C&C: Mask

[tellanand]

I took this picture again in Besant Beach Chennai - A mask vendor!

Would appreciate your comments.

URL: http://picasaweb.google.com/tellanand.list/CommentsAndCriticism/photo#5163063467949567474

best regards
- Anand

[Flo]

He is very dark in the face....I like the colors in the masks though.maybe just give it a little light and contrast...and slight straighten in the horizon.

[Robert_Lay]

You have a scene here that is beyond the camera's ability to capture using normal methods. The dynamic range is just too great. If you shot RAW you could try generating 2 or 3 separate images from your RAW file and use those to do HDR processing. I have never gotten very satisfactory results from that method but many others have.

You could try post processing using a gradient filter to attenuate the light in the upper half of the picture and raise the level of light in the lower half of the picture.

If you get a chance to shoot this again, I would recommend shooting when the sun is at a lower angle. Here, it looks like High Noon, which is bad for this scene.

[tellanand]

Flo:
Thanks very much for your comments. I agree that the face is too dark - I tried to lighten it a bit, but the colors of the masks lost contrast. I'm a newbie for photography. Can you please explain what "straighten in the horizon" mean?

Robert:
What is dynamic range? Why is it beyond the Canon XTi's ability? I did not shoot it raw - I used JPEG. Is it always a good idea to shoot in RAW mode? I thought it was easier to shoot JPEG.

I shot that picture just after sunset (not noon) - but your point about bad lighting is well taken - actually I wanted to use fill-in-flash, but I was worried that it'll spoil the mask colors. Do you think using flash would have helped?

thanks
- Anand

[Robert_Lay]

Flo:
Thanks very much for your comments. I agree that the face is too dark - I tried to lighten it a bit, but the colors of the masks lost contrast. I'm a newbie for photography. Can you please explain what "straighten in the horizon" mean?

Robert:
What is dynamic range? Why is it beyond the Canon XTi's ability? I did not shoot it raw - I used JPEG. Is it always a good idea to shoot in RAW mode? I thought it was easier to shoot JPEG.

I shot that picture just after sunset (not noon) - but your point about bad lighting is well taken - actually I wanted to use fill-in-flash, but I was worried that it'll spoil the mask colors. Do you think using flash would have helped?

thanks
- Anand
Dynamic Range is the difference in brightness from the deepest shadow to the brightest highlight. Many scenes can be and are beyond the capability of most digital cameras. This is a design choice in designig and fabricating the sensors. Most cameras from Nikon and Canon have similar limitations. There are techniques used by Fuji and Sony to give their cameras greater dynamic range.

I would rather not guess about the flash - I still cannot tell from which direction the sunlight was coming. If it had truly set, then the light should have been very diffuse, and the use of a gradient filter in post processing would have helped, just as a gradient filter would have helped at the time the picture was taken. Shooting RAW is contentious - many do not like to go through the extra trouble of processing the RAW files. If you are a moderate picture taker, then I would certainly say that there are plenty of reasons for shooting RAW.

I tried using PSCS3 "Shadow/Highlight..." tool. I feel that it was quite effective in lightening the subject's skin tones without affecting the highlight elements of the scene. That's an amazingly effective tool!

[Preben S]

Have you calibrated your monitor? It looks for me like your monitor gamma is too low. Try to calibrate to gamma 2.2 with Adobe Gamma Loader (You can find it in control panel). If you have other calibration software/hardware check if it is used properly.

Also try to adjust the image with "Levels" (ctrl+L or from layer palette), by dragging the middle slider to the left so the inverse gamma reading shows around 2.0.

[tellanand]

Preben S:

Thanks for the tip. I did calibrate my monitor now and I hope I'll be able to have better picture reproduction on my Monitor.

Thanks a ton!

- Anand

[tdodd]

In the original photo, as posted on Picasaweb, the histogram is perfectly positioned right to the edges with no blocked shadows or blown highlights. I have attached a screen print from Lightroom to show this.

I then took 5 seconds to add some fill light, to brighten the man's face, and increased the blacks to keep the blacks in the masks looking dark. I then took another 10 seconds to straighten the sea level on the horizon, although really I don't think this was much of an issue. I've posted the reworked example and histogram too. I'm sure fine tuning, especially using curves rather than simple sliders, could improve the final result but this is a quick and crude example.

[tdodd]

And here's another 5 second edit just to boost Vibrance and make those masks shine more. Then a final sharpening for resizing to 50% to post here. I'm afraid the quality is very poor as I had to use 30% quality in Lightroom to fit within the attachment allowance.

[tellanand]

Thanks Tdodd.

I've reposted the picture with my newly learnt skills in PS.

http://picasaweb.google.com/tellanand.list/CommentsAndCriticism/photo#5163893332940566082

best regards
- Anand

[tdodd]

I'm afraid it doesn't work for me. You've lightened the man's face but also lost a lot of colour so he looks a bit grey. Also I have no idea what's going on with that ethereal glow from his T-shirt. As you can't see what he is sitting on he looks like a floating ghostly apparition just hovering in the picture. If that's the look you wanted then you've succeeded :) If you wanted to simply enhance the natural look of the original then you've got a bit carried away, IMHO.

[tellanand]

Hmmm.. Tdodd - I relooked at my photo after reading your comments and I don't like it either. Its screwed up.

I've posted the original picture as I shot it (no edits) on Picasa (with EXIF information):

http://picasaweb.google.com/tellanand.list/CommentsAndCriticism/photo#5164197648553356914

Please let me know your thoughts!

- Anand

[tdodd]

OK, just a short commentary this time (see my comments about the beach for the fuller explanations).

The picture looks underexposed and the histogram (attached) bears this out. I don't see anything in the picture to cause the problem so I'm a bit puzzled. I see you're using partial metering, which is fine for this scene, but perhaps an unusual choice for a newbie. Normally, evaluative/pattern metering is the safe default. Once again, if you'd checked the histogram when you took the shot you would have seen the underexposure.

NEVER JUDGE YOUR EXPOSURE ACCURACY FROM THE PREVIEW PICTURE ON THE BACK OF THE CAMERA. It can be used to judge composition, and to a lesser degree, focus, but never exposure.

Again you're using these slow shutter speeds - 1/25 and your ISO is at 100. Why? You got lucky this time but camera shake or subject movement is a real risk at these shutter speeds. Considering the underexposure you already have in the picture I would say that 400 ISO and 1/50 would have given you a better result at the f/stop you used.

Now that I have my hands on the original, here's my attempt at a fix up (attached). I'm afraid it doesn't look too great because I had to use 40% quality on export in order to fit the 150KB limit for attachments.