely missing something, but technically it looked okay. I came to realize that I don't feel anything when I process my images...or I'm not paying enough attention to how I feel as I manipulate the image. The other images seemed to have much more life and energy in them.

This seems to confirm the fact that I've been concentrating mostly on post processing techniques rather than artistic expression. And the fact that I process every image almost identically probably doesn't help matters much...I'm processing the image without taking the image content into consideration at all and I think I'm finally beginning to realize that I can't keep processing my images like this anymore. 

Luckily for me I just happen to be reading a tutorial by Tony Kuyper where he talks about image editing workflow and in it he says "The first thing I will say about workflow is that every image, especially in nature photography, is its own creation and will require its own approach. No two images are the same. The sequence of steps to develop an image in Photoshop changes with each image and also as each image develops. The important thing is to be able to figure out what the image needs and then to find a way to respond to that need."

Wow...talk about getting a swift kick in the pants right when I needed it. Yeah, I'll admit that I don't assess each image to see what I need to do to get it to where I want it to go. But then I also don't know where I want each image to go to begin with. This is definitely something I need to work on as this involves the artistic side of photography instead of the technical. If I want my images to invoke feelings in others I think it would probably help if I actually felt something about the image too. 

 So what do I need to do now? I know I need to take photography a little more seriously and put more effort into it...but lets just stick to the post processing side of things for now. For starters I think I need to slow down and really look at the image I plan to process and see if I can come up with an idea of how I want the image to look like when I'm done. My Photoshop skills are pretty limited right now, but I think this new awareness will help push me into learning new editing techniques that will eventually help me to create the image I see in my head. And I really need to learn how to pay attention to how each image makes me feel and to process each image on it's own terms...no more cookie cutter processing steps in the future. This will probably mean I won't be processing as many images as I used to...but that's not a bad thing.

Wow, all this just because other photographers post processed one of my image files.  

Why It's Good To Meet New People

Last week as we were discussing where dA Crazies would be going for the Saturday Sunrise Shoot this week and Kenway mentioned that he was contacted by an Australian photographer who was interested in shooting with us. We were originally planning to go to Hauula Beach Park, but Kenway said he had to pick up the photographer from Waikiki and thought shooting at Sandy Beach would work out better. No one objected and I was curious about this photographer who contacted Kenway. Kenway provided a link to the photographer's flickr page and I was floored by the images there. The photographer's name is Kiall Frost and he's only been shooting for about two years. 

Kenway came to pick me up at 3:45 am and then we picked up Reid at 4:10 am. Then we headed to Waikiki to pick up Kiall...I had a bunch of questions that I wanted to ask Kiall. When we got to Kiall's hotel Kenway introduced everyone and then we headed towards Sandy Beach. After the initial small talk subsided I asked Kiall how long he's been shooting (and was pretty shocked when he said only since 2011) and how he processed his images. Kiall said he uses Photoshop CS6 and that he uses luminosity masks. I didn't know what that was, but Reid was familiar with it and asked Kiall if he follows Tony Kuyper. Kiall said he purchased Tony Kuyper's luminosity mask actions and uses them on every image he processes. 

When we reached Sandy Beach we saw someone walking from the parking lot toward the rocks on the right side. We didn't recognize the car so we figured it wasn't one of dA Crazies. There was another car parked there but we didn't recognize that one either...except Stacey came out of it to greet us. We were all shocked to see that Stacey was there before the rest of us. A few minutes later Norris, Vernon and Jeffrey showed up. Kenway introduced Kiall to the guys and then we headed towards the rocks.

When we reached the rocks everyone started to position themselves for the sunrise but I noticed that Reid had gone over to talk to the guy who we saw walking from the parking lot earlier. I walked over to see if we knew the guy and it turned out to be Alvin, one of the "I Wanna Shoot So Badly" group members, and he was there to shoot the sunrise too. Alvin is a fun guy to hang around with.

I tried to get into shooting mode but couldn't decide where I wanted to shoot from or what I wanted to shoot. The cloud cover wasn't too bad and there was some color in the sky during the Blue Hour, but I just couldn't get myself to take that many photos. I think I shot less than 130 frames and a big chunk of that was from the group shot. At some point Derrick, Leighton, Scott and George showed up and we ended up with one of the largest gathering of dA Crazies to date.

Since I wasn't in the mood to shoot I ended up talking to Jeffrey about growing as a photographer and mentioned that Kenway wanted to try this thing where each of us share one RAW file with a few of the others and have them process the image as they saw fit. Jeffrey liked the idea and we talked about the possibilities. 

It was getting close to group shot time and it started to drizzle on us. I was hesitant to set up, but the drizzle let up and I got ready for the group shot. I had a few of the guys help me get the exposure set for the OCF and then I had the group come together for the shot. I managed to get a few shots of the group before they got too hungry. And wouldn't you know it...the sun came out after I did the group shot. Typical. We headed off to Zippy's for breakfast . 

At breakfast I came to realize the reason I couldn't concentrate while we were at Sandy Beach was I couldn't stop thinking about luminosity masks...I had to find out what that was...and I couldn't wait to get home so I could do a Google search and start learning about it. I also wanted to find out more about that Tony Kuyper guy.

When I finally got home, cleaned and put all my photography gear away, I got on the computer and did a Google search for luminosity masks and guess what...Tony Kuyper's web site was the first hit. I took a quick look at his site and then went down the Google search results and checked out the next ten or so web sites to find out what I could about luminosity masks. 

Most of the other web pages that were talking about luminosity masks all mentioned Tony Kuyper and linked back to his web site, so I went back to his web site and started reading the information there. It seems that it's this tool or process that gives some photos that certain look that I haven't been able to accomplish through my post processing techniques. The fine control over contrast and tone that you have with luminosity masks appears to be what allows other landscape photographers the ability to process their images to have that certain glow about them.

On his web site Tony had available many tutorials, actions and videos available for purchase. I ended up buying his complete package and am currently watching the videos and reading the pdf tutorials. I haven't tried to work with luminosity masks yet, but I'm really excited to see where this process will take my photos...hopefully it'll be to the next level.

So, if Kiall hadn't contacted Kenway to say he wanted to come out shooting with us, I would have never found out about luminosity masks (well, I might have found out about them eventually, but who knows when that would have been). I am so grateful I had the chance to meet Kiall Frost and learn about luminosity masks. Meeting new people is a good thing...a very good thing indeed.

June 25, 2013 - Update: This is my first attempt at using luminosity masks...this technique gives you really tight control of the tonal range in the image, but it's very time consuming and the learning curves is kinda steep. Just need to remind myself that I won't get good at this technique right away...need more time to learn to use it properly.

Blog Reboot

I think it's about time to reboot this blog and get it going again. I've been thinking about trying different things with it, but I think  I'll just keep it simple and post the photos I've taken while out shooting with dA Crazies. I'll try to figure out why I shot the scene and go over how I processed the RAW files to get to the final image. 

This first reboot blog entry is a recounting of the Saturday Sunrise Shoot at Pounders Beach in Hauula with dA Crazies that happened on June 15, 2013.

For the first 2 photos my attention was drawn to what was happening in the clouds shrouding the Koolaus off in the distance. The sun had come up and the morning light was coloring the clouds really nicely. Janet and Jeff were shooting along the shoreline so I decided to put them in the shots to make the images more interesting. I walked around looking for a good vantage point and once I found I spot I liked, I fired off a few frames.

The processing for these shots was done a little differently from my normal method...I started with some initial adjustments in LR3 and then sent the image to CS5 where I used the NIK Collection plugins to manipulate the image in preparation for something I had recently discovered in Photoshop, the Lighting Effects filter. I found that this effect really helps with the feel of the images and I'll probably be using this filter regularly.

I've been consciously trying to create images that are different from what I normally shoot and the following image is one of those attempts. I saw the footprints in the sand and thought about using them as a leading line to guide the viewer towards Jeff, Janet and Kenway. Not quite sure if this image works or not...I need to learn how to self-critique my shots without being biased...but I do like the image.

I've been trying to be aware of the hyper-focal distance with my shots and I think this one has decent focus throughout the shot. I've also been trying to pay attention to my emotions when observing a scene and when I'm processing the image. I'm also paying more attention to the light and how it affects the way I feel about the scene in front of me.

While taking candid shots of Jeff, Janet and Kenway I got the idea to get into the shot with them and wave at the camera. The reason I wanted to this was because our friend Roni who lives in New York. She waits for dA Crazies to start posting our shots from every Saturday sunrise shoot and I thought it would be cool to have an image where I could say "Hi" to our friend. But my original capture was...uh...yeah, not too flattering...but it was totally unintentional...

So after taking a little heat for the original image, I decided to try and "fix" it. I don't have much experience with image compositing, but this would be a good time to learn. Luckily I remembered seeing a video tutorial about exposure blending on the Digital Photography School website and I did happen to take several images of Jeff, Janet and Kenway as I walked up to them so I had several shots to choose from. After watching the video again and picking out another shot to use, I attempted to "re-do" my original image and came up with the image below...it's not perfect, but it's "better"...

Taking the group shot is a regular thing with dA Crazies and for the last few weekends I've 
been able to shoot the group with off-camera flash (OCF) and I think the results are getting better each time. For this shot I borrowed Janet's tripod and clamped my flash on and set it up camera right, about 8 feet from the group. I tilted the head up a bit so that the foreground wouldn't be lit up too much and set the power to 1/4 (no flash modifier was used). This was just enough to bring up the shadows and improve the overall contrast of the scene. Camera exposure settings were ISO 100, f/4.0 @ 1/125.

After the first group shot was done, they wanted to take another group shot with the sun and waves to our back...oh boy, I wasn't looking forward to shooting that since I only had one 580EX II flash with me. I got set up and took a few test shots to get the ambient exposure...but with a max shutter speed of only 1/200 I knew it would really be a challenge. Looking back I should have used my ND filters to help control the ambient light, but dA Crazies were getting restless and hungry so I knew I had to just take the shot and make do. No time to do test shots.

The flash was setup camera left, about 8 feet from the group, and power was set to full. Exposure setting were ISO 100, f/8.0 @ 1/200. 

To process the image I did initial adjustments in LR3, which included setting the Recovery slider to 100 (something I never do since too much Recovery will affect the colors), and then I sent the image to CS5 and used the NIK plugins to continue the edit. I found a Polarizing filter in Color Efex Pro that really helped to bring the sky back and tried a variety of other effects until the image looked fairly decent. Then finished up with PS5 adjustment layers, final sharpening and adding my watermark. Final image turned out better than I thought it would.

So, I spent another funtastic Saturday morning with dA Crazies and I was able to capture a few decent images...even tried to think about the image before hitting the shutter button (pre-visualization)...and I even pushed my post processing a bit. 

I do feel as if I'm actually getting a little better at photography, but I also know I still have a long way to go. Just gotta keep pushing myself, keep chasing the light, keep asking myself "What if...", embrace my failures and just keep learning.

Now comes the real challenge...can I continue to post more blog entries regularly? I'll try to...