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Archive through January 25, 2005

The TVClubHouse: General Discussions ARCHIVES: 2005 Mar. ~ 2005 May: All Things Technical: The Help Desk (ARCHIVES): Digital Camera purchasing help!: ARCHIVES: Archive through January 25, 2005 users admin

Author Message
Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 7:40 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Levels is a fantastic tool for improving images.

Give the following a read and let us know if you have questions.

http://www.shortcourses.com/how/histograms/histograms.htm

Keep in mind though that your image of Ella is not typical in that it doesn't contain a lot of color (compared to a regular landscape image with lots of colors). Therefore, the histogram will look different and you don’t want to be too aggressive with your levels adjustment.

If you like, I can post a sample of what I would do with the image.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 7:51 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
That would be great! In the meantime I will check that site out (and feed Ella!!!) Thank you! Be back later....

Lumbele
Member

07-12-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 9:35 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Julie, I am thoroughly enjoying your practicing.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 11:25 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Yay Lumbele!! :-) I was feeling guilty for hijacking this thread!

Wendo
Member

08-07-2000

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 1:45 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Julieboo, you're doing very well. Digital cameras can be a lot of fun.

I hope you don't mind, but I played with the Levels of your picture so you could see what it could do.

pic

As you can see, just a little adjustment can go quite far. If you're using Photoshop, the option to do levels is under the menu item Image -> Adjustments -> Levels. The keyboard combination Ctrl+L works too.

Good luck!

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 1:52 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Thanks Wendo!! I appreciate any and all tips, tricks, etc! Feel free to play or help whenever!! Wow, you made that photo sooooo much better!!! It's beautiful! Can you tell me what you did so i can adjust the original?? Thanks!

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 9:12 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Hi Julie, I suspect that Wendo's adjustment looked something like this:

levels

Normally you would want to move the black and white points farther toward the middle just where the graph starts to rise, but due to the nature of this image you want to be more conservative.

But Wendo can let us know for sure.

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 9:18 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Here's the result I get from the above. I also made it black and white. Ella has lovely coloring for a little baby, but most babies tend to look better in black and white.

Ella

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 9:21 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Thanks Jimmer! She does look great in B&W! I'll have to change some others....!

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 9:26 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
No problem - this is a lot of fun. Remember to always save and back-up your originals though so you can always go back if you want to do something different.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 9:51 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Does this method seem to work well?



Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - 10:03 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Ignore my last post. I removed the photos (as I took a photo of a 2 pages from a book. Don't want to infringe on copyright laws or anything...)

Wendo
Member

08-07-2000

Thursday, January 20, 2005 - 12:54 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Julie, Jimmer basically pegged what I did. I pulled in the white point closer to the center; this lightens the images white points. I brought the black point in a little to compensate, but not too much or the picture came out to contrasty. I slightly adjusted the grey point a wee bit. Hardly anything.

Also, I should add that I toned down the red channel in Adjustments -> Hue/Saturation and select the red channel from the top pop up menu. In my experience, digital cameras tend to make images a bit redder than they should be.

---

You can post the pages from the book. Just post the copyright. You're not using it for profit or personal gain but for educational purposes. I think you're ok doing that.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 7:52 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Okay Jimmer, here's my next set of questions:

1. You said "Your best bet in all general situations (including all of these that you mentioned) is to use Av mode with an f-stop of about f-4 or f 5.6."

My question is do I need a tripod if using an f-stop of 4 or above?

2. What is the difference between using the -/+ of exposure and flash?


Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 7:52 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Wendo, thanks for your help!!!

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 8:11 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
3. Going back to LEVELS for a minute -- in general-- do you click on the darkest part of the picture with the black eyedropper (using info to tell for sure) and click on the lightest part of the picture with the white eyedropper and then hit ok?

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 8:33 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
It all depends on how much light you have. On a normal day outside, you should be able to use f 4 or f 5.6 and easily have a high enough shutter-speed that you won’t need a tripod.

Just to be sure, what you do is set the camera to Av mode, select the f-stop and then press the shutter-button half-way. The camera will then show you the appropriate shutter-speed that it will be selecting under your current lighting (based on the f-stop you selected). Just give it a quick check to make sure that it’s not too low (using the criteria that we talked about before). If it is too low, then you can select a lower f-stop and that will cause the camera to raise the shutter-speed.

Once you do this once, you don’t have to look at this every time you take a picture as long as the lighting doesn’t change – and it won’t change that fast.

For indoor pictures, most of your light is coming from the flash. The main thing that affects flash exposure is your distance from your subject. F-4 should be more than good enough as long as you are within about 8 feet. If you need to stand farther back, you will want to lower the f-stop.

But hey .... we’re using digital here!!! So what you do is check out the LCD after you take the image and look at the histogram. Generally, the histogram should extend from one end to the other with peaks in the middle. If the histogram is mostly to the left, with a flat line at the right, then you are under-exposing and you need to use positive flash compensation. If that doesn’t work, then it means that the flash is already at full power and you have to decrease your f-stop.

Also, look at the picture next to the histogram and if there are flashing areas in the image, then it means that those areas are over-exposed. Then you have to decide if those areas are important to you and if they are, use negative flash compensation.

Same thing applies to out-door pictures, except you use Exposure compensation out-doors (not flash compensation).

Generally, Exposure compensation for out-doors; flash compensation for in-doors.

With your levels question, yes that is a very good technique as long as you have white and dark areas in your image. Clicking with the black eyedropper makes everything as dark or darker than what you are clicking on, pure black. And, the white eyedropper does the same for white. You can use the info as an aid, but you really don’t want to click on an area that is already pure white or pure black as it won’t do anything. Of course, if you can’t find an area in the image that’s suitable or if using the eyedroppers doesn’t produce the effect that you want, you can do it manually, the way that Wendo and I did earlier.

Hope that helps Julie. Feel free to ask more questions if you’re not sure about things.

Do you do much photography yourself Wendo (I’m pretty sure that you’re a pro with PhotoShop!)?

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 8:42 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
I may not have been clear about one thing. You can use f-4 or f-5.6 with flash in-doors as well without a tripod, as the flash is providing the additional light.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 8:47 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
once again you rock Jimmer!!!! Is there a difference between buying a tripod at a professional photo store or at a Walmart?

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Friday, January 21, 2005 - 9:47 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
You can pay a huge amount or very little for a tripod, depending on the quality and your needs. Generally speaking, the ones at the pro photo stores are far higher quality and much more expensive and they’ll have a better selection. The ones at the general consumer type camera stores, may be a little better and slightly more expensive than Walmart.

More sturdy = more expensive
Light weight and strong = more expensive
Type of head (the thing you attach your camera to) = can be expensive depending on quality

Quick release = more expensive. A quick release is useful if you take your camera on and off the tripod a lot – you leave the quick release plate screwed to the camera (rather than screwing the camera to the tripod every time) and you can quickly remove and attach it to the tripod. But if you don’t do that much, then it’s a nuisance to have that plate screwed to your camera (though it is easier to screw the plate to the camera when you need to).

Things to think about ….

How often will you use it and where? If you use it a lot, you may want to get a better one (more expensive). If you don’t plan to carry it around a lot then the tripod weight isn’t much of a factor.

How heavy is your camera and lenses? In your case, not very heavy so you don’t need a super sturdy tripod.

So I’d check out a good photo store and see what they’ve got and talk to the salespeople. Then you can take a look at Walmart. So I’d guess for your use, don’t buy the cheapest you see (it will be flimsy); buy something that’s reasonable quality but not too expensive.

As a Photographer, I like to see the camera stores do well, so if they offer expertise and selection and their prices aren’t outlandishly different, I’d go with the camera store.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Saturday, January 22, 2005 - 9:30 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Is it cost effective to get a photo printer at home? I'm thinking maybe the Canon iP5000, any thoughts on that one.

Also any suggestions on how to make that Ella picture more fun? Do you like this one? I did the levels and then feathered the edges....

e

Did I marquis it too big (leaving too much feathered color around the edges)?

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Monday, January 24, 2005 - 12:22 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Hey, where'd everybody go?

Jimmer
Member

08-30-2000

Monday, January 24, 2005 - 9:03 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Just distracted with car trouble – darn thing wouldn’t start for me!

Ella looks as sweet as ever! The feathering is a nice touch and you did a good job with the levels. Were you thinking of doing this for printing or for sending to people over the Internet?

With respect to printers, Canon is best known for making very fast printers that produce brilliant colors and lovely prints. The downside is that I believe that they are still using dye based inks which means that they can not match the longevity of the Epson inkjets with the Ultra-Chrome Pigment inks. That’s not to say that the Canon prints won’t last a long time – they just won’t last for over 80 years!

The downside to the Epson inkjet pigment printers is they tend to be slower and unless you print fairly often (say at least once every few days) the ink jets may clog and need cleaning (which is just a matter of running the cleaning program, but it’s a nuisance and it uses ink). The Epson R800 is an excellent small printer for serious photographers.

So if you are interested in a dye inkjet printer, then the Canon’s are very good and make excellent prints. If you want both longevity and excellent prints, then you may want to consider the Epson R800. I’m not sure about the current pricing but I do know that the R800 is considerably more expensive than the normal dye ink jet printers Epson makes. The R800 will do very nice 8 x 10's and uses the very latest Epson technology. Epson also has the 2200 which will do 11 x 14, but it is due to be replaced very shortly by a printer of the same size with a similar print engine to the R800.

Personally, I like the Epsons but there are some very accomplished photographers who are very happy with their Canon printers.

Finally, if all you are ever going to print are 4 x 6's and you're happy with the prints you are getting done elsewhere, then it is definitely not cost effective. However, if you like to print larger than 4 x 6 on occasion and enjoy the artistry of getting exactly what you want in a print, then they are great to use. The print quality is superb and the longevity (with the pigment inks) is every bit as good or better.

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - 7:33 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Thanks Jimmer!!!

How do you keep all your photos organized? Do you know anything about Thumbs Plus? Any advice? Thanks again....

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - 7:58 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post    
Oh Jimmer, sorry to hear about your car trouble. Hope you got it up and running...