Useful Technique For Digital Photographers

[PsiKik]

Digital has more flexibility, yet less dynamic range. It is a difficult game to play, sometimes.

Digital has until very recently much worse dynamic range than 35mm film.. and is probably comparable with slide (which has a narrower dynamic range). The very latest digitals are finally improving dynamic range, but typically there is little difference until say the last 12months on this between a 2mp and 11mp camera. Finally they are getting it sorted though :).

Still going to be a while before you can backlight safely with a digital though, I fear.

-Geoff
On the subject of dynamic range. I was dissapointed with many of my pictures because the camera simply could not handle the dynamic range of some of the very bright outdoor scenes I wanted to photograph. I thought it was a failing of my camera or digitals in general.
I have just found out about a technique to overcome this problem, its called digital-blending.
You use the cameras exposure bracketing feature to take 2 pictures, one exposed for the highlights and one exposed for the shadows, then you use a photo editing program to blend them using the best exposed portions of both photo's.

For some excellent examples of the technique look here:
http://www.tawbaware.com/maxlyons/cgi-bin/image.pl?gallery=1

for a tutorial on the technique look here:
http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital-blending.shtml

[Kotuku]

On the subject of dynamic range. I was dissapointed with many of my pictures because the camera simply could not handle the dynamic range of some of the very bright outdoor scenes I wanted to photograph. I thought it was a failing of my camera or digitals in general.
I have just found out about a technique to overcome this problem, its called digital-blending.
You use the cameras exposure bracketing feature to take 2 pictures, one exposed for the highlights and one exposed for the shadows, then you use a photo editing program to blend them using the best exposed portions of both photo's.

For some excellent examples of the technique look here:
http://www.tawbaware.com/maxlyons/cgi-bin/image.pl?gallery=1

for a tutorial on the technique look here:
http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital-blending.shtml


Yes,...

Digital blending is a very good technique that I've mastered quite well,... although not so much with digital photography, more so with B&W infra-red photography. I usually blend bracketed shots of the same scene using different partially masked layers in Photoshop.
Quite a fiddly technique for the uninitiated,... but gives quite good results.. (I think in the tutorial the "painted mask technique is the nearest equivalent).

In terms of Digital cameras, yes,.. overall they have a restricted latitude compared with film (some of the modern comsumer films have a fairly impressive exposure latitude), but I suspect some will do better than others... it really depends on the camera & what end of the user range its on. I have a consumer digital as well as a Pro-sumer Digital & the latter is quite good on exposure control. (includes very handy exposure histograms)
When photographing backlit scenes, depending on the camera & how much control you have over the settings, setting the camera to overexpose by a stop or two can give better results (experimentation usually required),... of course,... you still have the problem of lens flare & light bleed....

[Geoff]

yeah, the blending works well.. if it is a shot I *really* want I'll heavily bracket on a tripod and then do this.

The results can be astounding (and a little fake, if you aren't careful). I dont see it as cheating as you take the same photo just with different exposures to make up for a technology limitation.

-Geoff

[PiccoloNamek]

Interesting. In situations like that, I always just made a levels adjustment layer and then masked out the areas I wanted to protect from the effects. I can see how this would be useful in extreme cases, however.

[Geoff]

Yes, because you really do preserve detail that would otherwise be blown out. Try it next time you have eg the sun shining across a river (bright water highlights, dark banks to the river and sunlit leaves).

-Geoff

[Kotuku]

Interesting. In situations like that, I always just made a levels adjustment layer and then masked out the areas I wanted to protect from the effects. I can see how this would be useful in extreme cases, however.

Quite right,.. with my digital (Nikon D70) I usually just do this. I generally expose for the highlights & in most cases there is still enough detail preserved in the shadows that can be drawn out in masked adustment layers (I find "curves" can be quite good). Sometimes I can have several different selectively masked adjustment layers in one image,.. each doing something slightly different eg. contrast, brightness etc).

I was originally trained in darkroom fine printing & basically I started off digitally replicating advanced darkroom techniques (dodging, buring, contrast split printing). Handprinting colour is an absolute bitch - digital editing is much easier for colour.

Usually with Digital, I don't need to join together bracketed frames,.. but as Geoff says,.. sometimes the light levels are just too extreme (& loosing highlight detail is generally bad).

[TPol]

Thanks! Will use the technique. Have a grand time manipulating digital photos anyhow, but haven't done much of this...and certainly not this way. I haven't mastered "masks" yet.

[Kotuku]

I haven't mastered "masks" yet.

Masks are wonderful,... they are the absolute ultimate in Digital imagery.

As an example of what selective masks can do, heres a slightly larger version of the image that my atavar is based on.
To the left is the raw version of the image, and to the right is how it looked after various different selectively masked adjustment layers (there were about three different image curve adjustment layers, and a couple of different colour adjustment layers)

http://www.intpcentral.com/uploads/masked.jpg

[Geoff]

Yeah there is an excellent tutorial on how to do this in this month's photography monthly in the UK. All good stuff :)

-Geoff