how can i get colours and richnes like this?

[darb]

http://www.christianfletcher.com.au/pag ... ephot.html

christian is IMHO an extremely talented photographer, and his books here in WA are fantastic

How would be getting such rich and vibrant coloursw? no matter what i try in post processing i can never get my own images this dynamic and rich.

[jethro]

very very good site polariser plus lots of PS work will acheive this fantastic work. great link darb

[darb]

im pretty sure he's all film and doesnt PP digitall ... thats what ive heard anyway, but not 100%

check these galleries out man!


http://www.christianfletcher.com.au/pag ... hotos.html


http://www.christianfletcher.com.au/pag ... hotos.html

[mudder]

Wow, just checking out the links, thanks... The color in these is stunning...

[darb]

yeah im intrigued how its done.

i dont see how a strong polarizer will assist under cloudy conditioons ... and no amount of PP or colour boosting to a d70 image could match this guy ... or at least i hope to be proved wrong !

[kipper]

Hahah....no PP, if he doesn't PP then Im the King of England.

[darb]

a fair bit of his work is a decade old and more

are you suggesting that this quality of landscape photo was not possible before our recent digital era?

either way, my question is how this can be done on digital equipment. Im yet to see or hear anyone getting close.

[kipper]

Well I said PP, whether it be with Photoshop or in the darkroom. My experience in a darkroom is only limited to BW and then it's very amateur.

Are you telling me that a lot of his shots are pre < 1990/95?

[darb]

i believe early 90's onwards mate ... ive just sent an email to politely ask what his equipment and techniques are. he may well decline. Other west aussies ive spoken to about his work have reported that he uses film, panorama formats, medium formats and other whacky things ... but i dont know how credible it was.

Yeah when i said PP , i meant digitally.

So far though noones been able to give me any advice how to get anywhere near these photos. Couldnt care if its film, or digital, post processed to the ends of the earth in a chemical darkroom or digital darkroom ... i just wanna know HOW !!

Id be particularly interested to hear of it being done digitally as thats where im at, personally.

[kipper]

Meh, why I posted this I don't know. Must refrain from posting after drinking. Sorry darbs.

[darb]

ahh ok do you mean by that comment that these type of images are only possible with digital? or both?

i dont CARE if it is or isnt only possible with one or the other, i just want to know how.

ive yet to get any of my own digital images anywhere near it ... so that makes me think it might be film based (and perhaps then scanned and digitall PP'd, or PP'd in film lab.) ... thats what im trying to find out.

Can you give me some tips on how i may do this digitally?

[AlistairF]

He's probably using a Fuji pano camera with 6cmx17cm negs/trannies.

[KerryPierce]

ahh ok do you mean by that comment that these type of images are only possible with digital? or both?

i dont CARE if it is or isnt only possible with one or the other, i just want to know how.

ive yet to get any of my own digital images anywhere near it ... so that makes me think it might be film based (and perhaps then scanned and digitall PP'd, or PP'd in film lab.) ... thats what im trying to find out.

Can you give me some tips on how i may do this digitally?

FWIW, I don't see any reason why you couldn't do the same with the d70 and post processing. Try changing your color mode to sRGBIIIa and Saturation to High in the camera. When shooting daylight landscapes where you want rich, vivid colors, underexpose by -.3EV. For high dynamic range scenes, bracket your shots to cover the range, so you won't exacerbate the noise, if you want to pull out the shadows and highlights, that is. Once you've got the base image with high color saturation, you can take it where you want in post.

[darb]

yeah im already competent and know most of the limits of my D70 and various photoshopping techniques that i use ... but ive never been able to get near that range of vivid, clean and smooth colour / image.

But, id love it if someone could correct me and show me their best examples of their D70 (or any camera for that matter !) matching those images i referred to.

I generally shoot jpeg, run srgbIIIa, saturation high ... then photoshop i will run my USM mask (a few different ones.) and spend considerable time boosting saturation on chosen channels (or overall if im not too worried.) ... often shoot NEF of course.

in real world i'll use a few different flavours of circular polariser, cokin grad ND's, coloured grad ND's etc ... which can get some fun effects and nice rich photos, just not what christians been able to achieve ... so either im doing something wrong, or im limited by equipment. ... im hoping someone can prove / show its not the latter !

Some of my shots fwiw, http://darb.net/select-photos , http://darb.net/eastbound-2005 , http://darb.net/

[KerryPierce]

I guess that I'm not understanding what you are seeing with the images then. The shots of his that I viewed are well exposed in excellent lighting conditions, but have high saturation, well beyond what was probably in the original scene.

Your shots, OTOH, are very well done, but appear to me to be well within the normal ranges of saturation that still look "normal", ie not heavily oversaturated.

IOW, his shots have the deliberate, artistic, oversaturated look, where yours appear to me to have richness without oversaturation.

Here's some d70 shots of mine that are "artistically" oversaturated.

http://www.pbase.com/kerrypierce/image/40250886

http://www.pbase.com/kerrypierce/image/32046419

http://www.pbase.com/kerrypierce/image/32046421

I'd be interested to know your thoughts on if they come close to meeting your criteria and if not, what is lacking in your view.

[mic]

I know what you mean darb,
You are trying to get to the higher grade in Photography, I am too and it is frustrating seeing these brilliant Images, I see them a lot on Fred Miranda Site and wonder what are they doing that sets the images in that higher plane from mine.

This guy you have highlighted is simply brilliant, I'll be interested to see if he gives you his trade secret.

Please share.

Mic.

[darb]

yeah i think the lighting in his shots was superb to begin wtih so i guess it allows him to push the limits of saturation further.

Thankps for the tips guys, i can push my photos to extremel levels of saturation, but im yet to see results that match it ... i just get overcooked images! ... or i overcook wrong bits etc etc. Those other over saturated samples are great, but not quite the same, to me.

what do yuo think of these images that ive just pushed various channels up on ? I find if i push any further it just blows colour channels out (to a point it looks splotchy.)

[kipper]

http://www.christianfletcher.com.au/pag ... f288p.html

By the looks of the shed he's tinted the sky blue maybe using a grad filter either attached to the lens or in photoshop.

Checked a few more of his beach shots and quite a few of them have blue tints.

[cyanide]

darb - could I ask for some comments on what filters you use? I believe you use the Cokin (P?) GND... are you happy with this setup? What CPL filters do you use/recommend?

I am about to take the plunge on filters and am trying to work out whether or not to go Cokin for the GND... are they a hassle to carry?

Cheers

[darb]

cyanide.

ND wise I use Cokin P series filters. A gray Grad, a tabacco grad, and a full ND ... the grads are all "soft stop" i think ... cant remember actually, but i can look the codes up when i get home if you really want.

The cokin filters are great, and adjustable, which is the absolute must. The downside is its quite bulky, and a bit of setup required each time you use them (you cant just put it back into your camera back with square sharp pieces of glass hanging off the front of your lenses.) but that comes with the territory, and its mostly landscape youre using them for anyawy.

as for CPL, I onyl have one at the moment, its a screwin Hoya Circ Polariser ... nothing special.

With regard to the CPL, i insist on using a screwin CPL, mainly because i use it sooo often, even when not doing "setup shots" ... ie, holidays, or campnig with friends, or whatever, its on there, nice and compact and easy. Lens cap clicks into the CPL , and back in the bag it goes until the next shot presents itself for taking.

does that make sense?

[cyanide]

Thanks for the quick reply.

Yes, that makes perfect sense. I agree the screw-in version CPL seems much more convenient, since there isn't the need for adjustability like with GNDs... and yes, I figure the Cokin are worth the extra setup/carry effort.

Did you order yours online or walk in and purchase? If you have different sized lenses, I guess you need different sized holders to fit, but can you still use the same actual filter glass, if they are in a certain range? (I did look on the website but didn't see this explicitly stated...)

Many thanks

[birddog114]

Cokin filter is only used to shoot with relaxed times, we had few threads and poll on the Cokin and Threaded filter on our forum.

[KerryPierce]

Wish I knew the answer to your question, darb, but I'm barely past novice in photo editing. AFAIK, color manipulation has to be done before contrast, levels and stuff like that are applied. Shooting jpg is probably limiting you in that respect, unless you have everything turned to the lowest settings in camera. At least, that's what the RAW shooters claim to be part of the problem. Otherwise, seems to me that the lighting and perhaps WB is a key part. Do you use custom preset WB when you shoot?

ugh, good thing for editing posts... Forgot to say that your pics look great to me, especially the one with the wing!

[mic]

Surely Darb you shoot in RAW

Mic.

You have a lot more options available to you if you shoot RAW.

[darb]

mic : often not mate, depends where and what im doing. But i think for any "special" shots i'll be sure to shoot RAW more often. I've been lazy

ps, yeah obviously RAW gives more options, but i meant that even RAW i havent beena ble to get near christians' work. A lot of it may be to do with shooting very scenic things I suppose, in awesome light.

[jethro]

hey darb i had a muck around this morning and i believe its possible using hue and saturation combined with selective colour correction

[Killakoala]

Is this what you mean Darb?


or



If so then all you have to do is play with curves in either Photoshop or Capture and you should be able to oversaturate to your hearts content. BUT you willbe best to use NEF to achieve it satisfactorily. I know i am still developing my own techniques but the only way to do this is through trial and error. See what methods work best and play around with PP.

[AlistairF]

Darb,
After shooting in RAW, I've found that you can pump up the color of landscapes by adjusting the tonal range in NC. Try a Tone Comp setting of Normal to High, change the color space to Adobe II or III with enhanced saturation.

This was taken in the middle of the day.



Alistair

[dooda]

Wow, that is one fine pic, and I must say I think that this is exactly what Darb/the rest of us is after. How much does NC cost? I might have to look into this in the near future. Thanks for posting that terrific pic. It is a pano correct?

Edit: I'm just looking closer at your pic and noticing the same speckles in your sky as it goes from dark to light that I was complaining about, although it doesn't look necessarily posterized, it is quite grainy. Does that bother you? I suppose it's just the limitations of digital. It will be fun to see them improve the tonal range. I must say this is what is really lacking IMO.

[darb]

yeah im already pretty fluent in in CS (i open nefs in cs.) and have my own methods of boosting colour tonal range ... just cant get near Christian's work. The above pics (and indeed my own super saturated images) look great, but not quite the same.

Im going to keep working on my technique and PP technique and strive to get there !

[darb]

a couple ive pumped up... but if i pumped them much further they look crap ... i guess its all about what im actually photographing.

[W00DY]

Darb,

Not sure if you use Nikon Capture or not but if you do try the D-Lightign Palette. This seems to do the trick somewhat.

Hope this helps.

W00DY

[mic]

Darb, That shot of the Apostles is bloody Brilliant.

Please keep persueing this with this Christian guy, It could put a lot of us over that edge of being average to bloody brilliant.

Mic.

Well me being average, there are some amongst us that are already brilliant

[AlistairF]

Wow, that is one fine pic, and I must say I think that this is exactly what Darb/the rest of us is after. How much does NC cost? I might have to look into this in the near future. Thanks for posting that terrific pic. It is a pano correct?

Edit: I'm just looking closer at your pic and noticing the same speckles in your sky as it goes from dark to light that I was complaining about, although it doesn't look necessarily posterized, it is quite grainy. Does that bother you? I suppose it's just the limitations of digital. It will be fun to see them improve the tonal range. I must say this is what is really lacking IMO.

Hi Dooda,

yes, It's a pano. but the grain in the sky is just from the low quality jpg produced when I uploaded it for the web. The original image is a tiff from the original NEF files.

Alistair

[MHD]

Brad! Mate! I'm stunned by that 12aps shot....

Jelous but stunned...

You can surely make that cam sing!

[mic]

Al, Thats a kick ass! image as well.

Mic.

[KerryPierce]

darb, have you experimented with uprezing your files before doing anything to them? I'm thinking that resizing by +100% would give you more latitude and preserve gradients. I've not done any scientific tests on this, but I've taken to processing the original for everything except sharpening, before I downsize for web use. I also do a mild sharpen and upsize before making any other edits, when I intend to make large prints.

[goodrich62]

Darb,
Those are some great shots.
When I looked at the link the it reminded me of one of my favorite artists. Rodney Lough he shoots 4x5 and 8x10 mid and large scale format with velvia film most shot between F 30 and 64.
If you look at his gallery he posts field notes on the camera and settings he used it may be worth a look
http://theloughroad.com/

Rich

[leek]

You've got me at it now...

I've been playing around with curves, sat and hues on one of my Blue Mountain waterfall shots... I think I might have gone a little too far, but it actually looks quite nice when printed...

[stubbsy]

John

Very disturbing. Blood in the water

[christiand]

blood in the water in Sydnety harbour !



Happy Easter everyone.
CD[/url]

[AlistairF]

Okay... Darb has me inspired to play with some NEF images and NC to increase saturation. Here are some comparisons of before and after adjustment. I don't believe the camera raw plugin in PS allows you to set the NEF tonal comp like NC does.

The original images are Colorspace II with Normal tone compensation and normal saturation. The enhanced images are in Colour space IIIa with tonal compensation set to HIGH and saturation enhanced. The enahnced images have had their saturation pumped with NC's Colour Booster. No curves adjusted.

Not very natural, but very rich.









Alistair

[darb]

Christian replied ;

use a FujiGX617 for my panos and Fuji Velvia. I then scan the tranys at home on a Imacon scanner and work the images in photoshop. They are then printed on a pegasus digital printer.
Thats about it really, nothing too difficult but always try to shoot when the light is nice, late arvo etc.



KP : nice, youve done it without "blowing" the photo. I guess it can only work with some images. Also going to be a lot easier to do it with 16bit NEFS than jpeg! I think someoen made that point earlier. (though its not what im really after.)

[darb]

great shots there alistair!

[AlistairF]

He's probably using a Fuji pano camera with 6cmx17cm negs/trannies.

Not a bad guess

[dooda]

Darb,

When discussing with the professor in photography about color, I brought up your question, as his photos all have the qualities that you're talking about-they were spectacular. He told me that it was all about light qualities, which I didn't really understand, but I took it to mean that he generally waits until the light qualities that he achieves are ideal, he says he generally has only a couple of minutes to shoot when the light is ideal. He told me to stop shooting JPEG and start shooting Raw. I read elsewhere that it didn't really matter so much. Boy were they wrong. I'm a convert.

[darb]

heh cool. yueah i think your right, picking the moment is half the trick.

he looked through my pics and said some nice things , i was stoked !