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September 18, 2004
Today's photos are the result of a conversation I had with Mike the other night during a marathon pool session at, of course, The Charlotte Room. We were talking about what some other people had done to their photos in post, and how in some cases they had turned some absolutely ordinary photos into masterpieces.
So, rather than going out to shoot today (what a mistake — I missed a gorgeous sunset!) I came home, switched the camera to 'Auto' and quickly took two photos of my hand — with a flash — with the sole purpose of seeing what I could do in post to make them more interesting.
Yes, this is a topic sure to offend any purists but it's purely an exercise and a challenge for the day. Ultimately I just came up with two photos of a dirty grimy hand, but I did learn a few new tricks for getting extra detail and sharpness out of an image so it was worth it at least from that perspective. It's all too easy to go 'too far' and I've probably crossed that line a bit here.
For those that are interested, click the 'View the original' link below the image to can compare how they changed. As always, I'd love to hear comments, criticisms and all that jazz...
Update: I forgot to mention that tomorrow is the GTA Photoblogger Get Together (which, I cannot make unfortunately due to some forgotten plans :( ). Details here.
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17 Comments
These are great, Kendall! I have to admit, I was fooled until I read your text. I'd like to know how you got from point A to point B, and what was the trick you learned to get the detail and sharpness? Please share, if you will! The only thing I noticed that could give away the post-processing is the area outlining the ring finger on the top photo...looks a tad off. Hope you can make it out tomorrow!
Nice shot Kendall. It amazes me how much the hands can say.
I came into photography quite recently from a computer background and much of my stuff is post processed to some extent. I see photoshop as a digital darkroom. Just as you might take an image knowing you can rescue it, or make it in the darkroom (pushing, pulling, x-processing, etc), I see nothing wrong with taking an image that you know you can 'make' in photoshop.
They're just tools.
I sometimes think that it's a little cynical to randomly take a bunch of photos and then try to bring something out of them with PS, but if the intention is there, if you can say to yourself at the point you take your image that you can see what the result will be, then I have no problems with that.
I do think it's important to keep a connection with the actual image, and you can only really do that with intention. You see the image before you take it, you see what you want to end up with, then take the photograph.
That's how I try to work, by knowing what I can achieve in the darkroom (digital or not) I can recognise the potential in an image and understand my intentions.
Photoshop can do a lot more than just colour and tonal adjustment, but there is a line that you can cross once you start compositing and manipulating, it becomes graphic design at that point. Which I have nothing against either :)
Oh, and the charlotte room is in my neighbourhood, we should have one of those anchorman-style turf wars :)
great result.. i thought u were a coalman till i saw the originals ;)
Wow, I'm really impressed by these. Can you talk about how you did it?
That's an amazing transformation you accomplished with Photoshop! I'd also be interested in knowing what you did to achieve the result; I'll be back to see if you post on the topic. By the way, thanks for your very nice comment on my Simplicity photo! :)
the result is surprising when you look at the original photos.. nicely done!
I don't think it's a bad thing, using PS to manipulate some photos. these turned out amazing.
ps. the link to the original of the photo isn't working for me..
I totally thought you had gone off infiltrating without gloves or something. Nice work.
Too bad you can't make the get-together tomorrow.
So well done, yet so gross.
And yes, you did miss a BEAUTIFUL sunset. I wish I could have told you to get your butt out and take some sunset pictures. My 3.2 megapixels didn't really do it justice.
Love your work. I might try my hand at it :)
Here's a master at this stuff: http://www.andrzejdragan.com/ ...
"Here's a master at this stuff: www.andrzejdragan.com/"
holy crap!
Wow, lots of comments today. :)
First.. The website you mentioned Mark, is exactly the one that Mike referred me to which caused this whole experiment. That guy's stuff is amazing and is a very interesting example of the use of post processing. I highly recommend everyone looks through his work and read his section about 'painting with light' where he starts to explain his technique.
Second - it seems there's some interest in how I did this, so I will try to get together a page which explains it. It's nothing really new or inventive, but for those without a lot of Photoshop experience, I may be able to shed some light on it. Assuming of course I can scrounge together some time - we fly out to Arizona on Wednesday.
A quick summary though is taking the colour channel with the most shadow detail (in this case, it happened to be the blue channel), pasting it over the image multiple times in multiply mode, and using a 'poster edges' filter to bump up the detail a bit more.
At first I was wondering if you normally handled your camera with your hands that dirty ;-)
I hope you enjoy your time in Arizona! I know I love every minute of living here.
Wow, beautiful effect! Very impressive.
Woow, this is definitely Caravaggio! Astonishing pictures, super work.
I didn't get a chance to visit your site again until today and I am not surprised that you had to take a stab at the *painting with light* technique. It has a wonderful effect of creating the feel of an oil painting while retaining the detail of a photograph.
Keep up the great work...