THE PP GAME!

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Rhodese said:
I ‘m not really happy with it :'( as it has banding in the sky.
Is there a way round this?

Rhodese.
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Work in 16bit throughout... unless you need some of Photoshop's features that require 8 bit, but leave that until the last possible stage(s)

Don't compress JPEGs so much would be my other advise.
 
Rhodese said:
I ‘m not really happy with it :'( as it has banding in the sky.

Rhodese.
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Rhodese, could you explain what 'banding' is please :thinking:


....cheers :)
 
It's when smooth gradients are broken up into bands... usually through working in 8bit, or by pushing things too far... or excessive JPEG compression. If you zoom into his edit you'll see it. Select the dark theme too.. that helps see it.

5Mym8l7.jpg
 
Pookeyhead said:
It's when smooth gradients are broken up into bands... usually through working in 8bit, or by pushing things too far... or excessive JPEG compression. If you zoom into his edit you'll see it. Select the dark theme too.. that helps see it.
Click to expand...

Cheers David, so this is something that can happen in pp that isn't there on the raw image?
 
Farmerjim said:
........................................... and decided to get rid of the big black palm trees but then realised that it was more difficult then I'd envisaged so used section of the big wheel from the opposite side and inverted it.
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Jim, I'm impressed :clap: I looked at getting rid of the two tall palm trees, but for me, it was impossible :lol:
 
Phil-D said:
Cheers David, so this is something that can happen in pp that isn't there on the raw image?
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Yes. It's not on the RAW.
 
Good afternoon all, sorry for my late response, I have been at the oxpickul all morning. The last appointment for this year.

Pookeyhead said:
Work in 16bit throughout... unless you need some of Photoshop's features that require 8 bit, but leave that until the last possible stage(s)

Don't compress JPEGs so much would be my other advise.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that David.
David, Do I load the image as is, then convert it to 16bit, work on it and then save as an 8 bit tiff to keep the size down to upload for “imgur”
The image I post on the PP Game is as near to a 200kb jpeg as I can get for TPs gallery.

Phil-D said:
Rhodese, could you explain what 'banding' is please :thinking:


....cheers :)
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What David said.

Jim, yowl be torkin like a "YAMYAM" in in no time atall. :lol:.

Rhodese.
 
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Rhodese said:
G


Thanks for that David.
David, Do I load the image as is, then convert it to 16bit, work on it and then save as an 8 bit tiff to keep the size down to upload for “imgur”
The image I post on the PP Game is as near to a 200kb jpeg as I can get for TPs gallery.
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It's already a 14bit RAW, so load it into lightroom or ACR and it be worked on in 16bit. If you export from Lightroom or ACR, then just ensure you do so as 16bit.

I'd just use Imgur, or Flickr for this, then you can use the full resolution file.
 
Pookeyhead said:
It's already a 14bit RAW, so load it into lightroom or ACR and it be worked on in 16bit. If you export from Lightroom or ACR, then just ensure you do so as 16bit.

I'd just use Imgur, or Flickr for this, then you can use the full resolution file.
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Thanks again, I’ll have a play tomorrow and see how it goes.
I know you and others have explained how to upload, but I’m an old duffer, all this fiddly stuff bamboozles my addled booze soaked brain cell.

Rhodese.
 
Hang on... you DID upload a hi-res JPEG to Imgur :) You already know how to do it :)

I'll call this one later after dinner.
 
OK.. Tough one this:

You know me… I’m very critical…. So take the rough with the smooth please, and take the crit as it’s intended – as feedback on methods used.

Neil: Love the colour treatment. Different from what I did, but works well. Great crop, almost identical to what I did. Not a fan of the Topaz filter, but it’s subtle, and the bright highlights already had diffractions, so it does work well here enhancing an already present feature. Excessive sharpening though when you zoom in.. it’s quite harsh and actually lowers quality.

Phil-D: Like the warming of colour temp. Good attention to detail with cloning out people. Good quality retention. I think the -2 stops and -62 highlights has made it a little too dark though. Really love the colours though.

Graham: Mono to colour fade is interesting, but I’m not feeling the blurring. The D800 RAW has such detail that even at the forum size; it’s making it look very, very soft in comparison. The colour side is beautifully done though. Fab crop!

Lee: It’s essentially a negative image. If I invert it, it’s just a mono version, so a great deal of work was spent making a mono negative… in Photoshop this could have been done with Image/Mode/grey scale, then pressing CTRL+I. Having said that, it’s certainly interesting, and I like the way the palm trees and foreground actually give the impression of looking like a positive taken on old Kodak High Speed IR film.

John: Hard to judge quality due to low res file size.. it looks a wee bit over sharpened though. Nice contrast control, and highlight retention. So much clarity has revealed sensor dust spots that haven’t been retouched out though.

Jim: Trademark silliness present. Disappointed it wasn’t Godzilla though :) but it’s topical. The edit is nice.. smooth somehow. Palm tree removal was ambitious, but reasonably well done, with only slight artefacts left. Again, hard to judge quality as full res not available, but looks clean.

Stu: Not sure what’s been done as no description was given, and no hi-res version available to check quality, but it’s a lovely edit. Particularly like the way you’ve darkened things down, but retained the bright highlight detail. Colours are vibrant without being OTT. A nice, neutral white balance. Great crop. Overall though.. seems a little dark. I do like it though.

Rhodese: A very inventive workflow, but I’m not sure it’s worked well. There are artefacts left by your layer mask around the buildings and dome. As discussed earlier in the thread, there’s a great deal of banding in the sky. Selective sharpening on names has been effective. Sharpening overall was subtle and hasn’t reduced quality as it often can do if taken to extremes. Just that method of darkening the sky while trying to retail highlight levels in the buildings isn’t working.

All inventive, and show real determination to dig into features, and I'm liking the extent of Photoshop layers, adjustment layers and layer masks being used. They're all pushing things to the limit (and sometimes beyond :)). An interesting set of entries.

Ok… despite being very dark I really liked Phil-D’s edit very much, and despite no information on what was done, I really like Stu’s edit… I deliberated for some time on this, but I really like Stu’s edit. Despite being a little on the dark side, it has a richness to it without being over the top.

So… Well done Stu! Over to you.. post up an unedited image, and also post a link to the RAW file. I look forward to what you offer up :)


Oh... here's how I edited it. (Imgur has slightly over compressed things)

CLICK FOR BIG, CLICK AGAIN TO ZOOM - may not work on phones and tablets.

 
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Well done on your winning edit Stu :thumbs:

And, thank you for your feedback and critique David.
 
Stu - Off to a good start on the thread
animated-smileys-jumping-011.gif


And David thanks for the crit & looks like next time I need to upload bigger AND AND AND clean my bloody screen as I thought the marks were on the screen not the pic
animated-smileys-embarrassed-06.gif
 
DayDreamer said:
AND AND AND clean my bloody screen as I thought the marks were on the screen not the pic
animated-smileys-embarrassed-06.gif
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I've lost count of how many times I've done that! :)
 
Well done Stu :thumbs: looking forward to the next image:)

David, thanks for the comments and feed back :)
 
Well done Stu :clap: nice edit and thanks David for an interesting project:thumbs: I'll post a better res image next time :)
 
LOL... I'm not suggesting people do... it's up to them. I just place great importance on maintaining quality with an edit. Just my thing... there's nothing in the rules that says you have to :)
 
Pookeyhead said:
LOL... I'm not suggesting people do... it's up to them. I just place great importance on maintaining quality with an edit. Just my thing... there's nothing in the rules that says you have to :)
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I know but what you say makes sense, I normally post on Flickr, the file upload option's too small to give a decent appraisal.
 
Pookeyhead said:
Alright Stu.... when did you get the 5D MkIII? How you finding it?
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Picked her up last Monday - went up to the lakes at 4:30am this morning to try her out in daylight properly for the first time... failed really, didn't see a speck of sun al day, just cloud and rain. :(
Stayed there shooting for 11hrs though regardless and I Love it, it feels quite a natural upgrade from the 7D as its 90% the same but certainly seems to capture more detail and has some awesome new shortcuts I really like.
I'm struggling going from crop to FF though, but will get used to it no doubt. Anyway... don't want to stray off topic. We should hook up for a catch up mate, or tune that Mustang of yours some more. LOL
 
Pookeyhead said:
Stu: Not sure what’s been done as no description was given, and no hi-res version available to check quality, but it’s a lovely edit. Particularly like the way you’ve darkened things down, but retained the bright highlight detail. Colours are vibrant without being OTT. A nice, neutral white balance. Great crop. Overall though.. seems a little dark. I do like it though.
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Thanks Dave, and I agree, it is a bit dark lookng at it on my monitor at home. I did that at work.
I knew id forgotten something - the history data! I was in the middle of doing a screenshot of my lightroom history panel to upload on the post for ease, and then James came in wanting a hand pushing a dead car off the dyno and I forgot all about it.
Sorry guys. :bang:

Pookeyhead said:
So… Well done Stu! Over to you.. post up an unedited image, and also post a link to the RAW file. I look forward to what you offer up :)
Click to expand...

Wow! Thanks Dave, I'm chuffed. :)
That said, im useless at this, no idea what to post up for editing. Might as well be a shot from todays trip I guess. Let me have a look what I have and dropbox a raw.
 
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Stu Blackpool said:
Picked her up last Monday - went up to the lakes at 4:30am this morning to try her out in daylight properly for the first time... failed really, didn't see a speck of sun al day, just cloud and rain. :(
Stayed there shooting for 11hrs though regardless and I Love it, it feels quite a natural upgrade from the 7D as its 90% the same but certainly seems to capture more detail and has some awesome new shortcuts I really like.
I'm struggling going from crop to FF though, but will get used to it no doubt. Anyway... don't want to stray off topic. We should hook up for a catch up mate, or tune that Mustang of yours some more. LOL
Click to expand...

I've used the 5D MkIII loads f times for video. It's way better with video than my D800 in low light. Nice cameras. I'm off for 2 weeks now... so may drop you a line. I plan to do a great deal of sleeping however. I hope to get some shooting done too. I've got a Bowens location lighting kit, with large battery pack and radio slaves on trial at the moment.
The Mustang is SORNed for winter :) It dissolves in the rain :)

Nice detailed RAW there Stu. Not sure what to do with it yet, but I'll have a crack at it in a wee while when the coffee has kicked in.
 
Just spotted this thread, great idea - thought I'd have a go. Very interesting seeing how different everyone approaches things. Apologizes to Stewart, my delay in responding means that I'm a bit late with David's Singapore shot, so I've done both for this reply. My approach is probably very simple compared to most.

For the Singapore shot I've gone for a panoramic crop, getting rid of excess sky and the furthermost buildings on the right. There's really very little after that I felt needed to be done, a contrast boost, clarity. Reduction of highlights and some selective burning in the bottom left. Minimal sharpening too by my standards and a tiny vibrance and saturation adjustment and that's about it:



As for Stewart's Ennerdale, again, nothing fancy - in LR a contrast boost again, as standard, with clarity too - then I've layered burn brushes diagonally from bottom left to top right to try and carefully bring back the sky without a noticeable change in exposure across the frame - a filter didn't really work for me. Once that's done I've run clarity and highlight brushes over the clouds to increase the texture. Sharpening and a microscopic de-saturation to reinforce that bleak feeling. I've seen this again as a wide panorama so I've cropped 2:1 and then I've opening in PS to add a drop more contrast (to me, the application of contrast in LR dealing with a RAW and in PS dealing with a JPEG result in totally different effects) and a gamma reduction before cloning out the twigs in the foreground, which I thought a touch distracting.

 
Stu Blackpool said:
Thanks Dave, and I agree, it is a bit dark lookng at it on my monitor at home. I did that at work.
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If you want me to pop around and calibrate your screens with a X-Rite i1 Display Pro I can do.
 
LR5:
  • Rotate to straighten and crop.
  • Highlight -60
  • Apply lens profile and remove CA
  • Slight sharpen
  • Careful noise reduction
  • Export as 16bit TIFF

PS CC:
  • Curves adjustment layer for contrast
  • Levels adjustment layer for colour balance.
  • Copy made as separate layer
  • Black and white conversion done with adjustment on red, yellow and green channels separate tones on the hills
  • opacity on B&W adjustment layer reduced to 50
  • Saturation layer to increase colour back to normal levels
  • Layer mask created for sky, and further curves adjustment made to add contrast to clouds

  • Convert to 8bit
  • Convert to sRGB

JPEG at full res
Upload.

Kept the twig in :) I love that twig.

CLICK FOR BIG. Click again to zoom. May not work on phones and tablets.



Although the above image is my official entry, I also did a B&W version (not up for judging... just thought it was interesting).

LR5:
As above

PS CC:
  • Black and white conversion done with adjustment on red, yellow and green channels separate tones on the hills
  • Layer mask created for sky, and further curves adjustment made to add contrast to clouds
  • Convert to greyscale (necessary for next step)
  • Convert to duotone
  • Split toning using separate warm and cool pantone colours to simulate split selenium toning.
  • Curves of warm duotone adjusted to limit warm tones to highlights, and allow cool tones to dominate darker tones
  • Convert to 8bit RGB colour
  • Convert to sRGB profile
  • Save as JPEG at full res.
  • Upload

Click for big etc.
 
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Tried to edit as single file in Lightzone, but couldn;t retrieve any highlights in the sky...

so made 3 files (-2, 0, +2) in Canons DPP
and merged with SNS-HDR

PS
Tiny straighten, clone stick, crop to 16:9 ratio.
flip horizontal. :)

 
Save the twig!!!! Poor defenceless twig!
 
Well done Stu, ava :jaffa:.

OK, this edit is pretty much an all-new process for me.
I’ve used this month’s gift from Practical Photography, a download copy of “CyberLink’s "PhotoDirector 4".”
I opened in PD4 and had a play, it’s a bit like PS, I did say a bit. As far as I can tell from one exercise its all there except for levels. I was very clumsy so opted for a one-click option preset called, “Autumn Leaf” a further download. It looked great to me so I exported to my desktop.
I did the rest of the edit in PS, familiarity and all that.
Cropped to straighten. A little burning-in on the foreground.
Then the big decision …. Do I keep the "Twig" or do I destroy it, sending it to the “Phantom Zone.” to roam in "Twig" oblivion forever. “NO, NO.” my inner self cried, “It’s Christmas”, so with a joyful heart I made a selection of “The Twig” and copied and pasted it into its own brand new layer. I then selected its frail spent "Twiggy" bits and upped it appearance using levels, I then inverted the selection and raised the saturation and brightness on its leafy bits. Then to give it the true stature in the image that a “Twig” should have I enlarged it to give it “Grandeur“.
I then selected all and added the border using the stroke command.
Flattened and saved.

THE END


CLICKFUBIG.

The saviour of the "Twig".
 
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Just having a play on a cold and dreary Sunday afternoon before Christmas. ;) So this is not for consideration.
This image reminds me of the hours I/we of my generation would spend in a darkroom making cardboard masks and such to blend in a sky to cover the burnt out space on the neg being printed.
The cost today of paper and chemicals must be prohibitive; I know I couldn’t afford it on my pension :(, thank god for digekul.
Open in ACR, Auto, open in PS, Crop and straighten, copy layer.
Convert to mono… Image, Adjustments, Black &White, Yellow Filter.
(Duurring the wowa, I would have used a Yellow/green filter for a shot like this. Do they still make them?)
Adjust contrast and brightness.
Drag in a stock sky, alter blending mode to multiply.
Drop opacity to 80%. Add a layer mask and erase the unwanted areas.
Flatten.
Dodge and burn.
New layer, make an irregular triangular selection from below the centre top to include the highlighted cloud and the lighter areas on the water and hillside, feather by 100 pixels.
Apply a white grad from the top, drop the opacity to suit.
Flatten and add the border using stroke.

Save for web.


CLICK 4 BIG AGAIN 4 ZOOM.
Rhodese.
 
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When's the closing day for entries Stu? I'm still looking for a Nessy Monster:)
 
I knew it!!
 
I like that Rhodese, definitely got the retro dark-room look.
I went down the monochrome route as well. Been playing with evaluation copy of Silver Efex so this image is a good candidate for that.
Started with ACR, screenshot here................View attachment 2727

Then opened in PS and used the Silver Efex filter.
Boosted the structure slider and pushed down the highlights and mid tones to bring out the sky then juggled the colour filters to get the effect that I wanted for the water and pebbles.
Went back to ordinary PS and used the highlights/shadows slider to get more sky definition but ended up with a nasty bright band on the right hand hill/sky junction. Tried cloning it away but that was a mess so selected the hill, made a layer and shifted it up just a tadge to cover the banding. This had to be sorted out at the water's edge at the bottom with a layer mask.
The rock in the fore-ground reminded me of a similar rock in Copenhagen I saw last year so put the little mermaid there as a momento.
Resized for Flickr and voila!
Click image for larger one..(larger image, nothing of a personal nature)


5D3_0978 by Farmejim, on Flickr
 
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animated-smileys-drinking-023.gif
Stu where are you we need to keep this thread moving?
 
Christmas probably got in the way. :)


Just messaged him.
 
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Hi guys,
Really sorry, Xmas, Kids and a few day trips shooting in the lakes has got tight in the way this last week, apologies.

Looking through all these images its really close, but the one I keep coming back to for its uniqueness is "Overbez" for his horizontal flip because I feel the scene looks better that way and I genuinely wish I had thought of trying it myself.

Uoi5t9y.jpg


Great work Graham, well done. Over to you... :)

P.S: I hated that twig too! LOL
 
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