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07/23/2002 10:54:03 AM · #26 |
gr8photos: thanks!
clubjuggle: I'd be flattered! :-) |
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07/23/2002 01:21:59 PM · #27 |
Originally posted by hokie:
Just do what you want here for subjects or whatever turns you on and get as good in the technical control until you can reproduce magazine quality work, then ignore it :-)
There are millions of stock photos with perfect this or that but only one you :-)
Well said Hokie. 10 points for attitude, dude.
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07/23/2002 01:58:58 PM · #28 |
I forgot to add that while DOF may be a very subjective issue (some like a lot of DOF for a particular image, while others would prefer a smaller DOF), having the subject of your photograph be in sharp focus is almost an absolute necessity unless you are intenionally going for a "soft" look.
The reason being is that one of the first things the human mind does with the visual stimuli given to it by the eyes is to find shapes and patterns using edges. An image with egdes that are hard to detect (or non-existent) will force the eyes to roam all over the picture.
This is why most illustrations (comics and cartoons included) emphasize edges by drawing them in bold black lines... even though edges in real life are infinitely thin, and certainly are not black. Without them, your eyes would have a hard time deciphering the shapes being drawn. |
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07/23/2002 02:41:11 PM · #29 |
Originally posted by sohr:
I forgot to add that while DOF may be a very subjective issue (some like a lot of DOF for a particular image, while others would prefer a smaller DOF), having the subject of your photograph be in sharp focus is almost an absolute necessity unless you are intenionally going for a "soft" look.
A picture has to have *something* in focus, and that something will be the focus of the photo. Portrait photographers typically use a wide open lens (lower f numbers like 2.8) to throw the background out of focus. This causes our eyes to 'snap' to the subject. In landscape photography it usually is nice to have a large depth of field (high f numbers like 8, 22) so that more is sharp. In a lot of the pictures submitted here, I think the problem is that the photo is shot on auto and DOF just isn't considered. If a person's camera allows manual settings or apature priority, he/she will be able to somewhat force it to take DOF into account. If not, then possibly pick a different subject.
The main idea is to look into the LCD before you click the shutter and then after you take the picture see what you've just taken. Evaluate the effects of the chosen focal point and see how the areas of in focus and out of focus cause the eye to linger over the picture or jump around and not know where to settle. It sounds like a lot of work, but in time you'll do it naturally.
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07/23/2002 02:44:40 PM · #30 |
| Ok, I hear you. So what's the difference between choosing sharp focus on my camera and using PhotoShop unsharp mask? How or when is one preferred over the other? |
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07/23/2002 02:47:24 PM · #31 |
you need both. the subject of your image needs to be in focus when you take the photo. unsharpen mask then helps re-sharpen what's lost in postprocessing or through the edge being across pixels (explained much better in the examples above). unsharpen mask will not 'save' a photo that is out of focus in the first place.
Originally posted by ron:
Ok, I hear you. So what's the difference between choosing sharp focus on my camera and using PhotoShop unsharp mask? How or when is one preferred over the other?
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07/23/2002 03:13:20 PM · #32 |
| Thanks for your explanations on sharpening the focus. My photo was criticised for being blurred but I couldnt see it. I ran the unsharpen and then the sharpen mask and the difference was day and night--I had never used these before and now I realise how useful they are. |
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07/23/2002 03:16:18 PM · #33 |
Originally posted by Agamemnon:
What does unsharp mask do?
Sohr''s explanation is great as to how the fuzziness gets there. What the Unsharp Mask filter actually does is look for a place where two contrasting colors meet. It them slightly darkens the pixels on the darker side of the junction, and lightens those on the lighter side to create a more visible junction. You control the effect with three settings: a percentage as to how "strongly" to apply the effect, a radius showing how far the effect should be extended into the surrounding area, and a threshold setting which determines how "different" the colors have to be before the effect is applied. Set this number lower for a more pronounced effect, higher for a more subtle one. In particular, set the threshold higher for flesh tones or you can introduce banding.
It is often better to apply a small adjustment two times than a larger one once. I''ve posted some samples of a couple images with various amounts of sharpening applied to compare effects -- I''ve made some of them extreme for demonstration purposes.
Unsharp Mask Sample
gallery.
Personally I find a lot of photos oversharpened, but a lot of the effect can also be dependent on viewing conditions and distance.
--Paul
* This message has been edited by the author on 7/23/2002 3:19:08 PM. |
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07/26/2002 05:12:17 PM · #34 |
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Sohr.
Although I was getting clear images with landscapes, still lifes, and organic objects, I was less happy with the resolution of my architectural and cityscape shots. I have some beautiful city scenes near dusk but I was getting a more flattened painterly quality to my prints than I expected in a photo. Although sometimes this made a very nice image, it wasn't the photo image I was trying for. The eye is more forgiving with the irregular edges of organic shapes than with the hard vertical/horizontal geometry of architectural elements where the eye recognizes a cheat when it sees one.
I was blaming it entirely on working with the default JPEG settings on a 2.1 megapixel camera and I was considering working in the largest TIFF mode. This leads me to believe I can possibly recover more definition in my architectural shots but I recognize that I will have to be upping the JPEG settings to get the shots I want.
I bought my camera this spring and I'm now about to begin learning PhotoShop but so far have only been using the Camedia software that came with my camera. It's simple sharpen function is not the solution to this problem. |
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07/26/2002 06:46:14 PM · #35 |
| The picture must be as sharp as you can get it when you push the shutter button.Use the eyepiece and adjust the diopter setting to your particular eye sight.This also will help get the sharpest image.No amount of photo shopping will save a shot thats out of focus to begin with.The auto focus on the Olympus cameras can be fooled very easily,experiment with the manual focus setting. |
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