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plaguedoctor posted:Jesus Christ, this thread has taken a depressing turn. Or should I say, more like "as expected". Professional, fine art pro labs in large cities running state of the art inkjets. Everything else loving sucks. You can just do what I did and buy your own inkjet, calibrate the gently caress out of it, and just sit around and proof over and over again until it's perfect. Expensive and often a pain in the rear end, but my poo poo looks absolutely flawless.
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Mar 13, 2009 06:17
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Tez posted:Cool thanks for that. To limit the scope of a Curves adjustment set the layer mode to color/luminosity/etc.
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Mar 19, 2009 03:16
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evensevenone posted:Don't use the individual R G and B curves, just use the combined curve. If you use the individual channel curves you need to make microscopic adjustments (and these probably aren't the best tools for color editing since its so hard to do anything useful). I kind of disagree, I use Curves to color balance using the individual channels. You do have to know what you're doing but you get a great deal more control than any other method. CS4 makes Curves a little more user friendly because you can do the "click area you want to change and drag the mouse" thingie from Lightroom. brad industry fucked around with this message at 05:17 on Mar 19, 2009 |
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Mar 19, 2009 04:59
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All of those examples look way too plasticy/fake.
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Mar 30, 2009 19:01
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Open a HSL layer, click the color selector, click and hold the color you want to change on the image, and drag forward or back until it looks good. Mask as necessary.
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Mar 30, 2009 19:13
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The way I do it is use the patch tool at 200% to remove blemishes but this is time consuming and probably not worth it for snapshot type stuff. I tend to only process 1-2 photos from a shoot and I'm anal so I don't care about the time investment. The upside is it doesn't make your subjects look like mannequins or aliens. edit: since I have this image open anyways... her right cheek and neck needed to be cleaned up.  \/ oh I know brad industry fucked around with this message at 20:33 on Mar 30, 2009 |
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Mar 30, 2009 19:51
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Loinworm posted:A histogram will tell you IF something is clipping. It will not tell you what or where. Specular highlights for example, should clip and you shouldn't particularly care. I don't know about should clip because they don't have to, but they are way over to the right, yeah. I pretty much ignore what the LCD says and just watch the histogram, although that is not ideal and shooting tethered is the way to go if at all possible.
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Apr 27, 2009 19:12
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Yeah the LCD has absolutely nothing to do with the file. If you want that shoot JPEG at the defaults I guess.
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Apr 28, 2009 04:31
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Splinter posted:I would like to emphasize how horrible the ACR profile is for some cameras. Here are some examples that compare the Lightroom with the ACR profile, Lightroom with one of the new profiles added in 2.2, and Nikon Capture: I don't think any of those are objectively "better" than any of the others and any of them would be what I would consider a more than acceptable starting point for a RAW file. This is like complaining that your negatives need work before the print looks good.
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May 1, 2009 00:33
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RA-4 printing is the reason I switched to digital. I hate that poo poo. And of course, the only other thing that approaches that level of tedium and frustration is scanning negatives. I will take the worst RAW processor over having to constantly walk back and forth from an enlarger to a processor any day.
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May 1, 2009 02:02
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snowman posted:Well to be fair, an inaccurate lcd display on the back of the camera really can screw you when you thought you had the correct exposure, and it turns out it is underexposed, or your flash isn't set right when you look at it on a computer. It would be nice if you could set the lcd display to show a more true representation of the raw image. This is why god invented the histogram.
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May 2, 2009 06:03
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evil_bunnY posted:That, and you can't go back if you ever want to switch away from Adobe. DNG is an open standard, that is the whole point. I have LR convert everything to DNG on import, I don't see any reason not to and there no downsides to it. I've heard too many horror stories about files that are locked up in proprietary RAW formats from back in the day. caberham posted:Does converting to DNG makes the file lose dynamic range making it difficult to create HDRs (that's what a studio photographer working under canon told me) There are no disadvantages to converting to DNG unless you are one of those people who thinks your camera manufacturer's RAW format/converter is more "correct" than Adobe or whatever. Spyder and the Pantone Huey's are both excellent choices.
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May 11, 2009 22:09
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spog posted:It doesn't seem to have gathered much of a following. Looking on the Wiki it seems that only a handful of camera manufacturers support it and there's not much of a software following either. It's still relatively new, every piece of software supports it (or at least I can't think of any that don't), most camera manufacturers will probably switch to it eventually, and I can't imagine a hypothetical future where obscure proprietary formats are supported but an Adobe promoted open standard isn't. quote:Out of interest, which formats are a problem? A lot of old digital backs. Actually the ones I hear bitched about most are the Kodak ones. The only reason pros care about this way more than consumers is that all those really old consumer cameras just shot JPG and don't have this issue of unsupported RAW formats with software that doesn't exist anymore so they haven't had to deal with it (yet). It's not a big deal but it's all transparent and automatic when I import in Lightroom and there are no downsides to it so why not? It's good DAM practice. I do it for the same reason I prefer LR vs Aperture and won't buy a Drobo (even though they're sweet).
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May 12, 2009 03:16
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RAW formats are just container files, there is nothing inherently special about them. DNG provides support for proprietary, manufacturer-specific addons in addition to the normal stuff so I think it's just a matter of time before they all shoot DNG natively. I don't think Canon/Nikon files are in any real danger of being inaccessible, but the photo industry changes fast and it wasn't that long ago that everyone swore film was never going away and that of course you'll be able to open your Kodak files for forever... There's no reason to not to do it. I started doing it when every digital tech I know started converting everything. I have a pretty specific workflow, have to worry about asset management, and make sure all files are handled the same way so this is just one tiny thing in a long list of stuff I do when I work with new files, you may not care/be as anal as I am. I've just worked for too many guys who had no sort of organizational or backup system... pulling files for people like that is a nightmare so I make sure my stuff makes sense. quote:Are they complaining that the RAW format is unsupported in LR/PS - or is it that there is no software at all available (ie cannot convert to TIFF)? Their files can only be opened by proprietary, manufacturer software that no longer exists and is impossible to get another copy of now. No LR, PS, Aperture, Bridge, whatever - there's literally no way to get the information out into another format anymore. brad industry fucked around with this message at 05:19 on May 12, 2009 |
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May 12, 2009 05:14
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pwn posted:That's stupid, you mean nobody in the world has this software anymore? Oldversion.com? Torrents? This isn't like downloading an old version of CameraRAW for your mass market Canon. I'm talking about really old medium format backs that were never used by consumers and at the time, very few pros. No one bought these things because they were so expensive, so everyone was leasing. No one has the hardware anymore, much less the software that came with it 10+ years ago. In a lot of cases it wasn't that extreme, it was more like no one updating the software that could open the files when the switch to OS X or Intel Macs was made. Oops, your $30k digital back just became useless in a production environment and now you have to keep an old G4 in the corner just to access your archives. God forbid you need to send a RAW file to a retoucher or your printer or anything like that. (I don't think this is going to happen with cameras now... but there are zero downsides to converting to DNG, LR and a lot of other software makes it easy and painless, and no matter what camera/software combo you use now or 10 years from now DNG will be supported perfectly)
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May 12, 2009 07:13
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(For me) Lightroom is for RAW processing, Photoshop is for actual retouching.
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May 21, 2009 21:00
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Sharpening should always be the very last step in your workflow, so do noise reduction before (which makes thing soft anyways). Don't sharpen in ACR unless that is the last step before output. Radius depends on the file size and what it's being output for. I generally use .5 for web and 1.5 for print but that depends.
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May 29, 2009 01:53
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Back up your library with it. Not sure if creating the XMP sidecar will save your edits but that might also be a solution.
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Jun 2, 2009 04:51
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I've always used [ and ] in LR and PS, map your scroll wheel to that maybe? That's what I do for my Wacom tablet buttons.
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Jun 11, 2009 03:26
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raggedphoto posted:(I have never trusted web based storage) I don't trust most of the services out there but Amazon's S3 is what I use (with the JungleDisk software for doing the actual backups). S3 runs like half the internet, and Amazon or their services aren't going to disappear over night or anything which is more than you can say for some of these "$5/mo for unlimited backup!!" services like Mozy. I do not trust DVDs at all, even archival ones. I've heard too many horror stories. Optical media is just too fragile, too many things can go wrong, they're too easy to damage, and there's no real evidence that the archival ones last all that long either. I think it's better to use hard drives over DVDs. At least if something goes wrong with a hard drive there are ways to recover the data, unlike a hosed up or degraded DVD. Really you should just assume all of your media is going to fail or become corrupt at some point and plan accordingly.
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Jun 12, 2009 21:34
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I'm in. Just pick files that can actually be interpreted multiple ways.
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Jul 6, 2009 22:30
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What's the point of doing this if people aren't going to process it to their taste/style? Just post a file and let people do whatever they want with it and have everyone post their steps.
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Jul 6, 2009 23:18
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Everything's kind of midtone-y and there's not a clear focal point, you need some dark areas and deeper blacks. I would just burn a lot to add some contrast and kind of limit the focus down if that makes sense.
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Jul 7, 2009 00:32
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poopinmymouth posted:This is done often in 3D where one model (think a digital sculpture) is offered, then as many people as desire do a texture for it (think painting the surface) You really get some amazingly different interpretations, and it's awesome. I had a couple of printing classes where we took turns with a negative/given a RAW file and were told to make a print from it and then all compare what we had all done. Always interesting to see how different people will interpret the same source. A really, really flat file would be best for this. I'll see if I can find something.
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Jul 7, 2009 02:07
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TsarAleksi posted:About how much would you say that you spend on S3? I am looking into backup and while a lot of it seems like it would be fairly inexpensive when you look at raw numbers, adding it up makes the costs seem to explode. Or do you only backup high value files, or what-have-you? I dunno I should probably look up the bill. I think right now I'm storing like 100GB, so not very much. I don't back up tests, snapshots of friends, etc. to it, just actual shoots. The advantage of Jungledisk+S3 vs Flickr is you can store any kind of file (ie. RAWs, PSDs), it does automatic incremental updates, keeps revisions, mounts as a normal drive, is all seamless, etc.
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Jul 16, 2009 20:42
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Interrupting Moss posted:Do you have have a very fast connection for uploading files? That's what keeps me from using off-site backups. Yeah I have a pretty fast DSL line all to myself. I get like 600k/s up to Amazon's servers.
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Jul 17, 2009 01:52
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kmcormick9 posted:Could someone post a tutorial for masking and layering in cs3 for someone with almost zero photoshop experience? Every tutorial online assumes I already know how to mask, etc. One tip I can't live without: Press "|" to see where the mask is.
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Jul 21, 2009 22:46
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Just using d (reset palette to black/white) and x (switch foreground/background color) when making masks will make everything go twice as fast.
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Jul 25, 2009 21:20
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SirRobin posted:Pack your spyder or munki or whatever you use to calibrate your monitor along with a few changes of clothes, some food and a notarized statement from a reputable therapist attesting to your sanity into a sturdy backpack. Pretty much this. If you really care about people seeing it how it was intended, make a printed portfolio. But then of course you have to deal with showing your book in places with lovely lighting  poopinmymouth posted:Quick post from last night I figured I could post. Keep in mind it's purposefully underexposed because it's going to be the backdrop for a portrait. I pretty much do this to all of my photos, it is the first step in my retouching workflow. Removing small distracting elements makes a massive difference in the end result. An easy way to do this kind of stuff is to duplicate it and then clone-stamp onto the new layer with the source set as the original layer. I dunno if other people have a name for it but I call it "polishing". teh_Shane posted:I like the split-toning in this one.
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Jul 31, 2009 02:42
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That's not really a lot of post if you previsualized that result from the start.
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Aug 14, 2009 07:21
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You can't do it in Lightroom, and The Gimp isn't really going to help. I would get a copy of PS, put the images on separate layers, and then mask in the portions from each exposure. It's pretty simple.
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Sep 15, 2009 21:45
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Kaluza-Klein posted:The little graduating filter tool in Lightroom is nice, but it doesn't help much if your sky line is not straight as a ruler. LR and PS do two totally different things, they're not alternatives to each other. Lightroom is a workflow program and RAW processor, Photoshop is a raster pixel editor. One way to attempt this in just Lightroom would be to try using the Brush tool, but that kind of assumes you have enough dynamic range to work with in one file. It'd be better to do it with multiple files in PS even if you can make it work in LR.
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Sep 16, 2009 19:11
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Probably my favorite thing about LR is the H/S/L tool. The ridiculous amount of control you get over your color is awesome. Especially since they added the "click and drag a color" to change it thingie (I forgot what that's called, it rules) which also works with the Curves dialog. I know some people who refused to shoot digital because they felt the color palette of film was really important to them, and they couldn't replicate it digitally well enough until Lightroom came out because Ps takes a more heavy handed approach and Camera Raw isn't intuitive enough to make really subtle changes.
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Sep 19, 2009 01:17
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Toupee posted:I'm probably using them "wrong", but I like using the Calibration sliders too. I tend to use those, then fine-tune with the HSL if anything else needs changed. Nah I use that a lot, it's particularly useful for getting red tones where you want them since digital sensors seem to suck at reds.
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Sep 21, 2009 18:34
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psylent posted:http://www.shorpy.com/4x5-large-format-kodachromes?page=1 This is awesome.
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Oct 12, 2009 03:06
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Keep it on an external drive, or create a new library on set and merge it with your main one afterwards.
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Nov 10, 2009 19:22
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Put your image on top of a transparent layer then put a layer mask on it with a gradient.
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Dec 1, 2009 03:11
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I don't really use my Wacom with Lightroom since it's mostly sliders and things like that and when I use the brush tool it's usually really broad and basic. PS on the other hand I couldn't live without a Wacom for masks, patch/clone, etc.
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Dec 17, 2009 22:09
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I have a 4x5 basic tablet and it's more than fine for doing photo stuff. I find the large ones a little more cumbersome to use for things like making masks. The bigger and more sensitive tablets are really for drawing and IMO overkill for retouching.
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Dec 17, 2009 23:16
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Probably the best part about LR is the H/S/L panel. Such a ridiculous amount of control, that in and of itself is a reason to shoot RAW.
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Dec 18, 2009 03:36
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