Help with Processing the Picture

Hi guys,

I'm new to photography and love getting to grips with taking differents styles of picture, my main issue is sometimes the correct settings to use on the camera when shooting, the more I take the better I'm getting. My next issue is to look at the processing of a picture in Photoshop.

Can someone give me ideas and some tips of how I can improve this shot both on camera and in Photoshop?

I have Photoshop CS5 and a Canon EOS 550D

Thanks,
Jez

Did you take in raw or jpeg,if you have taken in raw then elements will do the overexposure for you.
if its in jpeg then I'm not very good in elements with jpeg.but someone will be along shortly to help out with that.

Thanks, I've been taking some shots in RAW but this particular shot is JPEG.

I use picasa or windows photo viewer to do quick fixes on jpeg.
try take raw and jpeg that way when one like this comes up you can use elements or other to do easy fixes.I assume you just want to get the exposure back.

Yes please, bring a bit of life back to it, I was trying some Motion Blur shots

First off, welcome to the forum! and be sure to turn on your "image editing ok" under your options so others can freely edit the image.

I'm rather bored at work so all I can use is Paint.NET unfortunately.

All I did really was adjust the curves to lower the darks and mid tones as your highlights look a little blown out at parts.

To improve the picture in camera, try to lower the exposure a little as its very washed out and bright. I am guessing you were hand holding it as well as its not really sharp, putting the camera on a tripod or resting it on a railing on the bridge or whatever there might be always helps to steady the camera.

The picture conveys a good sense of motion but the crop just seems a little too tight for it and imo looks a little off as the train disappears to the right along the tracks in the tunnel where as the picture has a lot of empty space to the left.

Good start though!

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Wow, thanks for the quick replies

Ok yes, making it a little more life like and not a washout. I'm still trying to understand all this different ways and things in Photoshop

I had the camera on TV setting with the shutter at around 1/5, would it have been better to shoot in Manual to be able to select a different exposure? It was hand held, I thought about that afterwards that maybe it would haven been better resting on the bridge, but I was unsure about when the train passed under that it would have affected the shot because of the sligh bridge movement. Would also shooting this sort of shot in RAW been better, like butugly had mentioned in an earlier thread?

Thanks I shot the idea I was looking for and with it being just down the road I can try again. The crop isnt the best I had to get it down from about 7mb to be able to send. Would a better crop be to make sure the train is in the middle?

Magic3rds wrote in post #12085844
Wow, thanks for the quick replies

Ok yes, making it a little more life like and not a washout. I'm still trying to understand all this different ways and things in Photoshop

I had the camera on TV setting with the shutter at around 1/5, would it have been better to shoot in Manual to be able to select a different exposure?

One thing I always try to do, especially in manual is to take a test shot before hand. Especially if a train is coming since its not a static object so once it passes you its gone and your waiting again awhile before the next one Its not film so click away. To get a starting point you can always meter the scene in TV for 1/5 SS and see what kind of aperture it spits out. Remember that number and when you go into manual, put that in for your aperture and take a test shot, see what the exposure is like and then you can wait till the train comes and unless the sun goes behind a cloud it should still be the same. This allows you to keep the same exposure instead of having it on TV and just as the train is passing the camera might meter off something dark/light and suddenly change the setting.

That is a good point you make about the rumbling, didn't think about that until you mentioned it. You are correct in that the railing or ground will most likely rumble as the train zips by

I generally always shoot RAW as it allows a lot more control and correction of your image after its been taken. In this case shooting in RAW would allow you do bring a bit more detail out of the highlights before they were blown out. It is a personal choice as lots of people don't enjoy the extra processing time.

I think you did the best with what you could, I personally would increased the field of view so you can see more and have the train "pass" under you in the tunnel more. Hard to explain. But if your on a bridge and the lens you use is at its lowest focal length then there isn't much you can do about it. Since the tracks under you and in the tunnel are all a bending to the right and running off frame essentially there is not much you can do to improve it in that sense. Ideally in this shot the tracks should be bending to the left slowly instead of the right so the train is more framed and 'disappearing' instead of leaving to the right in my opinion. But in the real world we rarely get the 'perfect' setup.

People have mentioned various apps such as Elements and other editors to do basic stuff, but you said in your OP that you have CS5. I'd advise you to spend some real time learning CS5. Since you are getting into Raw shooting, check out the book Real World Camera Raw. Camera Raw in CS5 can be used with both Raw, jpegs, and tiffs, and has powerful features.

And, to go beyond that there is quite a learning curve for the Photoshop editor, but there is so much that can be done -- check out the site Lynda.com for a very highly recommended resource for tutorials on Photoshop -- they are a pay subscription but check out their free trial to see what they offer.

Glad to have you here, enjoy your photography!

In Photoshop, I opened a hue/sat adjustment layer, changed the blend mode to multiply, and reduced saturation a little in the yellows.

Her's a quick and dirty edit


IMO, you should shoot RAW 100%. You have CS5 and it comes with ACR. These two are the best editing software available, IMO.
Learn how to use Photoshop and start off editing your RAW images in ACR. ACR = Adobe Camera Raw.

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All the posts are a great help thanks

I have a better understanding how I can make this shot better. I've been googling and found some tutorial videos and both my shots and post processing can improve

At least with digital it doesn't matter how many shots it takes to get that one which is spot on