Textures

Ok, here's something I took while at the beach.

http://www.benhall.co.uk/pics/naturalmetal.jpg

I really like texture, and thought this one would be good to practice on.

One of the main areas I feel I'm really inexperienced at (and therefore going to try to practice more) is moving on from my raw images - like a lot of people, I'm thinking that many of my photos are quite bland compared to the good stuff - this is quite common I see. So I'm trying to get into the habit of developing my developing, if you see what I mean ;)

Don't get me wrong, I know the techniques and how to use Photoshop pretty effectively - it's more developing my understanding of what needs to do done to an image, and by how much. In other words, it's the art of improvement I feel I'm lacking, rather than the technique. To begin with, it feels a little unnatural to start bumping up the contrast, saturation, sharpening and so on to make a bolder image, which is why I've resisted it in the main up until now, but I'm really trying to move my brain on a little, much as it tries to resist. It's like when you retouch portraits - when you know what you started with, the edits seem way more unnatural than if you only see the retouch, because you know what's changed etc. I'll post the raw pic in a little while.

So.. with this, it's an interesting rusty piece of metal. The photo is cropped, as it had another piece of metal on the right coming right out at right angles to the foreground, which while I liked it at first, it was distracting, and a bit of a blurry mess which lessened the focus on the interesting bit - so it went.

From there, I did a B/W conversion, and then did a bit of work on the highlights and shadows to make it a bit bolder, and a bit of sharpening. I also darkened the panel around the bolt to draw a litle more attention to it.

What I like about it is that once the colour has been removed, it's not immediately obvious whether it's wood or metal...

Here's the original shot:

http://www.benhall.co.uk/pics/naturalmetal_original.jpg

A very interesting shot to my eye Ben H. I like the texture and the representation of tones and the 'abstract quality' in the b/w version

Thanks Marko. It's partly your insistence on doing this kind of postproduction on basically *all* your important images that's made me want to work harder in this direction.

And I can certainly see that the final image, while not spectacular (wasn't really intended to be) is certainly working a lot harder at being visually interesting than the source photo. At least for me ;)

If you're looking for podcast suggestions, I'd certainly welcome a podcast on post processing - not so much on (for example) what dodging and burning is (I know you've done this already - and I did indeed find it useful), but *why* these things should be done, and when, and how much is too much etc. Basically the aesthetics of post-production, rather than the techniques.

Because it seems that virtually all final images we see are "packaged" in this way - the don't fall out of anyone's camera looking that fabulous - which is reassuring to those of us reviewing our bland source images :)

Thanks!

It would look much more Halloween appropriate in a colour version after postprocessing for texture.

Tegan

Thanks for that Ben. I'm glad my insistence on making people look more closely at their images is working :p

In terms of that suggestion,...it's just too broad i think. I like to give people neatly packaged 'tips' or bitesized chunks that are meant to motivate and/or educate on a specific topic. The topic you are suggesting is a buffet sized meatball sandwich for 100 people. You know the kind that spans 2 tables at a party.

If you want to tighten the topic ( Basically the aesthetics of post-production, rather than the techniques.) I'd be happy to reconsider...

The why part is easy - it's always to make the image sing.

thx - Marko

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ben H

Thanks Marko. It's partly your insistence on doing this kind of postproduction on basically *all* your important images that's made me want to work harder in this direction.

And I can certainly see that the final image, while not spectacular (wasn't really intended to be) is certainly working a lot harder at being visually interesting than the source photo. At least for me ;)

If you're looking for podcast suggestions, I'd certainly welcome a podcast on post processing - not so much on (for example) what dodging and burning is (I know you've done this already - and I did indeed find it useful), but *why* these things should be done, and when, and how much is too much etc. Basically the aesthetics of post-production, rather than the techniques.

Because it seems that virtually all final images we see are "packaged" in this way - the don't fall out of anyone's camera looking that fabulous - which is reassuring to those of us reviewing our bland source images :)

Thanks!

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by marko

In terms of that suggestion,...it's just too broad i think. I like to give people neatly packaged 'tips' or bitesized chunks that are meant to motivate and/or educate on a specific topic. The topic you are suggesting is a buffet sized meatball sandwich for 100 people. You know the kind that spans 2 tables at a party.

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Yeah, fair enough, you're absolutely right.

Realistically, the only way to get better is to shoot and process more, absorb other peoples' images that inspire you, and keep upon the reading/research/podcast stuff absorbing as much info as possible.

So I guess ultimately anything related to polishing raw captures to "make them sing" (hopefully in tune ;) will be especially interesting to me.

Other things I'd personally be interested in include the dreaded Noise - why/when it happens, and ways to deal with it...

Thanks as always,

Ben - Very good that you are stepping into a more thought provoking arena! Also, that you shared your thought process with us, very much appreciated, indeed!

You are so right about second guessing what you eye is seeing with the b/w version - well done! (I do though, love the color of the original image.)

Susan

Thanks - yes, the original colour is really nice, and I took plenty of those too - I can never be accused of not shooting enough ;)

I like the way this one almost seems to come right out of the frame:

http://www.benhall.co.uk/pics/rusty.jpg

It's funny, because my dad comes from a film shooting background, and even now with a digital camera I see him line up a shot, compose it carefully, and then he doesn't take the shot, and moves to a different angle to try again. This comes from years of treating each shot as something that costs money, so the only shots taken were ones that are really good.

I tease him about this and keep saying he should take the shot anyway, even if he isn't too sure - in fact, take multiples. Remember, it's *free*.. :)
Sometimes it's when you get back and look at them that you notice something in detail that you only took in by instinct at the time of capture.

Ben, this image grabs me as well. The texture on the old iron work is exquisite and you are right, I really am intrigued by the way it looks as though it is about to jut off of the page. Good work.