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

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