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substituting lighting changes for software edit
REPLACING SOFTWARE EDIT ALTERATION OF PHOTOS WITH CHANGES IN LIGHTING
IN EFFECT WHEN A PHOTO IS SHOT Photo X ( http://www.angelfire.com/ma/vincemoon ) is a portrait that was in my mind unacceptable (hyper-contrast) in its unedited state as produced by a Nikon Coolpix 5700 digital camera. The version of photo X you see at http://www.angelfire.com/ma/vincemoon was edited in Nikon Pictureproject (PP) and Hewlett-Packard Imagezone Plus (HP) to make it acceptable looking. The process used to do this was simple, a digital camera could be programmed to execute the process in-camera. Saturation was increased in PP which eliminated hyper-contrast and produced a red skin tone; then saturation was decreased and white balance was corrected in HP to restore a realistic skin color. The question on my mind has been, how do I re-shoot photo X in such a way that the final output requires minimal use of photo editing software? Although the simple corrective steps I took using photo editing software on photo X could easily be programmed to execute in-camera instead of in-computer, people probably (mistakenly) tend to think that correction using software is somehow "cheating". I've been operating under the assumption that I need to understand how light interacts with a digital camera, if I am to be able to minimize the use of in-camera editing software and if I am to be able to rationally defend the use of such in-camera editing software against those who would accuse me of departing from so-called "realism" through the use of such; and I think this assumption of a need to understand has turned out to have been well founded. WHICH LIGHT SOURCES DOMINATED IN THE UNEDITED FIRST VERSION OF THE PHOTO Generally and roughly speaking impacting on a subject with light brown skin color as was the case in photo X, direct tungsten (incandescent) light produces a yellowish effect, indirect (bounced) tungsten produces a reddish effect, direct flash produces a pinkish effect, and indirect flash produces a whitish effect. The pinkish tones produced by direct flash, and the red tones produced by reflected (bounced) tungsten, in my estimation dominated, in terms of their impact on the subject in the original unedited verson of photo X, the effects of direct tungsten (yellowish) and indirect flash (whitish). Thus the direct tungsten (yellowish) and the indirect electronic flash (whitish) were dominated by indirect tungsten (reddish) and direct electronic flash light (pinkish) in the photograph. It surprises me that the yellowish tones caused by the bright direct tungsten lights were dominated, but such seems to have been the case. WHY THE CONCLUSION IS THAT THESE LIGHT SOURCES DOMINATED THE FIRST UNEDITED VERSION OF THE PHOTO When photo X was hyper-saturated (meaning the saturation was increased) in PP, the colors of the face grew redder and redder as more and more saturation was applied. Since hyper-saturation gives more dominance to already dominant colors, I assume that the light sources that produce pinkish (direct flash) and reddish (indirect tungsten) tones on a light-brown colored subject, were the dominant light sources amongst all the light sources hitting the face. WHAT THE CONCLUSION IS RE HOW THE PHOTO SHOULD BE RE-SHOT TO MINIMIZE USE OF SOFTWARE EDITING Therefore if I were to attempt to reproduce the effect I achieved through the use of photo editing software on photo X, while minimizing the use of modifications made using photo editing software, I would attempt to minimize the effect of light sources that were dominated by other light sources and that clash in terms of their contrasty impact on the face with these dominant light sources, and I would attempt to alter the dominated clashing light sources so that they clashed less with the dominant light sources. Therefore I would replace the direct tungsten (yellowish effect) with reflected indirect (bounced) tungsten (reddish effect), so as to minimize the contrast-creating clash with the dominant reddish light; I would attempt to minimize light produced by electronic flash bouncing off of objects (whitish effect) so as to reduce the contrast creating clash with the dominant reddish light; and also perhaps I would attempt to make the color initially produced in the subject's skin through use of electronic flash even redder, by increasing the power of the electronic flash output used. If I did these things, I suspect that the unedited version of the photo produced by the digital camera, would require significantly less editing in the computer than was required the first time around, especially if I did a sophisticated job of setting white balance when the photo was shot. PHOTO X SPECS Nikon COOLPIX5700 2004/10/20 13:03:01 RAW (12-bit) Image Size: 2560 x 1920 Color ConverterLens: None Focal Length: 52.4mm Exposure Mode: Manual Metering Mode: Multi-Pattern 1/4 sec - F/4.1 Exposure Comp.: 0 EV Sensitivity: ISO 100 White Balance: Auto AF Mode: AF-C Tone Comp: Contrast (-) Flash Sync Mode: Front Curtain Digital Zoom Ratio: 1.00 Saturation comp: 0 Sharpening: Auto Noise Reduction: Fixed Pattern @2004 David Virgil Hobbs http://www.angelfire.com/ma/vincemoon |
#2
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"David Virgil Hobbs" wrote in message m... [...] Is there a point in this post? |
#3
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"David Virgil Hobbs" wrote in message m... [...] Is there a point in this post? |
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