New York Photography Blog

The same three files used before, this time tonemapped in Photomatix, and not touched in Lightroom.

The workflow is like this:

1. Lightroom, preset for exporting to flat tif.  Contrast set to linear. Calibration set to: faithful. White Balance: As Shot. Everything else zeroed out.  In other words, a flat file with as much data as possible preserved.  The color tiff files generated are just extremely low contrast.

2. Photomatix: Image Fusion (I use the Average Setting.  No tinkering at this point).

3. Process the Fusion and then into Tone Mapping.  Also fairly straight forward using the Tone Compressor engine.  Luminosity ends up very low (left side) and compression high, almost 10.0  Saturation is zero.  And here you can tweak color temp. and white and black clip points.

Import the new file into Lightroom. Only thing applied here (at least in this image) is a bit of sharpening.  That’s it.

Detail and tonality – very nice – and something I haven’t been able to really show well, though maybe you can get a feeling for it through the larger web images I’m using now.

ONE NOTE: During the IMAGE FUSION process, there are many ways to blend the images.  As I say, in this case I simply chose average (the three shots are one as metered, and then one under by a stop and one over by a stop).  But if this is not giving you a wide enough tonal range, you can do the fusion and tweak how the images are blended, i.e. leaning towards the highlights or the shadow areas.

I have 3GB of memory on the computer, and often run into trouble if I try and run Photomatix straight from Lightroom (which is definitely supported).  Hence the export, and then using Photomatix as a standalone program rather than through Lightroom.

Even if I am using Photomatix as a standalone program, it may run out of memory if I try to fuse more than three images.  This is what the “batch” option is for.  You can set it to do three frames at a time, and then you can combine the resulting files produced by the batch process.  The program really does think of everything.

(Infrared and ‘Tonemapped’)

How this shot was done: this was early in my digital infrared days.  It wasn’t done with a modified digital camera, but by sticking an infrared filter (I don’t remember which one anymore) on the 40D and doing a fairly long exposure.  The resulting image was all RED.  I then created a profile that could be used with the ADOBE DNG profile editor app (free) that gave me a more acceptable color temp.  Still, not very good – but when I stuck it into tone-mapping – suddenly this image popped out at me.

**NOTE**

1. Print prices have gone down again.  I couldn’t sell enough of them to make the ‘outsourcing’ work.  I will still use WCI for large prints, but after several weeks of very slow business which corresponds with the price increases for outsourcing – I can see that it won’t work.

2. There are only about 8 limited editions (11 x 14) of Poet’s Walk left.  In other words, I have nearly sold 100 of them at that size.  Some people care about such things (collectors) so it just means that there won’t be any limited editions of that print at that size.

3. The black-lined grid screen for the 5D is impossible to see at night.  It’s great during the day – but disappears in the dark.  I don’t remember having that problem with the Rollei TLR or with the view camera.  Maybe they were etched into the screen differently.

4. I’ll get in touch with an Epson technician today, or at least try to.  I lost track of that problem while I buried myself in HDR and color.  Though I may have figured something out.  Will write more about it if I have solved the problem.  I do have a work around for sure.  A kludge – but it works.  But I made a change yesterday with the 7800 and I want to see if it works today.

5. As noted, even though I may not end up working in color, I can say that I have gone pretty far with HDR and especially with the tone-mapping tool which is wonderful, whether for color or b&w.  It seems like there’s always one more thing I want to try.

I went out on the fire-escape with tripod and did some long exposures (this is 30 seconds) tonight.  It’s a much better view than what I see looking directly out the window (back of a school).

There is a history of photographers doing shots out the window that goes back a long ways and you can even find entire books (Ruth Orkin) shot out the window.

*** One note about the ee-D grid screen for the Canon 5D: almost impossible to see at night.  This was taken at night with as I say long exposure – and there was no way I could see the grid lines which would have been helpful since I was using the 20mm f2.8.

This is still in the experimental phase… I combined 9 shots… not necessary and I have three where there is only one guy who is motionless.  I also did a rough job with the perspective controls.  But this morning I’ll be at B&H to pick up a grid mat for the 5D.  But I think I’m onto something.  Haven’t hit the nail on the head yet but I’m a trial and error sort and when I get it – you’ll know.

One of those just about over the top HDR shots I’d better let sit a while; and am tempted to correct the converging verticals in photoshop, something I almost never do.  Well, like I say – let it have a rest.  Yes – obviously from here on in everything is 5D so I don’t need to keep repeating that (40D arrived safely with James); and Sigma lens should arrive in FL on Monday.

And just about anything that’s remotely static right now is HDR – so I’ll just tag it and not go into that much more.  The trick when you’re shooting moving stuff like horses, even these guys that are taking a break is to setup the shot and wait / hope for that second where you can squeeze in the 3 shots without horse movement.  It’s all alot of fun for me – this color phase.  You get to make so many choices – is the blue sky too blue.  Should the foreground be brought up a bit.  Bring down the blown out lights or let ‘em be.  And do it all so that it has a somewhat natural feel to it.  Tricky stuff (at least for me) compared to when I do b&w which seems to present less problems.

I think that subconsciously, and now consciously I’m working to build up a color portfolio; not so much from the selling point of view – but to get to a point where you can sit back and contemplate the portfolio as a whole – whether it has jumped into postcard territory (not that there’s anything wrong with that) or whether that certain wave of enjoyment you get comes across to others.

The real trick is not to over analyze a new path (as this one is) since you have no idea where it’s going. But together with the perspective controls in Photoshop, and with combining fewer images, I’m starting to get the idea of how this can give you the view camera feeling.. . without the weight…  but with lots of clean pixels…  I don’t quite have it all figured out yet but it feels like that’s where this is headed…

Flower Pots – HDR – 5D – Three Exposures – 28mm.

10 fused images of 5th Avenue, Version 1

I say Version 1 because there are a lot of ways to approach this, and I happen to also have many images to choose from. Also, the static parts of the scene are not aligned as well as they could be, as the camera was at the top of the 15 foot rig and tended to wave in the wind.  But with careful selection I can do better.

.

Considering the fact that Roosevelt Island is one of the most ugly spots in the city, this is a favorite of mine from the hdr trip.  It’s only two raw shots, since if I used the third one, the boat which is just visible disappeared.

Took the three shots tonight and fused them  together.  As you can see, more pleasing (to my eye) then trying to fake out the program with virtual copies. Can’t quite get the web version to hold the detail and gradations of what I’m looking at in Lightroom – but guess that’s how it goes.

Bodega, 110th Street.  Shooting hdr, does give me the feeling of working with a view camera.  I continue to see potential for this process, though I’m not sure how much comes through on the web since it is the detail and complete lack of noise that I find fascinating (from the 10mp 40D).  At any rate, it definitely has knocked the idea of needing a new camera out of my head.

Yes, it is the first time in my photographic adventure that I’ve been happy with the color results.  No, not completely naturalistic, a bit saturated, but still true enough in terms of hue.