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06/20/2007 11:47:54 AM · #1 |
the most dramatic moment of the play and just as she shows her greatest emotion in the play, they turn out the lights. SONOFA.....
It's called a SPOTLIGHT... ok, /rant...
anyhow, this pic is pushed reallllly hard from underexposure. However, I also thought some brush strokes would give some nice style here... Can't really see them (by far the greatest contributor to the 'noise' in the image is the layer of canvas texture underneath a layer of brush strokes - 'angled strokes', but the noise has become something like a 'blotchiness'. there really wasn't much to begin with.
i do like the picture overall though...
The story for it is that she has just said goodbye to the guy that she fell in love with after trying to con him and pretending to fall in love with him... something she is well known for. She is doubly heartbroken because she knows that the girl he is going off to marry the very next morning is just as bad a con as she was... now she has to go back to the life that she had before... working a tag team con to cheat dirty old men out of cash...
For a tragic romantic comedy, the ending is pretty meaty. Well I liked it anyhow... :)
Oh yeah, my point!
I have been editing most of the day, and my creativity has somewhat waned... I think it's bedtime...
Bottom line, please let me know your thoughts, particularly on what needs to be improved...
Feel free to play. Be honest, be brutal...
Thankfully, I'm almost finished this set!
Message edited by author 2007-06-20 12:01:04. |
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06/20/2007 01:47:21 PM · #2 |
What steps did you go thru to get this? I probably can't help much (unless you don't have Noise Ninja, then I can) but if you listed the steps, I'm sure others could suggest different methods or approaches.
I not a huge fan of the texture in this one, but if that's what you're after then that's cool. You should check out PPChallenge.com, there was a challenge a few weeks back that was 'correcting a seriously underexposed picture' and I was amazed. Maybe you could gleen the steps in those images for help...? |
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06/20/2007 02:15:18 PM · #3 |
Hi Keiran,
I think what you were working to achieve with the texture probably helped if there was a lot of noise pushing it from being under-exposed. I think the overall effect regarding the levels and colors is a bit too dark and depressing in a way, but then again I dunno nuttin' about that there fancy dancin' stuff and may well have been a scene to depict death.
I had a little dabble with it to get a softer, more pastel rendition of it:
From this: -- to --> 
Just a different set of eyes.
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06/20/2007 09:02:41 PM · #4 |
Thanks brad, well it's not depicting death, but as tragic as a 'tragic romantic comedy' can get, this was the climactic tragic moment and indeed the very last second of the play.
The woman who originally intended to take advantage of the nice, but foolish young man on the night before his wedding elsewhere has come to realize that her reputation as a con artist has preculuded having a relationship with a man she has come to truly love. He has been almost literally snatched away from her and taken back to his real life... which unfortunately is just another lady who has never met him but will marry him for his money.
I like the edit brad, what did you do? It's my first time working with texture filters... the vast majority of the texture filter is lost in the resize. there's a HUGE difference between a 1 pixel wide brush stroke on a 640x480 resized image and a 1 pixel wide brush stroke on a 3000x2300 image, so it's a bit difficult to see.
100% crop of the original
please note that I usually follow the rule of thumb that says to view at 50% for a more accurate view of what will happen in a print, so my goal is to make the 50% look good, not this 100%. hence please save and view in PS rather than just on DPC.
I think I might throw a layer of blur on top of the brush stroke what do you think? Maybe a bit of crosshatch in darken mode?
Message edited by author 2007-06-20 21:13:39. |
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06/20/2007 11:15:19 PM · #5 |
Shifted the light via a curves layer and some heavy masking... Is it better?
Is it acceptable?
Thanks!!!
EDIT - wrong thumb!
Message edited by author 2007-06-20 23:16:08. |
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06/20/2007 11:21:58 PM · #6 |
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06/20/2007 11:25:37 PM · #7 |
Originally posted by eschelar:
Feel free to play. Be honest, be brutal... |
I'd be interested in trying some PP with this, but would rather start from the original, unprocessed image (small is OK), and I understand from your comment that this is one you've already played around with. |
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06/20/2007 11:29:38 PM · #8 |
Originally posted by eschelar:
EDIT - wrong thumb! |
LOL .... I thought (from the original thumb) that you were making a joke. Like .. all I did was play with curves and this is what I got! :-)
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06/21/2007 02:06:57 AM · #9 |
Heh. If you are interested, it seems I did actually get another shot a moment later after a few clicks of my exposure wheel....
this is what I ended up with: 
General, if you would like to play with it, feel free to give me an email or PM me with your email and I can provide either RAW or full size JPG. I have 2 JPGs to choose from. Original or post 1st pass batch.
I've learned bucketloads about applying vignettes in the last few hours.
heh. Pretty crazy low noise levels considering the last bit was shot at all ISO 1600 IMHO. You should see the full-size of the above shot... impressive considering it too needed a bit of rescue...
Message edited by author 2007-06-21 02:08:54. |
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06/21/2007 02:13:31 AM · #10 |
Originally posted by dwterry:
Originally posted by eschelar:
EDIT - wrong thumb! |
LOL .... I thought (from the original thumb) that you were making a joke. Like .. all I did was play with curves and this is what I got! :-) |
heh. no, when I put the wrong thumb in, it was an entirely different picture.
If you look a bit closer, the final thumb with the brush strokes has a subtle change, but it shifts the lighting focus so it looks like there is a light coming in to light her arms and hands rather than just that hot spot on her dress.
Thanks again for the in depth comments! |
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06/21/2007 02:49:39 AM · #11 |
Originally posted by eschelar:
I like the edit brad, what did you do? |
Hi Keiran,
Basically I took your first edit, did an Image, Adjustments, Match Color and tweaked the sliders a bit as a first step. If I remember right, I then ran the enhanced Shadow/Highlight and adjusted the shadows and mid-levels a bit to bring some detail back out. I added a soft focus filter, backing it back out some to keep it from going too soft, added a warming filter to enhance the reds/pinks. did a selective lasso on her head/face in a new layer and adjusted the levels to lighten her up bit, did a selective lasso on the part of the lace and adjusted the hue, saturation & lightness to take it out of the yellow range and shift it more green. Ran the history brush over a few areas to richen/darken.
Well was something like that.
:)
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06/21/2007 05:31:37 AM · #12 |
wow! lots of editing there. You using CS2 or CS3?
My demo ran out... back to PS 7.0. i sure enjoyed using that warming filter when I could, so simple and easy to use... Incidentally, the saturation was pulled down a bit intentionally, but I do like how your version really captures the pinks. Your color control is excellent.
But I'm not familiar with the Match Color function. What does it do? What is it for?
I'm thinking that the soft focus filter might have been a bit more necessary on the DPC version due to the resize, but what do you think of the texture in the 100% crop viewed at 50%? Still toying with the idea... I actually looked to see if my PS7.0 had the filter, but it seems it doesn't. Not to mention the fact that time is quickly running out on me. Finished the edits for the play Tres Sombreros now and need to get the Performance Competition edits finished now.
Seeing as I have another very similar shot without any lighting issues, I'd like to have this one as a more 'dreamy', effects type shot.
I'm learning a lot!
I'm still interested in this pic, |
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06/21/2007 05:15:17 PM · #13 |
Hi again Keiran,
I'm using CS2, as I don't have Windows XP that's needed for CS3.
Regarding the match color step. It's a great way to check and often adjust white balance. The match color process was run and using that and it's luminance, color saturation and fade sliders, was all I did to correct this shot as an example:
There's another neat thing that can be done with the match color, and that is let's say you took 50 shots indoors at a wedding and the colors aren't right. Open one, make your corrections as needed in whatever manner is desired, then minimize it. Open another of the shots in PS and using the match color, go to the drop-down box and use the image that was minimized after being corrected, and select it. That will now match the newly opened, uncorrected image to the one you previously fixed. That's a HUGE time-saver. It can also be used that way to match colors of a shot you liked, like a sunset, and apply that color scheme to a shot that could benefit from it. The possibilities are endless.
Regarding the brush strokes - that's a hard one to tell without seeing the whole shot. Sometimes adding a texture, even like canvas, on an image that's not so great in detail to begin with or is noisy, is a good way of hiding things.
Here's a gift that I finally found the link for (Was a Rangerfinder Magazine thank you for a new subscription)
NIK Filters
The warming filter is great, as is the Bi-Color gradient. Lots of slider tweaks to customize the end result.
btw - using the Brillance/Warmth filter on a black & white, Brilliance at 50 (default) and 58-60 on the warmth really adds a nice tone!
Hope this helps.
Message edited by author 2007-06-21 17:24:11.
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06/21/2007 05:31:35 PM · #14 |
Hope you didn't mind but I wanted to give it a try.
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06/22/2007 05:32:57 AM · #15 |
I never mind when people choose to spend time to try to help me. I appreciate it a lot! Thank you Scott! It's always fun to work a shot hard. i always learn tons.
Brad. thanks for the filters... Will have to wait a while until I can move past PS 7.0, so that's pretty great.
by the way, do you have an action that you use for inserting a watermark? |
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06/22/2007 01:19:22 PM · #16 |
Watermarking was an effort, with portrait & landscape crops, different sizes, etc and opted to buy a program called Watermarker.
I made a psd file for the PROOF part, loaded it, and it works so smooth and easy. I can place the watermark in any of about 9 locations, adjust the opacity, saving level of compression, etc. I open the program, file the files I want to mark, adjust the opacity if needed, click save and protect all, and away it goes and places the finished files in a folder I made on the desktop called Proofed. Easy to go upload from that folder.
Online purchase, email sends an activation key generator that writes to the registry.
$30.00 well spent.
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06/22/2007 03:56:23 PM · #17 |
Originally posted by Brad:
Watermarking was an effort, with portrait & landscape crops, different sizes, etc and opted to buy a program called Watermarker.
I made a psd file for the PROOF part, loaded it, and it works so smooth and easy. I can place the watermark in any of about 9 locations, adjust the opacity, saving level of compression, etc. I open the program, file the files I want to mark, adjust the opacity if needed, click save and protect all, and away it goes and places the finished files in a folder I made on the desktop called Proofed. Easy to go upload from that folder.
Online purchase, email sends an activation key generator that writes to the registry.
$30.00 well spent. |
 Brad it looks like a nice program but I have a question. What does it offer that can't be done in photoshop CS2. Other than batch conversions with I think can be done with PS/CS2 as well. I have a saved layer that I just add to photographs as a watermark. Does this program protect images better than just a watermark? I ask because I may be interested in the program.
Thanks |
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06/22/2007 04:02:45 PM · #18 |
CS2 can pretty much do same/similar, except that the interface is so much simpler, and I can choose the positioning and opacity and save as quality so much easier and batch them - all in a matter of a couple seconds. Protect any better? It's the same. It embeds nothing, just applies the layer and flattens. I was just lazy and didn't feel like creating an action for each aspect ratio and size. I can make a couple mouse clicks with this program and it's done. I used a psd file I made, though the program has so many options and text layouts in it's defaults.
As an example, when I went to mark all my portfolio pics, I had to save each one, one by one, put them all in a single folder, ran the watermarker program, and had it save them all in my Proofed folder. I chose the source, select all, adjusted the opacity and clicked. Less than 2 minutes later, 1045 images were done, some I am in process of re-doing as the first go-around I was a bit too aggressive in the settings.
I'm a PS moron and found this program made my life so much simpler.
Message edited by author 2007-06-22 16:10:08.
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06/22/2007 04:08:33 PM · #19 |
Originally posted by Brad:
CS2 can pretty much do same/similar, except that the interface is so much simpler, and I can choose the positioning and opacity and save as quality so much easier and batch them - all in a matter of a couple seconds. Protect any better? It's the same. It embeds nothing, just applies the layer and flattens. I was just lazy and didn't feel like creating an action for each aspect ratio and size. I can make a couple mouse clicks with this program and it's done. I used a psd file I made, though the program has so many options and text layouts in it's defaults.
I'm a PS moron and found this program made my life so much simpler. |
Thanks for your reply. I don't have images of your caliber that would, at this moment, justify me spending $30 for the program unless it did something radical to protect an image. I will just stick with the action I saved for now. At least until I take pictures good enough that someone would be willing to take. :P |
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06/22/2007 04:14:39 PM · #20 |
Originally posted by Brad:
I was just lazy and didn't feel like creating an action for each aspect ratio and size. |
You can make it a small file you keep open while you run PS and make a Text Layer with the type you want -- when you need it, drag it from the Layers palette to the target picture and it should import onto a new layer without any Cut/Paste needed. Edit>Free Transform should let you scale, rotate, and reposition as needed pretty quickly, and you can adjust the layer opacity before saving. |
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06/22/2007 04:20:54 PM · #21 |
Oh I know, I just needed something I could do easily and quickly. At the time, I had hidden every portfolio image until I could watermark them and re-upload over the original. By saving the watermarked images in a separate folder, I could look at the thumbs in Irfanview, right-click, rename, copy the name, then find the portfolio image, browse to that folder, paste and submit. When doing over 800 images, time-savers are a real big plus.
Message edited by author 2007-06-22 16:23:44.
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06/22/2007 04:26:24 PM · #22 |
Originally posted by Brad:
When doing over 800 images, time-savers are a real big plus. |
Yup ... though most people only need to do a few at a time most of the time.
With no practice, the technique I described took 25-30 seconds -- 15 would probably be the best it can do. |
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06/22/2007 10:33:22 PM · #23 |
yeah, 15 seconds per image for 600 images is TWO AND A HALF HOURS.
What else could I do with 2.5 hours?
On my images at the 'acceptable' level of quality (images that might be of relevance to the person in the picture, but of no really exciting artistic merit), I generally try to take only 10-30 seconds for a FULL edit in 2nd pass. This would cover a crop, fine tonal adjustments, attention to shadow detail, checking to see if the image has been destroyed by my 1st pass batch edit.....
This is why I asked Brad about his system as he seems to have a very good method of doing this for lots of images with little or no effort.
I will be looking into this in the future.
Thanks brad |
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06/23/2007 01:51:26 PM · #24 |
Originally posted by eschelar:
I generally try to take only 10-30 seconds for a FULL edit in 2nd pass. This would cover a crop, fine tonal adjustments, attention to shadow detail, checking to see if the image has been destroyed by my 1st pass batch edit..... |
If you already have the image open then dragging the watermark layer onto it as a final step should add 5-10 seconds to your workflow, less if you aren't that picky about location. If you do it like stock sites and just put a standard watermark in the center you can easily automate it with a PS Action.
I gave your photo a pretty simple duotone treatment:
-Copied Red Channel to new Grayscale document
-Grayscale Curve
-Duotone Mode using Black and PANTONE 143
-Convert back to RGB Mode
-Resize for DPC
-Crop some from the bottom
-USM at 12%/48 dia/TH = 0
-USM at 88%/0.8 dia/TH = 5
-USM at 88%/0.8 dia/TH = 5
-SaveAs JPEG at quality 9/10 = 109kb |
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06/23/2007 08:52:25 PM · #25 |
| Wow, lots to learn from that one! thanks gen! I'll be giving that stuff a try down the road... |
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