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04/11/2002 07:23:20 AM · #1 |
I think photography starts with an idea for an image. You then spend some time finding the right place, view, lighting. Maybe a few hours or days later you press the shutter. You've had to think about the exposure to make your idea work (should it be stepped down to saturate the colours, should it be over exposed to get a more high key image)
You've had to think about Depth of Field - how do you want the blur to be controlled. You've had to think about motion - do you want everything static, do you want water to 'smoke' etc)
You've set aperture, shutter speed, focus, maybe picked an ISO value, adjusted the white balance and spent a whole lot of time framing, considering compositional aspects, filling the frame, balancing the colours used in the image, not too much red and so on. You've looked at the use of diagonals, horizontals, curves, see where the leading lines go, where your eye will rest and a hundred other things)
Once you've thought through all of these aspects, you've pressed the shutter. At that point, I think you've got about half way.
Once you get the picture back to your computer, it may be exactly what you wanted, if your original idea was that it realistically represents what you saw. Or it may need work to fufill your original idea for the shot. It may need colour adjustments to make the mood right for your original idea - perhaps you couldn't afford the really expensive lighting rig you'd like to change colours and mood and lighting without photoshop.
It'll certainly need colour adjustments and sharpening, contrast improvements etc to make it anything like reality. Digital cameras plain arn't good enough to do this right for all or even any shot.
Maybe you want to get the effect of having used different film approaches, like Kodak Velvia with its really strong saturated colours, or T-Max black and white, with the heavy grain.
Maybe you want to make it look like you've cross processed in the wrong chemicals, so you want to solarise or apply weird curves to your image.
Or perhaps you want to remove the big spot on your nose, before printing for a loved one's desk.
Photography to me is all of the things above, not just pointing a camera at something and pressing the shutter.
Discuss ? :)
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04/11/2002 07:54:09 AM · #2 |
Gordon,
I agree with you wholeheartedly. I believe that actually pressing the button on the camera is only about half of the process of creating a digital image. Under normal circumstances, when I frame my photo in the viewfinder, I allow myself a lot more space around the image so I can crop to my own specs rather than what the camera sees. I ALWAYS take the picture in color and then make my black & white or sepia images from that. I also usually make brightness adjustement (usually to the negative side) and then examine my colors.
Your comment about the lighting is absolutely correct. Incandescent lighting and digital cameras do not get along well. My lighting rig consists of up to three 500-watt quartz halogen lamps. This is very harsh lighting. However, I can achieve my desired tones with level adjustments on the computer.
The digital process allows me to be the photographer and the film processor. The versatility is excellent. If I want a print, I make a print. If I want a really big print, I make a really big print.
I think you are right on target.
I believe that some software effects (like solarization) create an image that does not resemble a photograph. I don't normally mess with the changes that make me ask myself, "does this still look like a photograph?" I have made some watercolors and other images for fun but I don't take them seriously in my 'photography' hobby.
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04/13/2002 02:17:08 AM · #3 |
Hi there, just noticed the 'tips & tricks' forum. Agree completely with whats been said, you have to be extremely fortunate to get near the effect you want within camera - something that has always goaded me when sending film in for processing. In the 'Curves' challenge I severally underexposed for effect and the ex-camera processed image knocked my eyes out but I did not submit this one because it fell foul of the present rules.
Vin |
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