Photoshop the POW Special Edition II--12/27/10

 

<p>This week, I've again selected an image from a recent wedding for you to Photoshop. I made it hard this time, with artistic decisions for you to wrestle with. :^)</p>

<p>This image is straight from the camera except that I lifted the overall exposure by about 2/3 stop or so. There wasn't a lot I could do about the sun position and resulting flare, so I decided to 'go with it' and tried for some good flare rainbows. I shot a lot of off angle shots with and without fill flash, so there will be plenty of overall ceremony shots for the couple to choose from, with and without flare.</p>

<p>So let's see what you all can do with this shot--whether to 'repair' the flare or accentuate it, etc. Have fun! For those of you unfamiliar with "PS the POW", a neutral image is chosen for everyone to Photoshop 'their way'.</p>

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You asked for it Nadine!!! You didn't say it had to be good or artsy! The 3 year old next door helped me.<div></div>

<p>:^) Thanks, Bob! C'mon, guys--let's see how you tweak flare shots or fix 'em.</p>

<p>Added a vignette in lightroom, used a preset called Hawaii five-o medium to fade color, then I added grain, and cropped to center the B&G. I might try a couple of other treatments of this in different styles if I thought it was a worthy photo. Happy Holidays to everyone. Hope you all had a nice Christmas.</p><div></div>

<p>Nadine didn't like my 'funny version', so...a serious attempt, hard to do with such a small file, but you get the point, this is salvagable. Got rid of the flare in the BG area, and major crop so it's not so static:</p>

<p><img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/12156887-lg.jpg" alt="" width="494" height="328" /></p>

<p> </p>

<p>Shawn--it isn't that I didn't like your funny version. I think the bride and groom and their relatives deserve some respect, since they may possibly see these images, don't you? As wedding photographers, we are all aware of how much a couple's wedding means to them and their families. Images that poke fun at this don't have a place on a public forum.</p>

<p>Absolutely, I wasn't doubting you, I was just trying to be funny without thinking about the implications (my post was about zapping the mother-in-law, who wasn't even in the frame, but I never thought to consider the lack of humour on the BG's part...my mistake). I hope my more recent post is better, and more appropriate:)</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Yes, thanks, Shawn. I appreciate your 'serious' attempt.</p>

<p>Ok here is my version, cloned out the flares, removed sky detail or what was left of it, added some selective colour saturation and added some detail to the arch.</p>

<p>Well the sky looked clean in PS anyway.</p><div></div>

I started playing with it again as a serious attempt. I did darken the sky, but it's hard to fix the glare. My attempt wasn't worth posting. I tried it in B&W and the pic doesn't pop.

<p>If I had to use it, one method I would look at would be to accentuate the contrast and just concentrate on pulling out the main faces - a rough, working from the small res sample, is below:<br>

WW</p>

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<p>here's my attempt</p><div></div>

William, nice job cleaning it up. I didn't think of adjusting the contrast. Very cool!

<p>I've spent a lot of effort avoiding taking such shots and if I did get one like this I'd probably just trash it.....if I absolutely needed to attempt a repair it would go something like the image below.</p><div></div>

<p>David--as stated, I got lots of other angles with and without fill flash, with and without flare. Since the flare, <strong>at this angle</strong>, was unavoidable--no amount of shading would work--I decided to deliberately get the flare rainbows and see what I could do to accentuate it. I thought it would make a good PS exercise, both for trying to 'fix' it, and trying to accentuate it. Interesting that so far, most people have tried to fix it. I offered it to my clients with flare accentuated, and many other shots with no flare. I am not a flare fan, but I like some of these kinds of shots, particularly if you offer your clients choices.</p>

<p>Thanks Bob.</p>

<p> </p>

<blockquote>

<p>“Since the flare, <strong>at this angle</strong>, was unavoidable--no amount of shading would work--I decided to deliberately get the flare rainbows and see what I could do to accentuate it. . . etc.”</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Breaking it down, there are two (Flare) issues. I took the attitude not to try and remove/fix the <em>Lens Flare</em>, (the rainbow dots) - rather just to leave it, it looks pretty.</p>

<p>The other issue is the Veiling Flare. My guess is Nadine used a Tamron 28 to 75/2.8. The EXIF states F/9 and the lens was at FL = 28mm. Veiling Flare, at its worst, results in an appearance as if a milky filter has been used and also there is lack of mid tone contrast. It is a result of the images’ rays being in-efficiently baffled; bouncing around<strong><em> inside</em></strong> the lens; and subsequently being reflected back onto the film or sensor, thus “diluting” the acutance and contrast of the image - especially noticeable across the mid-tones.<br>

Veiling Flare is exaserbated by using wide lenses generally; zoom lenses at the wide are usually worse offenders; large apertures; and lens filters. As noted the angle of the sun is the killer in this shot – and impossible to avoid with any shade – such as using the free hand or a black card as a lens hood extender. The lens hood would be useless in this shooting scenario.<br>

Because the Mid-tones suffer so much, it is often fruitless making a B&W conversion to get out of the soup, (as mentioned), because often even a thicker pea soup results. Though I am sure a Post Production Guru can make something of it in B&W, I just saying it is often difficult. Half-tone or Bas Relief would be interesting, I expect, <strong><em>in a large print</em></strong> – but the Main Subjects are kind of small so for the web exercise I doubt it we could pull it off web size working form the low res sample.<br>

So, further to what I did in my rough: I burnt the horizon to make a darker platter for the faces; increased the saturation (especially RED and GREEN); reset the Black Point and then dodged the faces to bring them up. Basically my logic was, the mid-tones are shot to bits anyway, might as well nuke them – make the tux darker the faces lighter and the red dresses richer and to hell with the rest.</p>

<p>WW</p>

<p>PS - I had a go, maybe there is enough in it for a B&W? – This is a B&W conversion from my Colour attempt and then a second reset of the Black Point . . . but B&W kills the pretty Rainbow Flare . . . which was the point in the first place. No?</p>

<p> </p><div></div>

<p>Would it be cheating to use Photoshop's content aware deletion to get rid of the flare?</p>

<p>PSCS5 Content Aware tool to remove most of the hard flare ... contrast boost, and selective restoration of color, simple painted in sky with grad to horizon to keep it somewhat natural looking. Selected bride's dress to remove the discoloration caused by the flare.</p>

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<p>OOps ... here's the pic</p><div></div>

<p>My take, not in PS since it's a quick try on my netbook. In PS I would burn in the top of the arbor and also add contrast to the grooms face</p>

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<p>Nadine, I would imagine that you got other images and at other angles that worked out, thus you wouldn't need this image and could simply trash it without any noticeable loss of coverage. However, stating that the flare was unavoidable in this case is not accurate, you could have used a free hand as a scrim to block/shade the lens. IMO, no amount of PS magic is really gonna provide what I would consider an acceptable image. Granted PS can make it better but I doubt it could be made good enough.</p>

<p>While it is possible to get good results in some cases with lens flare, in practice it's very difficult to pull off well......... I also understand that the point of this thread is a learning exercise which is why I chose to participate and why I have discussed the photo from my own POV.</p>

<p>Starting with "levels" in PS I increased the blacks, darkened the midtones, and decreased the highlights slightly. Next I reduced the saturation and then lightened the shadows and increased the overall brightness. It brought the rainbow flare out more and reduced the flare around the B&G.<br>

I also straightened and cropped it slightly for a little better composition.</p>

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<p>I understand what you are saying David, but I can assure you that no amount of shading would have worked with the focal length and angle. In fact, I tried to do some shading with a longer focal length, but got nowhere. I also tried some at a low angle, to try to block the sun with one part of the arch--also no joy. About the only thing I could have done (to avoid flare), at this angle, was levitate maybe 10 or more feet into the air and shoot down, and I did not have a crane handy. :^) If I did, I might have tried that.</p>

<p>This is an image I see in b+w. Processed with my conversion and flare removed by hand. Mid-tones boosted for improved contrast and graded texture added to compensate for missing detail in sky.</p>

<p>Irrespective of the point of the exercise, this is an image I enjoy and find interesting for the composition and ingredients. I questioned whether to remove the flare as I wasn't at all convinced it spoiled the image. In the end I took it out to be thorough, although I could just as easily have gone the other way.</p>

<p>I love the layers and my eye finds lots to explore here.</p>

<p><img src="http://balancingpoint.org/singleimages/psw001.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="467" /></p>

<p>Although the sun may be very low to the horizon, judging from the shadow that is being cast by the B/G/Officiant some shading of the lens would be possible, challenging perhaps but possible.</p>