pilotboat

I recently went to a wildlife photo exhibit. The pics were of deer, owls, birds and fish.

The colors were perfect. The artist said that he uses no photoshop techniques with his photos. He only uses techniques that Ansel Adams would use.

Is this possible? I don't know what type of camera/lens that he uses. www.rhodeshots.com

I sure would like to take photos like his.

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

Considering that Ansel Adams
1. spent loads and loads of time in the darkroom "pp"ing his photos
2. Was primarily a Black and White photographer

Kind of think he's full of _____ saying that he's using the same techniques to get the same colors.

bigwolf40 Loc: Effort, Pa.

Maybe he is talking the zone system. How you would use I'm not sure but I myself could never understand it and as far as PP he spent hours in the darkroom doing it so I have to agree with you....Rich

jaymatt Loc: Alexandria, Indiana

:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

MT Shooter Loc: Montana

Ansel Adams was a pretty fair photographer, but he was a MASTER in the darkroom. Maybe your photographer doesn't use "Photoshop" per say as it is a brand name, but obviously he is using something comparable, his statement to you pretty much confirms it. Photoshop, and all other post processing software, is todays digital darkroom.

anotherview Loc: California

Some of his photos show the lack of PP. He appears to shoot using film akin to Fujifilm Vivid for banging colors. His photo of himself depicts unnatural skin tones on his face.

He definitely has an eye for subject and composition.

Yet you can see in several of his photographs he does not correct for a level horizon.

Upshot: Some of his photographs could benefit from PP.

I agree regarding the extensive darkroom efforts of AA. Having read several of his books, I can attest to his mastery of film photography overall. An informed cameraman will find inspiration in the written and photographic works of AA.

halman Loc: Foothills of Colorado

He's no AA.
Good photos though.

TheDman Loc: USA

I'm sure he uses the zone system while shooting birds in flight.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

Zone system refers to luminance. It is 'no big deal' per say; it simply divides the image in 10 luminosity areas according to presets. It is also highly subjective.

The zone system is not set when 'shooting per say' but in preparing the latent image by selecting the exposure that will give the best 'plage' to work with. As such the original can appear over or under exposed to the untrained eye. That 'original shot' is a base for PP, nothing else. The final image is latent.

When post processing you use channels masks to work with it. Channels masks are not all that easy to work with and demand a highly calibrated system as you can divide the luminosity up to 256 zones (which makes no sense) The most I have seen worked with, by a portrait photographer was 32 zones. I personally can deal with up to 16 zones. More than that, I do not see the difference.

While you can work with zones on a JPG I personally do not, that format is way too weak to give satisfactory results (My opinion here).

There are many resources on the WEB to learn how to create and use luminosity masks.

SharpShooter Loc: NorCal

Pilot, If the guy is a real wildlife shooter, keep in mind that wildlife photography has rules for PP.

In a wildlife shot, if any colors start to look like they are un-natural then the pic crosses the line and it is no longer a wildlife shot, but a pictorial. Wildlife rules are a lot like journalism rules.
So in reality, other than small amount of tweaking, with saturation and sharpening, there isn't more you can do to a pic, as cloning is not allowed.
What was meant by the AA comment, is anybody's guess. ;-)
SS

jimni2001 Loc: Sierra Vista, Arizona, USA

:thumbup: :thumbup:

Rongnongno Loc: FL

That do not seem to exist anymore... Like verify, verify, verify and do not reveal your sources...

SonyA580 Loc: FL in the winter & MN in the summer

If Mr. Rhodes does not use PP he must be set up to get those saturated colors right out of the camera. Possibly a CPL filter, camera set to vivid, slightly underexposed and, it looks like he shoots a lot at sunrise/sundown to get that saturated golden glow. However he does it, his pictures are very nice.

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

Thanks for this - you have totally misrepresented what constitutes the zone system.

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

His images are quite good - shows excellent control over exposure, but saying he uses AA's approach is a questionable claim, as others have pointed out - especially since AA was the master at exposure and post processing.

To summarize AA's system - through careful testing, he was able to establish the dynamic range capture capability of his film. Since he was working with negative media, the holy grail was shadow detail. Shadows in negatives appear as very lightly exposed (thin or almost clear) sections. So he understood what the minimum exposure value he needed to capture the shadow detail.

He devised a zone system to quantify all of this. It consists of 10 zones, with zero being black with no detail, and 10 being completely white with no detail, and everything else fell in between.

The most critical part of his approach was in being able to evaluate a scene in terms of its brightness range, and relate it to the film's capability to capture it. In a low contrast situation, the exposure range might only be 5-7 fstops. But in certain high contrast situations, it could be as much as 15 stops or more. He used a popular reflected light meter - the Weston Master V to measure his baseline, then used his experience with brightness ranges to arrive at optimum exposure settings. Today, you would use a spot meter, or the spot meter function in your camera, to measure highlight/shadow, and determine your exposure by making sure the highlights are not irrevocably overexposed - exposing to the right. This is the opposite of working with negative media, in which insufficient exposure will irrevocably fail to capture shadow detail (you would expose to the left).

With his understanding of exposure, film capability, and how much he could influence dynamic range by adjusting the variables during film developing - chemical formula, concentration, temperature and time - to hold back highlights, develop more detail in the shadows and control fog and noise - he was able to record the maximum amount of information possible in the negative. Then it was off to the darkroom to create his "vision" of a scene, which often involved copious amounts of dodging and burning, image intensifiers, and other esoteric techniques.

Luminosity masks can be thought of as "manual HDR" since they use two more more exposures of a scene and blend them together, isolating the important details in each using a selection based on luminosity - brightness.

If you are so inclined, you can download a set of actions to do this somewhere on this page -

http://iso.500px.com/luminosity-masks-in-digital-blending/

But with today's cameras offering in excess of 14 stops of dynamic range, the need for luminosity (and HDR) processing is minimized. Thought there remain situations where it is advantageous to use it.

As far as his colors are concerned, there is some serious post processing going on in many of his images, and one of his fall landscapes clearly shows that his orange and red color channels are clipped - and perhaps could have used some PP to diminish the luminance/saturation on those colors to render the detail better, or taken the image with a lower exposure value.