Flood — let’s have some fun!

Last week I got hold of a great book, Digital Photographer’s New Guide to Photoshop Plug-Ins by Jim Zuckerman and Scott Stulberg. I haven’t delved into this book very far, but I have to say this is an enjoyable presentation of mainstream plug-ins, some of which I already have and use, others that now interest me, and some that don’t apply to my artistic style.

Now, whatever your attitude towards using plug-in supplements to Photoshop, set that aside for a moment. Let’s just say you might find some of these fall into the category that they make creative effects accessible and possible that would otherwise be passed over because they would be too difficult to create manually or beyond comprehension for the mere mortal (that’s you and me folks).

In my forthcoming course at Dixie State College, Achieving Critical Artistry, one session/module will be devoted to Photoshop extensions. However, I will not be getting into anything that crosses the border into the realm of Photo Illustration. That being said, I have to tell you of a otherwise untold fun experience I just had a few moments ago.

Based on an entry in the book I described above, I downloaded the trial version of Flood, a plug-in from www.flamingpear.com. (Flaming Pear? C’mon man!) This software adds reflective flood effects that vary from incredibly believable to surreal. The registered version is under $30. I played around for 5 minutes. The only thing I really contemplated was finding an image which might be suitable. Frankly, I am far from understanding how to set up the creative controls of this plug-in. Here are the default results. How can you argue with anything that is this much fun?

Photoshop Elements Seminar

Dixie State College Community Education in St. George, Utah is sponsoring my new seminar: Photoshop Elements. This seminar will be held on your choice of either of two convenient Saturday Sessions on either 1/30/2010 or 3/37/2010. The seminar runs from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm with a one hour personal lunch break. The college’s fee for this seminar is $49 + $10 for materials. The following topics will be covered:

• File cataloging
• Easy Editor
• Full Editor
• Special Effects
• Printing and Output

Materials Students Bring

• You should own Photoshop Elements version 6, 7, or 8
• Bring some examples (files or prints) of your work for us to discuss in class.

Who is This Class For?

• For folks who want to use Adobe Photoshop Elements to easily edit and print their pictures.

Contact Dixie State College Community Education at (435) 652-7675 to sign up.

Photoshop—Lightroom Integration

Dixie State College Community Education in St. George, Utah is sponsoring my new class: Photoshop—Lightroom Integration. This class will be held in four 2-hour Tuesday evening sessions on the following dates: 3/30/2010, 4/6/2010, 4/13/2010, and 4/20/2010. The classes run from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm. The college’s fee for this class is $59 + $15 for materials. The following topics will be covered:

• This class will answer your perplexing questions regarding using Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom together to get the maximum benefit from each.
• We will discuss where each program can be best exploited, transfer methods and file formats, the use of smart objects, and plug-ins.

Materials Students Bring

• You should own a Digital SLR Camera. The camera you have is probably just fine. Bring it.
• You should own or intend to purchase Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom 2.
• Bring some examples (files or prints) of your work for us to discuss in class.

Who is This Class For?

• You should have a working knowledge of both programs before attending. (The Photoshop and Lightroom Throughput classes cover this background.)

Contact Dixie State College Community Education at (435) 652-7675 to sign up.

Lightroom 2 Throughput

Dixie State College Community Education in St. George, Utah is sponsoring my popular class: Lightroom 2 Throughput. This class will be held in seven 2-hour Wednesday evening sessions on the following dates: 1/20/2010, 1/27/2010, 2/3/2010, 2/17/2010, 2/24/2010, 3/3/2010, and 3/17/2010. The classes run from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm. The college’s fee for this class is $99 + $25 for materials. The following topics will be covered:

• All about RAW files and how to expose them properly.
• Understanding color spaces (Pro Photo, Adobe RGB, and sRGB).
• All about Metadata and the Catalog/Folders/Collections concepts.
• File ingestion using Library Module.
• File backup and storage strategies.
• Evaluating, ranking, labeling, and keywording files using Library Module.
• Using the Develop Module…
  • Color & Tonal adjustment
  • Noise reduction, Sharpening, and CA removal
  • B&W conversion and Toning
  • Spot removal
  • Vignetting
  • Presets & Batching
• Using the Print Module
• Using the Web Module
• Using the Slideshow Module

Materials Students Bring

• You should own a Digital SLR Camera. The camera you have is probably just fine. Bring it.
• You should own or intend to purchase Lightroom 2.
• Bring some examples (files or prints) of your work for us to discuss in class.

Who is This Class For?

• This class assumes you possess the fundamental skills of camera operation. You should be adept at exposure setting and operating your camera. Photographic principles of a fundamental nature will not be covered (see the Photographic Principals and Camera Operations course for that).
• The typical attendee is an enthusiast, ready to move into a self-structured process of working so they can work efficiently and effectively.
• People that believe that they want a solid grasp on fundamentals before they become confused with all the “razzle-dazzle” “tips and tricks” seminars out there.
• You do not need to know Photoshop to attend this course. There is no connection.

Contact Dixie State College Community Education at (435) 652-7675 to sign up.

Photoshop CS4 Throughput

Dixie State College Community Education in St. George, Utah is sponsoring my popular class: Photoshop CS4 Throughput. This class will be held in eight 2-hour Tuesday evening sessions on the following dates: 1/19/2010, 1/26/2010, 2/2/2010, 2/16/2010, 2/23/2010, 3/2/2010, 3/16/2010, and 3/23/2010. The classes run from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm. The college’s fee for this class is $99 + $25 for materials. The following topics will be covered:

• All about RAW files and how to expose them properly.
• Understanding color spaces (Pro Photo, Adobe RGB, and sRGB).
• File ingestion using Bridge.
• File backup and storage strategies.
• Evaluating, ranking, labeling, and keywording files using Bridge.
• Using Camera Raw to extract working files…
  • Color & Tonal adjustment
  • Noise reduction & Capture sharpening
• Workflow in Photoshop itself…
  • Lens Corrections
  • Principles of Layers & Masks
  • Tonal and Color touchups
  • Cloning and Healing
  • Using Filters and Plug-ins
  • Actions & Automation
  • Printing techniques
  • Other outputs (Web, ProShow, PowerPoint)

Materials Students Bring

• You should own a Digital SLR Camera. The camera you have is probably just fine. Bring it.
• You should own or intend to purchase Photoshop (CS4 is not essential).
• Bring some examples (files or prints) of your work for us to discuss in class.

Who is This Class For?

• This class assumes you possess the fundamental skills of camera operation. You should be adept at exposure setting and operating your camera. Photographic principles of a fundamental nature will not be covered (see the Photographic Principals and Camera Operations course for that).
• The typical attendee is an enthusiast, ready to move into a self-structured process of working so they can work efficiently and effectively.
• People that believe that they want a solid grasp on fundamentals before they become confused with all the “razzle-dazzle” “tips and tricks” seminars out there.

Contact Dixie State College Community Education at (435) 652-7675 to sign up.

Structure – a finishing step worth considering

Disclaimer: I do not mean to imply I “invented” this process. Frankly, I don’t know. It came to me over the last week as a way to create subtly enhanced, yet believable, images. If anyone else is already doing this then I guess the process is so obvious that several of us deduced the same technique simultaneously.

OK, now…

Many times I will take a credible image to its natural conclusion in Photoshop and create a master color file, that is, one that has been fully edited and adjusted, but not sized or sharpened for printing. If I see strong design elements beyond the colors, I will then convert it to black and white to see if it can stand in a monochromatic rendition. Sometimes there isn’t much worth saving, other times it is subjectively better than the color and I save it as a separate black and white master file. Having these two files, color and black & white takes us to my proposed technique: Structure.

This is a simple Photoshop Layer technique. Really simple! The point is that is adds “structure” (meatiness?) to the color image without throwing of the original color rendition.

Just stack the black and white image as a layer over the color image layer and change the blending mode to Luminosity. Adjust the opacity to suit. That’s it! Try it – let me know what you think.

Layer Settings

Here are the results…

 

Background Layer

 

Black and White Layer

 

Luminosity Blend with Structure

YAHDRC: Yet another HDR comparison

Zion National Park, Checkerboard Mesa, 3 renditions, best I could do. Please feel free to comment.

HDR in Photomatix Pro, Optimization in Photoshop CS4

 

100% Straight Photoshop CS4, no HDR

 

Turned the Photoshop version into B&W using Silver Effects Pro

HDR Comparison

It has intrigued me that the clamor increases regarding the potential and benefits of using HDR methods to compress dynamic range. As an experiment, yesterday I shot in Snow Canyon atop some sandstone atolls that have “water tanks”, the local moniker for “pools”. I present to you, for discussion and comment, both HDR versions and my traditional renditions of two of these scenes. I used Photomatix Pro 3.1 in Detail Enhancer mode. I will withold my opinion just yet. Please let me know what you think of the results.

 

Photomatix HDR

Traditional Photoshop

Photomatix HDR

Traditional Photoshop

My thoughts on HDR

First off, the essentials. The range of tonal intensity between the darkest and lightest parts of a scene is called the tonal range. Here are my opinions…

• Older digital cameras (and films) have a narrow tolerance for recording large tonal ranges. This is seen as highlight clipping or shadow blocking. Modern digital cameras improve on this slightly by having more latitude.
• The human eye has a broader perception for tonal range, but even that has a limit.
• Numerous solution have appeared over the years to artificially recreate a wide tonal range in a photograph beyond what a camera is capable of recording.
• For the most part, three aesthetic factors stand in the way of success:
  • Paper prints, at best, can only represent about 8 tone steps. The eye expects this because of its long familiarity with photographs. Attempts to compress dynamics into this range can look apparent and telltale of manipulation.
  • Anything that tries to represent a scene beyond what the eye could naturally see (about 12 tone steps) will be perceived as manipulated and mentally rejected as phony.
  • Enthusiastic photographer’s caught up in the current trend to apply dynamic range compression techniques seem hell bent on accomplishing the feat and less concerned with the perception of the image. We are talking ego over art.

Now, before I go on, let me explain that the computer offers us at least 4 different ways to represent a high dynamic range (HDR) scene.

1. Shoot a very accurate exposure with the intent of extracting shadows and highlight using Photoshop’s Curves and/or Shadow/Highlight tools. This is a technique that I rely on extensively since it produces the most impressive, authentic results.
2. Combine two pictures taken at different exposure setting using layers and blending masks (in Photoshop). This technique was first introduced to me by Michael Reichmann. Please see his original article for more info: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital-blending.shtml I occasionally use this method with some success, scene dependent. The photography above was produced in that manner. I was able to subtly control the rendering of the tones; no automation was used.
3. Use Photoshop’s HDR Tools to merge and blend multiple exposures. I have had miserable experiences with this because it seems like poorly written software (or at least unexplainable). On the other hand, a few days ago, my friend Kirby Flanagan, showed me a photograph prepared in this manner that was great. They say that each edition of Photoshop (CS, CS2, CS3, CS4) improves on this, so the time may be right.
4. Other HDR Software is stated to do a better job than Photoshop HDR Tool. I know nothing of this except it is all the rage. Again, I attain my HDR results in other ways so I have not bothered with this.

I frequently judge camera club competitions. I sit there and immediately pick out the the HDR-processed extravaganzas because of their unrealistic, ineffective, and frankly, pasty results. Until I saw Kirby’s picture the other day, I though that there would never be any hope.

The problem is, that these photographs are being presented as recoveries of reality, rather than distortions of reality. (Yes, I certainly do interpretive styles also, but I do not claim that these derivatives are intended to be reality. With me it is strictly “art for arts sake”, and the buyer is well aware that I am turning a few dials.)

What do I do as a judge? These folks are all out there in the crowd, salivating for awards, and turning out things I cannot appreciate, both because of the insincerity and the rendition. I am surely in the minority because the HDR craze has taken off like nothing I have ever witnessed in photography since my initial foray into the field 35 years ago.

Oddly, at least from my neck of the woods (NE Ohio), I feel a bit responsible. I have always sought to coax strong dynamic representations in my prints by traditional Photoshop methods, accurate exposure, calibrated systems, and top-quality media. People consistently remark about this. People have at times tried to emulate me. Any one can do what I do, but folks, there is no magic potion. IMHO, overdone HDR processing is very obvious and will not get you there.

It certainly bears repeating

Yesterday I sent out a mass email with a ton of news. For the sake of posterity, here’s what what was included…

Pre Holiday Art Shows

I am participating in 5 different Fine Art Exhibition/Shows from the middle of November through mid-December. I have had many customers ask to be reminded of these, so this is the first nudge I will be sending out. Remember, I will have the standard assortment of prints and cards that you have come to know, but, I will also have many new “standout” wall prints, ready to hang, printed in an amazing metallic finish. These make a wonderful gift. The photographs have been selected from my 2008 best sellers, so you will have many to choose from. In addition, the themed collector card sets that have proven popular would make the ideal holiday gift. I will have a high-definition large-screen video display of my offerings in my booth at these events making it very easy for you to make choices. I planned to be stocked up and ready to meet your holiday shopping needs. Here we go with the events…

• November 14, 15, and 16 – Cleveland By Hand Art & Craft Show – I-X Center – www.clevelandbyhand.com
• November 22 and 23 – Cincinnati By Hand Art & Craft Show – Duke Energy Convention Center – www.cincinnatibyhand.com
• November 28, 29, and 30 – Christmas In The Colonies – Medina County Fairgrounds – www.christmasinthecolonies.com
• December 5, 6, and 7 – Butler Holiday Craft Show – Butler Institute of American Art – www.butlerart.com
• December 20 – Countryside Conservancy Holiday Market – Happy Days Visitor Center – Route 303 in Boston

Gallery Exhibition

Once again, I have been honored to have a exhibition of my recent photography project at the Butler Institute of American Art. The exhibit, entitled “Call it a Loan; Borrowing a Piece of the Pacific Northwest”, will run at standard museum hours thought the end of 2008. It is timed in conjunction with Butler’s re-certification process and was personally selected to represent them by the management. It goes without saying, my gratitude for this opportunity is beyond words. You will find this exhibit on the second floor in the digital art wing. Once the exhibit closes, these works will be for sale, so contact me to reserve your art before it is gone. Here is the accompanying Artist’s Statement.

Never did I expect that a set of return trips to the Pacific Northwest would start a maelstrom of brain waves beckoning me to grow and explore this wondrous place. For three weeks during the Spring of 2008, I traversed three distinctly different regions of our Northwest: The Oregon Coastline; The Columbia River Gorge; and The Palouse Region of Southeast Washington. Sometimes I captured what I saw; at other times I only absorbed, reflecting rather than documenting.

This became a rich catharsis for me as I began to understand life unfettered in the realm of nature. What you are viewing here today is an exhibit of eight personal selections from a collection of about fifty that I show as examples of my photographs from this period. In making decisions to cull the exhibit, I reached inward for my inspiration – this is something one can easily do when commercial return is not the primary motive. You are looking into my soul.

From a technical standpoint, these are digital photographs taken using modern full frame SLR cameras and high quality lenses. I am somewhat of a stickler for technique and tend to spend a great deal of effort planning and executing to assure a striking outcome. Each image was carefully seasoned and cajoled in my processing system to bring out a “walk right in” characteristic. As such, I interpret with forethought. I do not simply document. After all, this is art.

This exhibit has been produced on Kodak Endura Professional Metallic Media to bring out a lustrous, striking gallery look with richness and head-turning capabilities. It is my first venture away from personally handmade pigment prints. I like the results and will be offering this option in the future.

Announcing DSLR Boot Camps 2009 Series

The DSLR Boot Camps have been around now for a few years and nearly 100 photographers have taken advantage of the in-depth training afforded them. Times change and so do we. I have decided to expand the class offerings to cover a broader range of interests as well as the varying levels of expertise. While these have not been planned out to the Nth degree, here is what you can expect. All classes have a size limit of 12 and are held in Brunswick at my well-equipped training facility. More dates will be added as these fill up. I am now taking reservations with 50% deposits…

• DSLR Boot Camp 101 – Photographic Principals and Camera Operation – 1/17/09 & 1/18/09 - 16 hours including guided field exercises – $159
• DSLR Boot Camp 201 – Photoshop CS4 Throughput- 1/24/09 & 1/25/09 – 16 hours – $229
• DSLR Boot Camp 202 – Lightroom 2.0 Throughput – 2/7/09 & 2/8/09 – 16 hours – $229
• DSLR Boot Camp 301 – Lightroom/Photoshop Interactions – 2/14/09 & 2/15/09 – 12 hours – $159
• DSLR Boot Camp 401 – Achieving Critical Artistry - 2/21/09 & 2/22/09 – 12 hours – $159

Please note that the above dates have been updated since this original post was placed online. The Boot Camp sessions now take place in a logical sequence and allow the requisite weekend off for the Super Bowl!

Field Workshops

I have many field workshops in the planning stages for next year. Stay tuned as I announce…

• Field Macro Photography
• Winter B&W Abstracts
• Panorama Extravaganza
• HDR Workout
• Spring Wildflowers
• Garden Scenics
• Fall in NE Ohio
• UP Michigan in Fall
• Spring in NE Ohio