"Get It Right In The Camera"
Jan 7, 2021 15:03:22 #
R.G. wrote:
It would be equally rare to see a repair job that was as good as a proper capture would have been.
That's right! Especially if the file is faulty enough, there are always telltale signs of the repair job. Somethg bad is usually missing or added. Missing highlight or shadow detail, that was never in the file, can not be restored. Sometimes, if the exposure is bad enough, additional noise shows up. Overly sharpening a poorly focused image will materialize as an unnatural outline. If you are a good "lighting detective" you can see shadows that have been added in portrait retouching software application or other shadows that don't jibe with the direction of lighting. Things like sky-replacement are fun but unless the operator is very skilled, well- it's like counterfeiting money- a bad job can be detected even by a non-expert.
For many years, I employed an expert retouched at my studio. This gentleman could apply retouching and airbrush work that was totally undetectable. He was also a photographer and understood facial structure and lighting principles. Sadly, he passed away a few years ago while he was beginning to perfect his skills in computerized retouching. I now am fortunate enough to have a younger digital retoucher and technician in my employ who really knows his onions. I am smart enough to realize I do not have many of these skills and talents so my post-processing activities are confined to custom printing, that is, control of colour accuracy, density, contrast and composition.
We still try to avoid repair jobs and prefer to reserve radical post-processing fixes to projects like lacing together panoramic images, routine portrait retouching, restoration of damaged images for our clients, and someof the creative "special effects" that are required by "creative" art directors.
Jan 7, 2021 15:27:42 #
E.L.. Shapiro wrote:
That's right! Especially if the file is faulty enough, there are always telltale signs of the repair job.....
The "Get it right in camera" lobby will be pleased to hear you say that
.Being an airbrush painter was probably perfect preparation for becoming a digital retoucher and repairer. I suspect that any painter turned photographer would probably make an excellent photographer.
Jun 2, 2021 01:17:06 #
Jun 2, 2021 04:19:10 #
R.G. wrote:
The "Get it right in camera" lobby will be pleased to hear you say that .
Being an airbrush painter was probably perfect preparation for becoming a digital retoucher and repairer. I suspect that any painter turned photographer would probably make an excellent photographer.
.Being an airbrush painter was probably perfect preparation for becoming a digital retoucher and repairer. I suspect that any painter turned photographer would probably make an excellent photographer.
Yup. Thaz excellent me. Former painter.
Never got into airbrush. Is that like air guitar ? But did my share of retouching halftone screen negs, where every tiny thing has major impact. So now I am reeeeally handy working pixel by pixel. Double your pixels, double your fun !!!
Jun 2, 2021 04:26:37 #
Chuck B wrote:
ditto!
Hey Chuck ... it’s a Zombie party. Got some brain dip and crackers right here. Thanks for the bump.
This is a great thread, a true UHH classic. You’re now the producer of a Broadway Revival to rival “Hair” :-)
Jun 2, 2021 12:23:43 #
My cousin developed b&w negatives in a darkroom. I spent just enough time in the darkroom with him to know that exposure was adjusted in the darkroom as much as it was in the camera. So, SOC has never been a real thing.
Jun 2, 2021 16:49:03 #
SteveR wrote:
My cousin developed b&w negatives in a darkroom. I spent just enough time in the darkroom with him to know that exposure was adjusted in the darkroom as much as it was in the camera. So, SOC has never been a real thing.
90% true, which is pretty good around here. FWIW, the other 10% is Polaroid prints and Kadachrome transparencies. You can’t do those in the darkroom. If you loved those media, you reeeeeally had to nail your sooc.
Jun 2, 2021 17:00:35 #
User ID wrote:
90% true, which is pretty good around here. FWIW, the other 10% is Polaroid prints and Kadachrome transparencies. You can’t do those in the darkroom. If you loved those media, you reeeeeally had to nail your sooc.
That is true for transparencies only if you project them. If you are printing them in the darkroom, some adjustment is possible. I played with Cibachrome printing back in the day, and burning and dodging can be done, but the result is opposite from printing negs. I believe some adjustment is possible also if they are being published.
Jun 2, 2021 17:37:53 #
If actually is what you want ok. I am not concerned actually with my photography
Jun 2, 2021 18:09:24 #
JohnSwanda wrote:
That is true for transparencies only if you project them. If you are printing them in the darkroom, some adjustment is possible. I played with Cibachrome printing back in the day, and burning and dodging can be done, but the result is opposite from printing negs. I believe some adjustment is possible also if they are being published.
Uh huh. I used to dodge/burn/etc and perspective adjust chromes via duping.
And you can shoot denser Polaroids and adjust by copying.
But none of this really matters. Polaroids and Kodachromes meant that sooc skills were extremely important.
Jun 2, 2021 18:25:46 #
I try to get it right in camera. But I rarely do. So some king of PP is usually necessary. Maybe I am just to dependent on the ability to manipulate the image. I was much more careful in the film days when I didn't have a tremor in my left hand.
Jun 2, 2021 18:57:32 #
boberic wrote:
I try to get it right in camera. But I rarely do. So some king of PP is usually necessary. Maybe I am just to dependent on the ability to manipulate the image. I was much more careful in the film days when I didn't have a tremor in my left hand.
Even if you get as good an image as possible out of the camera, you can usually improve it further with PP. There are things you can do in PP that you can't do in the camera.
Jun 2, 2021 19:50:20 #
Maybe I am just too old-fashioned- over the hill- seen better days- living in the past-a relic? OR my entomology is out of whack as to the word "processing" and don't understand the current jargon.
Problem is, I spent more years working with a film that I will live long enough to match in volume in digital imaging but I'm stuck with it because that's what my current clients demand.
So, whenh I world with film, PROCESSING was part and parcel of photography. If you did not "process" the film, you could not get paid for a latent image- you had to develop the film, come up with transparencies and/or negatives and make prints from the negatives. SIMPLE ENOUGH! "Processing" did not mean creating artificial or unrealistic images, only creating special effects, or worse, creating poorly crafted negatives that require hours of remedial work in the darkroom. In fact, the very first thing I learned from my first mentor/employee/boos is "we don't shoot sloppy and re-shoot every picturing the darkroom". It not efficient, economical, it delays production, and it reduces quality no matter how much manipulation you do.
True enough, as any master printmaker will tell you, a bit of dodging or burning in is not to produce artificial results, if anything it is used to restore missing detail that may have exceeded the range of the film (or sensor) or to correct a problem that may have been caused by uncontrollable or difficult lighting situations.
My initial training was kida strict. The boos removed those "remedy pages out of the Phot-Lab-Index which listed intensifies, reducers, beaches and a bunch of techniques to fix lousy or badly processed negatives- stains, pinholes, reticulation, agitation maks, etc "WE DON"T DO THAT HERE was the edict! We didn't need to stock every contrast grade of paper. Printing was easy- perhas a tweak here or there a crop or once one in a while and production ran smoothly. The slogan was "put it on the negative"! In transparency work, there was no negative so
it had to be spot-on!
Enter digital imaging! It really escapes me how so man photo gear tends to drill down so deeply into computer science and photograph software, that is unless they are actually computer scientists, software developers, or do nothing but edit difficult files.
The ongoing argument of SOOTC is ridiculous. You create the best file you can in the camera as to exposure, range control, use of light and composition- whatever. You then assess the image on the computer- tweak what is necessary and make you the final image. If you messed up at the camera- nobody's perfect, you fix it! There are more remedial controls, even in the most simple editing software, that you ever had in a darkroom. If you want to create something different- abstract, high contrast, special effect- have at it- ignore the purists who go around bragging that everything they shoot is SOOTC. or worse- insist that everyone else should do that or they are not good photographers! Many of these fols rever Ansel Adams and the Zone System which is the height of post-processing manipulation. So much so, the "process" is considered before the shutter is released. Sometimes I am out on an assignment and there are insane shooting conditions, you better believe I am thinking about how the heck I'm gonna manipulate this mess in post. I can't pack up and go home and tell the client I missed the deadline because I couldn't shoot STOOTC! They don't even know what that means!
Jpeg vs. Raw? More macho chest-beating! I shoot both. Jpegs are fine and Just in case and I mess up and have to "process" my head off, I have the RAW file! Beg deal- a few extra memory cards in the bag- so what?
There is, however, such a thing as over-processing. This means t me thathte the photographer did a lousy job of editing and whatever he or she did call attention to itself and over poser the message or statement of the image. As for over or under saturation vividness of colours, exaggerated skyscapes, etc. Well- back in the film days, each photographer chose the own favourite films as to colour biases, contrast, saturation, subtleties, grain, acutance, gradations, and more. Look at it this way- what if you walked into every museum and art gallery and all the works of art had a universal sameness. Pretty dull- eh!
I once knew a commercial photograher who had a "thing" about only making ONE shot for each required colr transparency- he HAD to hit it spot on- no Polaroid test, God forbid BRACKETING!-"What a waste of the film" he pontificated! Most of the time, strangely enough, he hit it! Problem was, ever now and again, the film was damaged at the la and there was no backup, or the printer preferred more saturated transparency. In the bracketing, slightly overexposed transparency that is slightly underdeveloped can lower the contrast of problematic lighting or art reproduction and a slightly underexposed and pushed film yields better cleaner whites in a high key subject. Much of this can also translate into digital methodologies. The film was the cheapest commodity compared to a flubbed job. The time and effort you take in creating a good clean file pays off but not at the expense of missing spontaneous shots, becoming so preoccupied with SOOTC that the work becomes stagnant.
Problem is, I spent more years working with a film that I will live long enough to match in volume in digital imaging but I'm stuck with it because that's what my current clients demand.
So, whenh I world with film, PROCESSING was part and parcel of photography. If you did not "process" the film, you could not get paid for a latent image- you had to develop the film, come up with transparencies and/or negatives and make prints from the negatives. SIMPLE ENOUGH! "Processing" did not mean creating artificial or unrealistic images, only creating special effects, or worse, creating poorly crafted negatives that require hours of remedial work in the darkroom. In fact, the very first thing I learned from my first mentor/employee/boos is "we don't shoot sloppy and re-shoot every picturing the darkroom". It not efficient, economical, it delays production, and it reduces quality no matter how much manipulation you do.
True enough, as any master printmaker will tell you, a bit of dodging or burning in is not to produce artificial results, if anything it is used to restore missing detail that may have exceeded the range of the film (or sensor) or to correct a problem that may have been caused by uncontrollable or difficult lighting situations.
My initial training was kida strict. The boos removed those "remedy pages out of the Phot-Lab-Index which listed intensifies, reducers, beaches and a bunch of techniques to fix lousy or badly processed negatives- stains, pinholes, reticulation, agitation maks, etc "WE DON"T DO THAT HERE was the edict! We didn't need to stock every contrast grade of paper. Printing was easy- perhas a tweak here or there a crop or once one in a while and production ran smoothly. The slogan was "put it on the negative"! In transparency work, there was no negative so
it had to be spot-on!
Enter digital imaging! It really escapes me how so man photo gear tends to drill down so deeply into computer science and photograph software, that is unless they are actually computer scientists, software developers, or do nothing but edit difficult files.
The ongoing argument of SOOTC is ridiculous. You create the best file you can in the camera as to exposure, range control, use of light and composition- whatever. You then assess the image on the computer- tweak what is necessary and make you the final image. If you messed up at the camera- nobody's perfect, you fix it! There are more remedial controls, even in the most simple editing software, that you ever had in a darkroom. If you want to create something different- abstract, high contrast, special effect- have at it- ignore the purists who go around bragging that everything they shoot is SOOTC. or worse- insist that everyone else should do that or they are not good photographers! Many of these fols rever Ansel Adams and the Zone System which is the height of post-processing manipulation. So much so, the "process" is considered before the shutter is released. Sometimes I am out on an assignment and there are insane shooting conditions, you better believe I am thinking about how the heck I'm gonna manipulate this mess in post. I can't pack up and go home and tell the client I missed the deadline because I couldn't shoot STOOTC! They don't even know what that means!
Jpeg vs. Raw? More macho chest-beating! I shoot both. Jpegs are fine and Just in case and I mess up and have to "process" my head off, I have the RAW file! Beg deal- a few extra memory cards in the bag- so what?
There is, however, such a thing as over-processing. This means t me thathte the photographer did a lousy job of editing and whatever he or she did call attention to itself and over poser the message or statement of the image. As for over or under saturation vividness of colours, exaggerated skyscapes, etc. Well- back in the film days, each photographer chose the own favourite films as to colour biases, contrast, saturation, subtleties, grain, acutance, gradations, and more. Look at it this way- what if you walked into every museum and art gallery and all the works of art had a universal sameness. Pretty dull- eh!
I once knew a commercial photograher who had a "thing" about only making ONE shot for each required colr transparency- he HAD to hit it spot on- no Polaroid test, God forbid BRACKETING!-"What a waste of the film" he pontificated! Most of the time, strangely enough, he hit it! Problem was, ever now and again, the film was damaged at the la and there was no backup, or the printer preferred more saturated transparency. In the bracketing, slightly overexposed transparency that is slightly underdeveloped can lower the contrast of problematic lighting or art reproduction and a slightly underexposed and pushed film yields better cleaner whites in a high key subject. Much of this can also translate into digital methodologies. The film was the cheapest commodity compared to a flubbed job. The time and effort you take in creating a good clean file pays off but not at the expense of missing spontaneous shots, becoming so preoccupied with SOOTC that the work becomes stagnant.
Jun 4, 2021 18:28:32 #
While I try to get it as close to right in the camera as I can I'm glad that we have the ability to edit a picture to our liking in an editor. I started as a photographer in the 70s, so I am ecstatic that today it is easy to remove a sign or telephone pole, or anything else you don't want in an image that I wouldn't have been able to do back then. There are so many reasons to use an editor that I don't understand why people don't want to do it. I gives you total control over the image. I see people that take JPGs without editing and they look like snapshots. I make art, not snapshots.
We have the technology, why not use it?
We have the technology, why not use it?
Jun 5, 2021 04:25:39 #
JohnSwanda wrote:
Even if you get as good an image as possible out of the camera, you can usually improve it further with PP. There are things you can do in PP that you can't do in the camera.
And thaz not recent news. AAMOF it’s 19th century, Victorian era, news.
Predigital, only instant film delivered sooc images. All other films required extensive PP. What goes around comes around.
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