How were these images were toned?

Hi,

Sports photos don't often grab my attention and hold be breathless, but John Gruber (of daringfireball) just posted a link to this review of the Nikon D3. The review contain some wonderful photos by James Russell.

Looking at the last too images in particular, does anyone know how the toning was achieved ? I just can't pin down what he's done.

Thanks,

Tim

Tim Armes said:

Hi,

Sports photos don't often grab my attention and hold be breathless, but John Gruber (of daringfireball) just posted a link to this review of the Nikon D3. The review contain some wonderful photos by James Russell.

Looking at the last too images in particular, does anyone know how the toning was achieved ? I just can't pin down what he's done.

Thanks,

Tim

Click to expand...

People have suggested he used Lucisart, but though that may have been part of it (or not), James is a wonderful post processor so I'm sure he has his own set of actions, techniques, etc. I've posted a question in the dpreview retouching forum asking them what they think James has done to get these effects. There are some great retouchers there that might have good ideas--or have their own ways to 'get there'.

BTW--you might like to see more of his sport shots from Osaka and elsewhere.
http://russellrutherford.com/sports/

Diane

Diane Fields said:

I've posted a question in the dpreview retouching forum asking them what they think James has done to get these effects. There are some great retouchers there that might have good ideas--or have their own ways to 'get there'.
Diane

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Hi Diane,

Could you point us to that thread please?

Thanks,

Tim

Hmm,

So, he's working woth Nikons. That's interesting. He always said that he didn't like the skin tones with Canon and I thought he preferred leaf. However, I think if one searches the old robgalbraith.com posts before he was kicked out, I seem to recall that he was the one who asked, "What sort of camera would J.C. have?", he did mention Nikon gave good skin tones.

Anyway, James is a great photographer besides having a freewhelling sense of humor. I have no idea how he does the toning!

Asher

Asher Kelman said:

Hmm,

So, he's working woth Nikons. That's interesting. He always said that he didn't like the skin tones with Canon and I thought he preferred leaf. However, I think if one searches the old robgalbraith.com posts before he was kicked out, I seem to recall that he was the one who asked, "What sort of camera would J.C. have?", he did mention Nikon gave good skin tones.

Anyway, James is a great photographer besides having a freewhelling sense of humor. I have no idea how he does the toning!

Asher

Click to expand...

Asher, I think he himself is still shooting Canon and MF, but he really liked the D3--though it was loaned to him by Nikon for the Okasa games. He did say that he tried to give them his credit card 3 times LOL. If you haven't read the review, its interesting--and very personal--not trying to 'sell' people on the Nikon, just his thoughts and a 'field review' as he says. http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/d3.shtml

Tim Armes said:

Hi Diane,

Could you point us to that thread please?

Thanks,

Tim

Click to expand...

Tim, I just posted it this morning so no takers yet. Perhaps later today or this evening. Here's the thread.
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1006&message=25326557

Hi guys. New to the forum. I read the thread on the original review, and thought I'd give it a crack. While I don't know what Russell did, I could only work on him mentioning lightroom. So I attempted to do my best using only lightroom, on some jpegs I have from my basketball work.

Since I only had Lightroom to work with, I thought this was about as far as I could get in that program

http://www.pshizzy.com/russell

If anyone is interested in the LRTemplate file, please post so. But honestly, I think the fun is in figuring it out for yourself.

Also, it's not exact, especially on the color tone, but I liked it, and I could easily change it to taste.

Max

I like it too Max, especially on the Amare shot. Basic steps?

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net

Nill Toulme said:

I like it too Max, especially on the Amare shot. Basic steps?

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net

Click to expand...

Maybe I should point to the Matt Klowkowski technique in LR for a sort of 'illustrated' look that you could tweak to get to similar points too.
http://www.lightroomkillertips.com/2007/video-surreal-edgy-effect/ I don't know how it would work on these or 'people' pics, but its one more way of working in LR.

I do think that there was a lot more PS work done on James' work after LR, but Max did well with what he did in LR.

Diane

Diane, thank you for your comment. I too feel that Phooshop was probably necessary, but considering how far I was able to take it in LR, and how easily I was able to batch apply it, I think that it was worth the effort in figuring out what I did.

First, the easy stuff..

I used the Lens correction for vignetting to create rather than reduce the vignette. Simple enough.

Then I used a split tone for the coloration. hue 50 and saturation of 60 for the highlights(I believe, I'm recalling from memory as I am now at work), and hue 230 (180 degrees or the exact opposite on the color spectrum) and saturation 60 for the shadows. I balanced at about 75 percent to the right. This part can be very subjective to the image, as the balance and saturation can change.

I believe I then bumped up the clarity all the way, to really give that high pass thick edge look. I also took down the saturation and the vibrancy to about -25

I used the chroma noise reduction to about 25, and no luma noise reduction

for sharpness I tried everything but was dismayed that I could use the old 20/50 bit. So I think i went with around a 20 or so at a radius of 3.0 with no detail or masking. I felt that this would help thicken the edges, something that I saw in the Russell images, that gave his work an almost painted feel.

And there you have it. Play with it if you like, I'll gladly post up the LRTemplate file later on when I get home, but even I kept thinking that each image needed it's own split tone tweaks.

Max

Input from James Russell

Well I was puzzled too. How does one get this uniqiue almost metalized look?



© 2007 James Russel


I did try getting the effects in CS2 but I was still only close but not there! So I asked James and here's the reply quoted with his permission:

James Russell said:

I've had a lot of response to the article I wrote most of it positive and
flattering, though to be honest, none of the post processing was done the
way anyone described.

I didn't use any plug-in, though I use light room as a guide, all the finish
work was done in Photoshop.

I approached each one of these photographs with a thought of either
traditional film or just to work something I believed was unique.

Some to look like solarized Polaroid, some to look like transparency film,
some to look more stylized than standard traditional films.

The one thing I did when capturing these images was to map out where I
wanted to position myself where the subject would offer the best lighting
and the most dramatic poses and shot from those areas.

In regards to the camera, the post processing is a positive reflection of
the D-3 because I could pretty much move the files in any direction I saw
fit and most importantly the camera did not stop me from doing anything that
I wanted.

I have no agenda to sell the D-3 because I believe it will easily sell
itself.

James Russell

Click to expand...

So that's some light on the matter!


The most important thing I take from this is having enough experience to know where the light will be as you will want it and then plan for that one moment and make sure that you have a camera and lens that you know so well that it just works for you when the prey is in the virtual trap!

Asher

A further clarifying note from James

James Russel said:

Yes you may.

To add to this, I guess I could have shot the same images with the Canons as
I had three Canon bodies with me, but chose the Nikon, mostly because I like
their 300 2.8 and Nikon's come very natural to me.

It's not an either or thing with me and will continue to use the Canons for
other work.

One thing about shooting this project was I was there to specifically cover
4 athletes. This is a somewhat different genre for me, as most of what I do
is preplanned, set up and repeated many times.

Obviously in these images you get one chance and whatever you plan you have
to be right. Once again the Nikon's feel natural to me so it wasn't a leap
going to this new camera or even trusting my instincts.

One thing I learned from Osaka and also the Prefontaine classic is to stay
away from the crowd. It's always a lure when you see 200 photographers
running for the same position, but it's important to block that out and go
where you think is the right place.

In Osaka it was difficult because so many of the areas were blocked off,
even with our credentials so I had to be "creative" in how I found and held
my positions.

James

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But in truth, he didn't give us much of any hint of his post processing--and I can understand why. It is a bit of a signature look for him with these sports figures. However, there are a number of people getting sort of similar looks being used for rock groups' covers, etc. There's been a lot of 'how did they do this' on the dpreview retouch forum over the last 2 years or so. Dave Hill comes to mind because there have been several that were interested in his techniques recently. http://www.davehillphoto.com/
Look down on the bottom row, 8 and 9 in gallery one--and most all his shots show a relatively 'metallic' feel to the people. Some refer to it as sort of an 'illustrator' look. He also has a behind the scenes video and states that most comes from lighting--but certainly not all. And--a good PS person can alter the effect lighting has without too much problem.

Mix this look with sepia tones or split tones and you are coming closer also http://smalldogimageworks.com/port_11.html

I think part of his process may have been in split toning too---just a very good post processor to get the looks he wants.

Diane

Yup,

You're right Diane, this is getting around! I like the Dave Hill website and note in his blog that he just bought an entrie Bronica SQi Film camera with tons of lenses and a Polaroid back for just $900! Wow! Also he's fallen in love with an M6 Leica.

Glad to see an accomplished digital guy go back to film, alongside his digital camera!

I might experiment with this look. One has to identify with an output to really use it. If it sells, then maybe offer a version I like it for commerical shots!

Asher