joopbie Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 Hi there, I've been shooting with my Nikon D70. Really happy about itin general but one thing that puzzled me is that the color in thephotos are not as saturated as I would love to. It looks a little bitflat. Can anyone tell me what I need to do? Thanks! Claudia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bryan_lardizabal Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 Check the white balance setting, as this is paramount for correct color exposure. For easy shooting, just set it on A - auto white balance and review the owners manual for further information. You'll get it down pretty quick. Regards, Bryan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joopbie Posted January 6, 2005 Author Share Posted January 6, 2005 Hi Bryan, Thanks for the suggestion. I've indeed changed the white balance setting accordingly (and have also tried the auto mode) But the color just won't jump out of the picture (as opposed to my Canon EOS film SLR) I can get it fine tuned in Photoshop but I want to know if I can calibrate my camera to do it on its own. hmmm..... Puzzled Claudia<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael_borland Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 This is easy to adjust. Press the Menu button, and go to the "Shooting Menu" (has a picture of a camera). At the top of the shooting menu is the "Optimize image" selection. Press the right arrow selector to enter this menu. Use the down arrow selector to go to "Vivid", then press the right arrow selector to select it. Have a look in your manual. It discusses how to do this and also how to customize the saturation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
markwilkins Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 First, if you haven't already, you can choose Shooting Menu > Optimize Image > Vivid to get brighter colors. If that doesn't do the trick, you can manually adjust various color settings by choosing Shooting Menu > Optimize Image > Custom. There you will find settings for (among other things) saturation, which you can turn up. Also, there's a "Color Mode" setting. Color Modes Ia and II choose between the sRGB and Adobe RGB color spaces. Unless you have a particular reason to do so, leaving that on sRGB will give you the most predictable results with the least postprocessing. Color Mode IIIa, though, is a special mode that outputs sRGB but enhances saturation of certain colors in a way that's meant to be pleasing for landscapes. I'd try those three settings in order (first the built-in Vivid mode, then cranking up the custom saturation, then changing to color mode IIIa.) From what I understand, some combination of these will probably give you what you want. There are some pictorial examples of what these controls do here: http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/nikond70/page12.asp -- Mark Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donald_choi Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 If the above suggestions don't wet your sponge, you can do what I did and upload a custom tone curve to you D70. These will give you images a real boost. Do a net search and you should find some info on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bryan_lardizabal Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 Claudia I have noticed, on my D70, that the color red tends to get over saturated no matter what WB setting I have selected. The attached shot is unretouched, WB setting was for daylight. Even so, it is easy to correct on the computer....welcome to digital photography. On the film side, I have shot slides for about 7 years but the problem with them is finding a good photo lab to print them. Either way it's a tradeoff.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tholte Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 The above advice is good but I think the real problem is not getting good light in the first place. We all think we can improve the light post-mortem so to speak and tend to shoot when the light is not ideal. Shooting film we were always a little more picky when we pressed the shutter, now we can blast away and improve things later. I have noticed that when the light is "film perfect" my images out of my D70 are really good right out of the box. When the light is not "film perfect", they always need a little tweaking. Any one else notice this or am I just nuts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donald_choi Posted January 6, 2005 Share Posted January 6, 2005 Try this link as a start: http://fotogenetic.dearingfilm.com/custom_tone_curves.html There are tons of customized curves out there, but most people seem to like the "White Wedding" curve. For me, I use the "Digital_Fuji_Superia_Reala" curve and am very happy with it for general use. By the way, you will need Nikon Capture to upload the curves to your camera. You can download a 30-day trial version of Capture and use it to upload the curve that you like before your 30 days are up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
streetlevel Posted January 7, 2005 Share Posted January 7, 2005 Also, depending on the profile the camera is using, and your settings in PS, you could be shifting (ie. shooting in Adobe RGB, then PS is converting to SRGB) which can often flatten color a bit... So check your color settings and make sure you are not overexposing... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsbhasin Posted January 7, 2005 Share Posted January 7, 2005 Joop, <p>The teapot colors look fine to me. dont enough if u want more red or gold to pop out. Are u using NEF or JPEG? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sergio_leal Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 Donald, where did you get specifically the Digital_Fuji_Superia_Reala profile ??? Did you download it from the link you suggested (http://fotogenetic.dearingfilm.com/custom_tone_curves.html) or you customized it yourself??? Thanks for sharing it with us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donald_choi Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 Sergio, Try this link: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/dltucker/nikond70/downloads/Curves/ Enjoy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sergio_leal Posted January 10, 2005 Share Posted January 10, 2005 THanks very much Donald. My best regards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joopbie Posted January 12, 2005 Author Share Posted January 12, 2005 Thank you so much for all your advice. I've tried to use the custom mode and it has indeed improved it a lot. I am not sure how I can try to load a profile up tho as I am using a mac.... the teapot image is in jpeg format. Maybe that's part of the reason as it's a compressed format? hmm.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brettjohnson Posted January 18, 2005 Share Posted January 18, 2005 I have tried a number of curves and all of them did not give me any better results than what I could achieve through native D70 settings. I have my D70 set as described below which IMHO provides me with the colour balance and saturation to my liking. As Tim Holte mentioned if the light is right the photo will be good anyway, but if the light is not quite right I find these settings the best to minmise PS work after the event. White Balance = AUTO -2 Contrast = LOW CONTRAST Saturation = ENHANCED Sharpening = MEDIUM HIGH The WB setting is the one that makes the difference for me. The others are not recognized by PS anyway but are by Capture. IN PS I have a standard NEF setting that I apply to all images that emulate the D70 contrast & saturation settings. Sharpening I do in PS after the NEF images is fully loaded. Try it, it works for me but will not be for everyone... Depends on your photo situations Rgs, Brett Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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