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Challenge - Optimise this

Diane Fields

New member
Andrew Rodney said:
Multiple converters and layering of each in Photoshop? Wow, I thought this was supposed to be a 5 minute exercise.

Can we stick with a single rendering from a single processor for now?

I didn't mention (sorry) that of my two attempts, one was using Lightroom, the other RAW Developer. And yes, they look quite different.

A difficult task is taking the same RAW file and using say 3 converters and attempting to match as closely as possible the rendering. That takes a lot more than 5 minutes each! I've got an "Iron Chief" RAW converter session in the works for PhotoPlus Expo in NY later this year where two very well know photographers will have four different companies attempt to produce a rendering they like, all the way to output. Should be a fun one.

I did it because I was curious about the differences in RCs. I chose the RSP conversion--and in fact, could have used one conversion and the Photomatix TM plugin as opposed to combining the 3 conversions in the standalone and then TM. Tried that--not much difference, but they all needed the color balance, saturation and curves layer IMO.

I'm not sure I could arrive at something i would like using only the RC conversion from any of the converters I have on my HD--all PC ones except Silkypix. I expect others, like Andrew, can do this--I always feel the need to add at least a curve layer and adjust--even though I do a curves in RSP or C1. I probably could have been happy with the color version from C1 or RSP if I had had a camera profile tamping down those greens though LOL.

Diane
 

Diane Fields

New member
Andrew Rodney said:
A difficult task is taking the same RAW file and using say 3 converters and attempting to match as closely as possible the rendering. That takes a lot more than 5 minutes each! I've got an "Iron Chief" RAW converter session in the works for PhotoPlus Expo in NY later this year where two very well know photographers will have four different companies attempt to produce a rendering they like, all the way to output. Should be a fun one.

I'd love to see that LOL. Just piddling with using RSP, C1 and ACR for this one was interesting (I have Bibble thanks to Eric, but just find the workflow not suitable for me--and don't care for the fact I can't 'calibrate' my camera ala ACR or use a camera profile). I often try various ones (and have been demoing LR--which I actually like generally) for a particular image. However, its WAY more than 5 minutes to arrive at similar conversion--and I'm assuming they won't be able to adjust except within the RC. I'd love to be a mouse on the wall LOL.

Diane
 

StuartRae

New member
Well, I never expected such a response; it's been an enjoyable and informative experience. Thanks to everyone for sparing the time to take part.

There are so many different renditions that it's difficult to say which I like best. At the moment it comes down to a choice of two, neither of which are exactly how (I think) I remember the scene. I won't say which they are as I don't want to influence the judge.

Whoever wins, I think Dierk should get a special prize for daring to be different. Ignoring the fact that the shot was taken at 10am on Octiber 15th, he went for the late summer evening look. And why not? It's as vaid an interpretation as any.

Don, I see you've removed the black border. Why did you add it originally? Do you think that the background colour affects our perception of a photo? My father was a farmer, and I remember that back in the 50s, when he took a sample of grain to the buyer it always had to be in a black cloth bag.

Regards,

Stuart
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Wonderful! Let's close this at noon Los Angeles time!

Who has a beautiful/interesting, but challenged, face in the RAW for the next challenge? Send to w84u hosted at mac.com.

Asher
 

Don Lashier

New member
Andrew Rodney said:
Multiple converters and layering of each in Photoshop? Wow, I thought this was supposed to be a 5 minute exercise.

Can we stick with a single rendering from a single processor for now?
Hi Andrew,

You must have missed the other thread which inspired this - HDR plug-ins and techniques. With new tools and techniques what used to be tedious can now be done in a few minutes.

I hate the idea of a "winner", just different interpretations, but if I had to pick my favorites would be Diane's and David's.

- DL
 

Eric Hyman

New member
Ok, enough Lurking I'll bite.


Less the one minute in Bibble Pro/ PS Cs2 (For ouptut sharpening)

Aut05-0010-bibble1.jpg


1. Click WB off clouds to neutralize them, takes a bib of red out of the image an leaves a tiny yello/green look which works well with the foliage.
2. Autolevels off (prevent clipping)
3. Highlight recovery = 100, monocrhomatic option selected (Pull detail out of clouds)
4. Fill light 0.2 (Brinb out some shadow detail, yet still leave some contrast)...could do more, but flatter)
5. Saturation = 7, vibrance = 100 (A bit more pop overall, and non locally add more in less vibrant areas)
6. Perfectl Clear on (automatic Localized contrast enhanacemnet...helps everyewhere, and brings in distant detail)
7. Lens Distortion corection enabled (Remove non obvious lens distortion at edges)
8. Output size 800 x 600
9. sharpen = 400 (Over sharpen a bit due to down sampling).
10. Transfer to photosharp.
11. Smart sharpen, default vaules (Output sharpening, restore some sharpenss lost in down sampling)

Comments:

A bit differetn color balance then the other entries which i find more appealing do to the subject matter. Could easil y be chagned with a different WB source. Tried to not go ver board with pulling shadows to preserve some contrast, could easily get more. Seem to have gotten more detail in the distant hills then other examples show (Can actually see small pines)

As an aside, you might like to play with Perfectly Clear, Vibrance, HR and fillight in the latest bibbles, as they are all locally adaptive adjustments that do a lot things you would nomrally need to do in PS with layers masks etc, but all automatically.

Eric
www.bibblelabs.com
 

Brian Lowe

New member
OK, I wanna play to here is my attempt, I used Adobe Lightroom.

Total time processing 20min.

Step one, I opened Adobe Lightroom and imported photo, 5min.

Step two, applying a saved preset setting, one click in LR, 5min.

Step three, Played with HSL sliders to tweak photo, moved four sliders, 4min.

Step four, exported photo into PS from LR, 4min.

Step five, applied Flexsharp for sharpening of photo 10sec.

Step Six, Save, upload photo to my site and type this post, 1min 90 seconds.

Enjoy,

Brian



 
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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Wow! Still incoming! This like Stephen Easwood's version gives us a late-summer day with different yellow green hues in the trees.

The clouds could have, perhaps more detail.

I like it.
 

Don Lashier

New member
Dierk Haasis said:
It proves that there is no "correct" colour, and a lot of roads leading to Rome.
This challenge reminds me of Uwe's "challenges" where entrants come up with sometimes radically different interpretations.

This might be a fun thing to do once a month or so - no winners, just eye-opening and horizon broadening. I could easily put this challenge's entries into a gallery (with contributor's comments) if no one objects? (could be openphotographyforums URL with a simple A record).

- DL
 
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Don Lashier

New member
StuartRae said:
Don, I see you've removed the black border. Why did you add it originally? Do you think that the background colour affects our perception of a photo? My father was a farmer, and I remember that back in the 50s, when he took a sample of grain to the buyer it always had to be in a black cloth bag.
I did it because the typical light background affects perception of an image, in particular contrast. But since no one else was doing this and to some degree the eye adapts, I decided to remove it. If there's no objection to putting these in a gallery, I'll put them all in a gallery with a dark background and neutral mat that displays to best effect (as opposed to a white page background).

- DL
 

StuartRae

New member
One final take.
It is my photo after all, so I'm entitled to make a real mess of it :)

Why not be different? I thought, so here's the moonlight version.

Aut05-0010-02-moon-2.jpg


It's the wall and clouds that matter, so:

Into PSE, a couple of spots in Light Machine, darken and desaturate background, resize, sharpen with Focal Blade.

Could have done with a bit more adjustment to the spot settings, but I stuck to the time limit.

Stuart

edited to add last comment
 
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Jim Govett

New member
I haven't seen an Aperture version yet, so I figure I'd better fix that. Didn't spend more than a couple minutes on it as I'm rushing to get out of here. Went for a more realistic effect with truer colours.

Aut05-0010-Aperture_2.jpg


Jim
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Nice to have an Aperture version! To be fair, what about the clouds when you get another moment?

Otherwise I like it, especially htat you brought out the different yellow greens in the trees and grasses.

Asher
 

Roger Lambert

New member
I'm no PP guru, but I am pretty inpressed with the results that many folks are getting with the Photoshop alternative programs that do not require blending exposures. :)
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Alain,

Of course yours is wonderful! Now what gremlins did you have doing this for you? The steps je vous en pris!

Asher
 

StuartRae

New member
If I may, I'd like to submit a proxy conversion.

It was made by a friend of mine on the RS forums who's not a member here.

It demonstrates a slightly different approach to the problem, and was achieved with free software (Picasa)

It was exposed for the foreground in RSP and then had auto contrast, a bit of sharpening and a blue graduated filter applied in Picasa.
To my eyes, and memory, it's pretty close to the original in terms of light and colour.

Aut05-0010-02-PC.jpg
 

Diane Fields

New member
Andrew's misreading of the 'rules' (from the other thread) pushed me to try and come up with a near final image from just the RAW converter. Thus far I've worked with RSP and LIghtroom--and, surprisingly, I preferred the LR final image. I haven't tried C1 (my usual 'alternative' RC) or Bibble--or DPP, but probably won't even try either of these since I don't use them on a regular basis so would not get an optimal result. I won't post my 2 RC only images---but it wouldn't take much--a bit of curves maybe--to get a nice image from LR--though it took me a heck of a long time to come to grips with the curve function there--and which was needed, plus the color calibration--to arrive at something I liked. Based on that--maybe I'll even go back and work with ACR again since my RC of choice is a deadend.

What a terrific group of inages---I loved the diversity since it shows how differently our minds and eyes--and creative vision---differ.

Diane
 

Alain Briot

pro member
Asher Kelman said:
Alain,

Of course yours is wonderful! Now what gremlins did you have doing this for you? The steps je vous en pris!

Asher

I'm glad you ask :) I did it late last night (morning?) It was all done in Lightroom on a Mac. Essentially with the split toning and the Greyscale mixer. I also straightened the horizon and cropped the house on the right side as well as the top of the sky. Finally, I worked towards keeping details in the clouds, giving a solid density to the sky, maintaining shadows where I feel they should be while maintaining what I feel is a dreamy quality to this scene.

The real challenge, as always, is knowing how this scene felt while one was there, since obviously I wasn't there. It is easier with my students because I can ask questions. Here, I just went with my experience. I do believe that the wall should end at the end of the wall, and not at half of a house. The tilted horizon truly bothered me. I can see why, because it was real hard to figure out were was a level line (there isn't one). Again, I went with the feel of the image. I wanted the clouds to be the lightest part of the scene, and yet not over-dominate the other tones. Things were easier with the shadows since there isn't a dominating deep shadow, except at extreme mid-left, but since this is where we pretty much start reading the image, it isn't dominating, plus it has little lighter branches to break it up. I kept the end of the wall darker to provide a tonal echo to the shadow on the mid-left (the one I just mentioned). The dominating compositional lines are definitly the mountains and the wall meeting, sort of, at far mid-right, lines reinforced by cropping the sky to just above the hill on the right, thereby increasing the importance of the hill, and playing up the clouds following the shape of the hill in a sort of visual echo. The sepia split tone brings unity to a scene otherwise broken up by clashing colors that become easily oversaturated if one goes in the direction of more saturation.
 
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Alain Briot

pro member
Here is a larger version so the fine details can be seen. There is some additional work to be done in Photoshop, of course, but I am following the rules in that everything up to this point was done in Lightroom:


Aut05-00101.jpg
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Alain,

Your explanation of your compositonal directions is so helpful. I like the idea of basing the eye movement on the darkest tone, and the horizontal edge before the mountains (not the horizon surely). I find your descriptions so helpful.

Great!

Asher
 

Alain Briot

pro member
Asher Kelman said:
Alain,

Your explanation of your compositonal directions is so helpful. I like the idea of basing the eye movement on the darkest tone, and the horizontal edge before the mountains (not the horizon surely). I find your descriptions so helpful.

Great!

Asher

Thank you. This is something I do in all my workshops and with most of my consulting students. It works better as a discussion than as a written statement, because interaction does make the process a lot richer --questions / answers-- but it was interesting trying to type it for once. I regularly spend a full hour on one or two photographs. I try to do several in an hour, but it is challenging. There is just so much to say. I could have gone on and type 10 pages on everything that can be said about the image above.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
We do have at least 10 pages for you Alain, but for the moment, thanks for adding some pointers to compositional nuances that can so help a picture.

All without mentioning schools or movements of art!

Asher
 

Jim Govett

New member
I can't say I'd ever go much beyond this to produce a life-like image. Here I've reduced the blue's levels to darken the sky and bring out the clouds a bit. I'm using Aperture, and am trying to avoid going outside of the application to get an end-image. For further changes like darkening the sky on the far left, I would go on to PS CS and return to Aperture for management purposes.

I have to agree with Alain Briot. The horizon feels off. I didn't change it initially due to time limitations, but I would rotate the image about 10°.

Jim

Asher Kelman said:
Nice to have an Aperture version! To be fair, what about the clouds when you get another moment?

Otherwise I like it, especially htat you brought out the different yellow greens in the trees and grasses.

Asher

Aut05-0010 Aperture.jpg
 
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Lightzone:

I have been trying the product and thought it may be useful in developing the emphasis of the clouds, stone wall, and spot of light at the photographer's feet. Presumably a late summer image.
Opened with LZ's raw converter, gave a very flat image.
Used two zonemappers, one for clouds and dark wall tones, the second to lighten trees and fields.
Then contrast, saturation and sharpen.
Still learning, it took but a few minutes.
No localised masking used, which is a strong point of LZ.

Could someone help me with posting the image ? Thanks.

Regards, Tudor.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Great! BTW, who says it has to be pure? If one wants to use PS too that's fine. Anyway the place is starting to look like it is somewhere I know!

Asher
 
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