High Key Images And Snow and Ice In Particular

Mike wrote:

I really enjoy your high key B+W images, but have had no luck at creating my own. Would you be willing to share your technique or direct me to other resources where I can learn how??

I do have some techniques to increase the chance of good high key images, which often involve pictures of ice and snow.

Here's the steps I take:

1) Use the highlight control to increase detail in the white and light areas by moving it to the left in Lightroom or Camera Raw

 without the highlight slider moved to the left.

and with the highlight slider moved left, and the shadows slider moved a little right.

The next step is to do normal editing on the image, adjusting tones as needed. In this particular case, there isn't anything I want to do to the image before applying Akvis Enhancer that opens shadows and increases separation in the highlights. The Clarity slider dose the same thing though more to midtones than either highlights or shadows, so most often if I think I'm going to need Akvis Enhancer, I will not use any clarity at all.

and here we have Enhancer applied then toned down to 72% of effect - just because I usually find the full effect a bit too much, and with any further editing the risk is to look cartoonish.

The next step is to make sure that the image pushes the boundaries of white. I do this by adding a threshold layer, set to 250. What this does is to turn to black all pixels darker than 250 on the 0-255 scale, while leaving the rest as is.

In order to see the underlying image - and know where to work - I then turn down the opacity of this threshold layer so the image is peeking through, and we have:

 there are literally only a few pixels out of the entire image that even approach pure white - definitely going to produce a muddy image when printed, even though because of the brightness, it looks fine on screen.

The next step is to add a layer under the Threshold Layer, a Curves Adjustment Layer, in which I move the top right point in the curve to the left (ie.  producing a steeper straight line). This has the effect of driving light pixels closer to white, and I don't mind going a bit past that point because I'll mask this layer after. How far to the left? To taste, experience, and not driving most of the ice over the top. Say, about this much:

The next step is to add a white mask to this Curves Adjustment Layer so I can reduce the intensity of the layer as and where I want. I then paint into the white mask with black, opacity somewhere between 10-30% opacity on the 'black paint'. To know how to do this, I use a combination of with the Threshold layer and without, so I can see how effectively I control those over the top whites (with the Threshold layer visible) and how realistic the tonalities are (with the Threshold Layer invisible (uncheck the box to the left of the layer).

And we have the above after turning off the threshold. Now we have the brightness we want, though the detail and tonality of the ice is a little lacking. I now use a Curves Adjustment layer, a sagging curve with the biggest change in the highlights to increase the contrast in the highlights further. I did this locally first, then decided I hadn't done enough and created a second sagging curve of the same shape, but applied globally and then used the opacity slider for the layer to adjust to taste and we have:

You might be tempted to think that all we've done is to go back to the step before I added the threshold layer, but not quite - there is a lot more detail and texture in the ice now - but I do agree, it's back to being too dark.

So, one more step. I flatten the image and duplicate it in a second image layer (you drag the image from the image layer down to the second icon from the right (the create new layer icon) and voila, two image layers - one I can mess with all I want, because I've a virgin copy underneeth.

So, what am I going to do with this extra image layer - I'm going to use the dodge highlights tool (Dodge tool, with Highlights selected in the submenu above the image window, and set to 5% opacity). With this, I'm going to bring back the glow to the highlights, and yes, I'm going to use that threshold layer again (I have it as an action - threshold at 250, opacity on the layer to 85%).

Again I'm turning on the Threshold layer to make sure I didn't drive large areas to pure white, while turning it off to check for overall tonality. Once you have a few small areas that barely get to 250, it's pretty easy to adjust the rest of the image to match.

At this point, it's worth taking a break and coming back the next day, as it's easy to carry this too far. Notice I did a bit of dodge highlights on the rock and it looks as if a little stray sunlight made it in, the rocks are now significantly more three dimensional. Think of dodge highlights as liquid sunshine, to be applied to taste. The dodging brush is applied quite uneavenly.

this rather bizarre image is the result of the dodging highlights, then applying difference blend mode to the dodged layer relative to the virgin layer below, and the result lightened a bit so you could see it better. This is just to show you the parts of the image that were dodged - black indicates no dodging was done. Note the different intensities of dodging, and also where I dodged, following the flow or edges or highlights of the ice, while leaving the recessed parts of the ice alone - further enhancing the three dimensional effect. Again you can see the rather intense amount of dodging done to the background rock to get the sunlight effect. Sometimes dodging the rock can result in splotchy lighter areas so I now tone that back (by masking out the dodged layer in those splotchy areas, and I have the final result for tonight. I took about an hour to make all these adjustments as well as write the article as well as save the various generations. Normally I'd spend twice that long just doing the editing - but as you can see, even rushed and a bit carelessly, the result is still effective.

As usual, don't forget to click on the blog images to see them larger so you can get a better idea of texture.  This technique can be taken way too far, and I have learned over time not to get too carried away (most of the time) and still sometimes have to start over.

So Mike, are you sorry you asked? What do people think - too far, over the top, or worth while?

Seebe Dam

Eric suggested an excursion, and he, Erna, Ken and I headed out to the Seebe dam, or to be more accurate, to below the dam. I'd not been there despite driving past it many times. It was extremely windy and tripods blew over and I did most of the day hand holding my Nex-7 and whatever lens. In this case, the 55-210, f11, and a 5 image stitch.

Not All Images Have To Shout

Daffodils

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Shot with the 200 micro nikor, largely backlit in my kitchen.

Buttercup Redux

This and the previous image have one thing in common, both have minus clarity in Adobe Camera Raw. Mind you, the amount is small, the effect subtle, but also important to the image. What's the feeling about using this in this way and in this amount - cheating? Tacky? Fine?

Is it as legitimate to turn clarity to a minus as it is to ramp it up and what does this say about increasing clarity - is that just as inappropriate or perfectly ok? What if the degree of minus clarity was taken to an obvious degree - what then?

And Now For Something Completely Different

Oven Door

 

Above is the first version - actually closer to the true colour of our very dirty oven door, but various edits later and a decision that the image was too warm and I have the result below. To produce the second result, I took the edited version of the above and saved as a TIFF, then brought it into Camera Raw and adjusted the colour temperature to cool it off a bit.  I suspect that ideal will be somewhere between and it's clearly a work in progress. The journey has not finished.

and the last is a reshoot later in the day with less light from the front of the glass.

 

Another Celestial Image

I can't decide if this looks more like outer space through the Hubble or someone's ultrasound test result.  Either way, I like it.

Sony Nex 55-210 Lens

It's only been one day, and most of the images were shot yesterday in shade so the auto ISO was 1000+ for most of the images, but a few were in partial sun, ISO 250, f 11 and I have just made a 16X24 print that looks excellent. I can read print that is 1/32 inch tall on the print - albeit with my magnifying glasses because I can't see that close without. Not bad for a $350 lens on a small camera, hand held. It's everything I need an  a walk around lens. I did debate getting the 18-200 which is reportedly about the same quality - but light weight and the fact that I have the 18-70 already covered, and saving 2/3 of the price won over. So, my three lens, light weight kit consists of the 10-18, 17-60, and 55-210 lenses, 15-315 mm. in 35 mm. terms.

I'll get round to doing some more formal testing on the lens (ie. wide open and iso 100, but all I needed to know was if it would serve adequately, and it's done more than that.

Remember to click on the image to see it at 100%

Wandering Around Downtown

I purchased the 55-210 lens for my Nex and spent the next two hours wandering aaround downtown.

Smugmug

Several years ago I left smugmug. The interface was not attractive, you couldn't use the keyboard to go through images, and integrating other parts of my website were less than easy to downright difficultt.

Enter 2014 and the New Smugmug resolves at least some of those problems, and makes uploading and moving images infinitely easier than the commercial website I currently use.

So, if you want to see all of my images (at least the colour ones so far), go to Smugmug

Whether I'll switch over the entire website remains to be seen - some stuff (like pdf files) has to remain on my current server and most of the links aren't yet functional from smugmug.

You can't order prints as at the moment none of the full size files is uploaded, but I'm considering doing that as a separate section of the smugmug site. That being the case I'm going to test several prints ordered from smugmug to check on quality before  I let anyone order directly from them.

Ebook Progress

After a lot of hours spent watching InDesign how to videos, and struggling to get an epub to look right on the computer monitor I actually made a lot of progress only to find that what adobe showed as the output didn't look anything like what appeared on my ipads, either the old one or the retina screen version. Seems that epubs are really for text type books, not image intensive publications.

Someone sugg. checking with David DuChemin and Craft and Vision ebooks. Turns out they are all pdf's. I checked with a few other sources - pdf's - beginning to tell me something here.

So, I'm not abandoning my intentions to produce an ebook, but I will be doing it in PDF format. Downside is that you need a different version for each screen, but that wasn't all that diff. from epub anyway so not much of a loss, and I can show images properly on screen.


I have the latest edit back from Blurb for my 12X12 book - actually very nice, but at $137 it's incredibly expensive. I'm going to explore more reasonable options.

Anyway, look for a pdf format ebook suitable for the ipad in the not distant future.

Why Do We Fuss About Selling Our Images?

The obvious answer to the above question is  that a) we need the money, or b) we need it to buy more photographic gear, perhaps gear our spouses wouldn't approve of otherwise.

Perhaps the more important reason is that is that someone paying for our work is a very clear message - our work is worth while (well, unless it's mum).

So, if the hassles of setting up e-commerce or accepting credit card payments and dealing with unhappy customers and failed transactions seems a lot of bother (it is), then maybe it's time to think of giving your work away.

Think about it.

What if you placed your work into a pdf, large enough images to really enjoy on a typical modern monitor, say something around 1200 pixels wide, 900 high, and either use your own website servers or a service to maintain this pdf file.

You then let everyone know that your work (perhaps a sig. but not complete part of your work) is now available, for free, to download.  You set it up so people do have to give you their email address, and make it plain what you will and won't do with that address.

You now have a way to track downloads and thus interest in your work, which was after all what you really were looking for when you thought to charge for it. True, people could share the downloaded pdf file, and you can't track that but that's ok - no saying where the exposure might lead.

Now, to be blunt, I haven't tried this, but it's something I'm thinking of.

I did think of an ebook but it occurred to me that a book of pictures wouldn't offer anything that a website wouldn't so expecting people to pay for it seems rather silly. No, for people to find a book worth paying for they'd reasonably expect more, and that's a topic for another day.

In the mean time, I'm interested in your thoughts about this idea, pros and cons.

Just To Get Out

No idea for a project but desperate to go out photographing none the less, I headed over to Ogden. I found a lovely rusty door - but though the colours were great, the overall form just didn't quite work. Likewise a rusting steel structure. I found some huge long dump trucks, with their beds raised, and their insides all rusty - but the light wasn't right and I was doubtful about the image anyway - not worth waiting for a cloud to pass.

I drove past ADM flour mill, that I have photographed many times, and there were thousands of ducks and geese feeding on spilled grain. I needed a background that wasn't distracting and the silos served. I tried stirring the ducks to fly but depth of field became a problem and so this one image with the ducks all near the silos worked best.

I might try this again though, a single duck flying against the background might just work.

My Best Images Of 2013

 

The above four images are from a new project, photographing storefronts and street scenes. Not sure where it will go. So far its been shot with my Nikon 800E, Sony Nex-7 and Panasonic GH2. No saying what's next.

 

 

And the above three from my ongoing abstract series.

Two from my garden, one from the back alley, and the last from a flower arrangement.

and I need to show that I still take black and white seriously.

and a few other images from the year. Don't forget that as usual, you can click on the image to see it larger.

What Is It About Me And Propellers?

Also from Granville Island. Nex-7, Zeiss 16-70, tripod and base ISO.

Colour from Granville Island

 

 

 

 

These were shot with the Nex-7 Sunday morning before flying home.

Vancouver

Two pictures from last weekend's trip to Vancouver. The first is on Granvill Island and shot with my Panasonic GH2 , the second with my Nex-7 on UBC campus. I was on a shoot with my daughter who's deciding what camera she would like to work with.

Thoughts On Camera Systems

Just back from Vancouver and while there I did my first serious shooting with the Nex-7 and came away with some definite likes and dislikes.

I'm delighted with the Zeiss 16-70 - yes, I'd prefer a 10X zoom but not if it meant compromising quality. I have no need for a faster lens (f4) even if I can imagine situations in which shallow depth of field would be handy.

Two things did frustrate me about the camera - firstly that because it has a tilting LCD but not swinging, it simply doesn't work when the camera is vertical - do camera designers not realize we shoot vertical pictures?

The second issue is that like my Nikon D800E, the Sony does live view (the only mode it has) with the lens stopped down - fine for previewing depth of field, hopeless for trying to accurately focus.

CORRECTION: this incorrect. If you turn off preview exposure, you also start using wide open aperture for focusing. Why the two should be linked is a bit odd, and it isn't clearly documented that this is what happens, but it does - so I lose exposure preview in return for proper focusing.

Now normally on the D800E I shoot in manual mode, which means that to open up the lens I also have to adjust the shutter speed to correct for too bright a screen when focusing - at least with the Sony, I only had to adjust one knob to focus and adjust it back to expose - that's handy enough I might just start using the Nikon on Aperture priority. It would be so much nicer though if there were  a simple button that I could press once to focus and either let go to return to the exposing aperture or press once to focus, and again to return.

On returning home last night I checked my GH2 and noted that it works like the Canon, working at maximum aperture till actually taking the picture.

I don't know if there is any way to set up the Nex-7 to do things differently. Could this also be an issue for the A7 and A7R?  SEE ABOVE CORRECTION.

I really wish the Nex-7 had a more painless way to turn on and off image stabilization and manual focus rather than dipping into menus and hoping you remember which main category has those. I think I might be able to set the menu to manual focus and override with the switch/button on the back to temporarily auto focus, but you can't do it the other way - once in auto focus, you can't go manual.

I much prefer having the is/no is on the body or on the lens.

Image quality from the Nex is excellent and I'd be loathe to give up such a small kit. At the moment I have the 10-18, the Zeiss 16-70 and the Sigma 60 but I think I'll replace that with the 55-210 for the occasional longer shot. This would give me a very flexible kit in a very lightweight small package, ideal for flying with - I worry that one of these days they are going to try wedging my Nikon backpack into their little frame and it won't come out and I won't be able to fly with it - airlines are definitely getting tougher.

Will I switch from the Nex because of my frustrations - almost certainly not. I could switch to a 24 MP DSLR like a Canon 70D or 7D2, but I'd take a hit on size and that was the whole point of this kit.