Whitstable

[greenwoo]

first things first.....was this the one Mike? if so you're right it was a tad 'off'.....in truth very late last night when i was playing with the final ones - thats my excuse.

Tony. I'm trying to learn a bit about the whole caboddle - taking them and what might be done in 'post' to get as much detail out or rather as much detail as wanted to hopefully catch the eye.
So when i started i was just shooting jpg, so the camera did the 'inhouse' processing, for the past 6-7mths have been taking both jpg and RAW, as all the boffins on the tutorials kept talking about why would you let the camera just use defaults and effectively compressing the data.

So mine are RAW and then post is done in Lightroom. I'd say on average that takes about 2 mins, not scientific - typically checking the white balance looks about right, then highlights/shadows/blacks/whites - often adding bit of contrast and a slight vignette.
There's a bunch of presets but i don't use them/like them.
For the 'mono's, i then drop them into a program from 'NIK Software', its a freebie and in truth could do the whole thing in that but i like lightroom and now understand the interface. Their presents i often do like as a starting point and then just tweak the brightness, add a bit of 'structure' and a different vignette.

that step takes another 3-5 mins.

I'm still trying to learn more from various tutorial blokes that i follow on utube about how to do effective dodging/burning to draw the eye more.

I think the camera showed that i'd taken about 280 shots yesterday, but that's 140 as the count is for RAW and the same as a JPG. From that i have 28 in my 'keep' folder, again some doubled up mono/colour. so I suppose that the total edit time as somewhere around 2 hrs.....i deleted all the jpg's before starting so i have nothing to compare my edit against.....for sure the RAW's are flat compared to the jpg.i'd guess that the colour ones wouldn't be far off because as i mentioned havent really mastered/practiced the dodge/burn, so the colour ones i edit are basic edits, maybe the camera would be close to my end results.
But for whatever reason i'm drawn to mono, and there's no way an out of the camera shot would be like those; Even if i used the fancy 'scene' settings which give various effects.

Is it cheating, is it worthwhile?
Personally i don't think it is. It's a bit like having 10 paints, use them as they are or blend a little to get the colour/result that i want. Similarly, i enjoy aspects of processing, i wouldnt want to do 150, but i discount a few for focus, a few for just not working and end up with a manageable amount. Doing the work after gives me something that i like, and is gradually teaching me about what doesn't work (why), what might work and how some average shots can be rescued.For the subjects that we've been doing i use Ikea as a yardstick- back in the day we had various pic's that we'd bought from there for lesser used rooms....if what i've ended up with in the 'post' folder woulnd't work as a wall shot i generally bin them.

oh you wanted the short answer....Lightroom & Nik software.

[b33fy]

Yep, that’s the one, spot on now, a great harbour shot.

Tony thanks for the compliment, appreciated. Since getting out more with my camera, I’ve been concentrating on improving my compositions and have found I crop my shots less severely than previously. I also spend a bit of time balancing the exposure between the sky and subject. Cameras struggle with bright sky’s,.. shots end up either with washed out sky’s or underexposed subjects. I use bracketing most of the time on the camera to give me a choice of normal, over or underexposed shots.Its easier to pull the detail out of an underexposed shot post processing.

I use a tripod a fair bit, helps with composition and also when bracketing (taking multiple identical shots at different exposures.) Which I sometimes “stack up” when post processing.

Camera is mostly set on aperture priority as I play with the depth of field. White balance etc all on auto, otherwise too many things to think about. As Mark I shoot in RAW and JPEG format.

Post processing, not very technical for me compared with Marks approach, done 99% of the time using the JPEG shots. I use the default basic windows photo viewing/editing for all images initially, to pick out the potential good ones. at this point I might rotate and crop very lightly if required and then save in a folder.

I try and produce a mix of images to suite most tastes, some more “normal” than others, though essentially I use the following software.

I use a stand alone program called Luminence a fair bit. Which “HDR’s” the image by evening out the contrast and pulling out the detail. There’s a load of presets which I work through, within each one adjustments can be made.

I’ve also started using a stand alone selective colour program called Tintii. I also use the photo editing built into Flickr, there’s a couple of preset’s I quite like. Occasionally I’ll use the presets on the photo editing software on the iPad.

Adobe, lightroom, etc all seem rather complicated to me, as does working with raw files.. I have dabbled with RAW and should get into it a bit more but it all takes time.. Hence my approach dabbling with a number of simple programs

Mark is much more technical than me, his approach is more oils and pastels, mine is marker pens and crayons. Ethos is the same, more art than a true visual representation of the real world. Benchmark is the same.. would I hang it on a wall, probably a toilet wall I hate chinz and too many family photo’s, if they were of that ilk I wouldn’t bother. I framed a few the other day, varying postcard size, to put up more as art than anything else. Luckily Mark and I have some commonality in subject matter, water, marine life, seaside, boats etc, for different reasons which helps.

Apologies for the long winded answer Tony, not an easy question to answer in a nutshell, not sure why though I guess it’s because it’s so technical nowdays with complex cameras and a myriad of on and post camera processing choices plus each of our individual approaches. If I get a chance I’ll post up an example of processing though the stages I use.

[David T]

Some great images there guys. Good effort.

[b33fy]

Some great images there guys. Good effort.

Thanks David, appreciated.

An example below of some typical processing stages I use. Not a great shot tbh, just picked it to show what I tend to do with them.

Original shot straight from the camera, a slightly underexposed shot to give the sky a little more detail


Cropped slightly to 16:9 format, mindful of the rule of thirds, using photos in windows 10


Droped into luminence and processed using a preset, pregamma turned down a bit to bring out some colour and detail, you can see more detail in the breakwater compared with the previous image


Dropped into Tintii, some blues picked out.


Back into photo, light, colour and clarity adjusted, job done.

[Tony C]

Thanks guys my camera has the RAW option, must see how I get on with that, to be fair to the editing function on the camera often makes a good job of correcting my shortfalls as a photographer, but the ability to do a bit more sounds good. Looks like I need to play catch up a bit

[Jay]

Glad you posted that Mike. I was also wondering what the difference between the raw picture and the edited version. Think my fav is the red boat with the guys working on it. Glad you both got some use from your cars too

[greenwoo]

@ Tony - not sure that this is the best analogy, but you'll get the point.
A recording studio has either a preprogrammed set of algorithms that to produce say a rock track, everything is set to work within various parameters and the end result is very listenable. OR they turn the machine off, and a bloke works with the full spectrum of the instruments to define the individual components as he wants. Maybe the drums are too soft, need lifting, the vocal is too bright and needs bringing down in places. RAW gives you more control to recover/access the full spectrum, otherwise it would be like giving that sound engineer a CD that's already been formatted and asking him to work with what he's got.

As Mike has said before, we'd welcome additional company, i know we didnt post this one up as we made last minute arrangements - but anyone is welcome to come along, we're picking up tips from each other and its interesting to see whether we find unique shots, or compare those that are are similar. We took the kits for the fist time in ages and that added to the fun....but there's no requisite for that.

[b33fy]

@Tony, not much catching up needed Tony, you've a great eye for a photo. As Mark says RAW files are the way to go, I just haven't really spent much time with the right software to use them.

Glad you posted that Mike. I was also wondering what the difference between the raw picture and the edited version. Think my fav is the red boat with the guys working on it. Glad you both got some use from your cars too

Thanks Jay, "people" and street photography type shots are my favourite, though hardest to take, invasion of privacy, paedo issues, and people generally not very forthcoming. Mark has all the luck with them (bad luck lol) bloke tried to charge him a tenner for taking a photo of his olives.. lol

Hoping to get a few more people shots with a trip up town and a spin round the markets.. probably more acceptable there due to tourists etc.. An old mate of mine used to be heavily into street photography in London, mixed it with the various demonstrations going on and got some superb shots.

As Mark said we would always welcome more along, it is very weather dependent and a bit last minute for various reasons. We do take our time, with around 2 hours or so at a spot, then a bit of nosebag at some point. Plenty of banter and a quite a few lol moments and we don't take ourselves too seriously, just a bit of fun, hopefully with a nice result and a sense of satisfaction at the end of the day.

[Tony C]

@ Tony - not sure that this is the best analogy, but you'll get the point.
A recording studio has either a preprogrammed set of algorithms that to produce say a rock track, everything is set to work within various parameters and the end result is very listenable. OR they turn the machine off, and a bloke works with the full spectrum of the instruments to define the individual components as he wants. Maybe the drums are too soft, need lifting, the vocal is too bright and needs bringing down in places. RAW gives you more control to recover/access the full spectrum, otherwise it would be like giving that sound engineer a CD that's already been formatted and asking him to work with what he's got.

As Mike has said before, we'd welcome additional company, i know we didnt post this one up as we made last minute arrangements - but anyone is welcome to come along, we're picking up tips from each other and its interesting to see whether we find unique shots, or compare those that are are similar. We took the kits for the fist time in ages and that added to the fun....but there's no requisite for that.

Cheers Mark, would like to take you up on that, there seem to be some good photo opportunities over your way, but there must be some mid-way between us?

[Crunchie Gears]

Really liked the photos guys

You really caught the flavour of Whitstable and it brought back memories as I lived there for a number of years.