Revisiting Infrared

The new Outdoor Photographer (Jan-Feb 2014) has an article on IR by Nevada Weir. She doesn't shoot a lot of nature, but uses a processing method that gives a very interesting soft color effect. My IR-converted Canon 5D had been collecting dust since the summer greens faded, and her pictures convinced me to see what it did with winter browns. This is nothing noteworthy -- just a first quick try, 50 ft from my front door.

I'm not sure her method will work with all IR filters. There are several that transmit different spectra. She uses the LifePixel Standard conversion and I have their Super Color, and it looks like I can get basically the same effect she does.

Unless you shoot JPEG, you can't correct the White Balance sufficiently in ACR/LR. You can in Canon DPP. I don't know about other converters, but she mentions an easy way to do it, which is also what I have done for quite a while. She says she uses the Adobe DNG Converter, but I think she means their DNG Profile Editor, which is a separate app you download. I'm not sure many people here are shooting IR, but here's how to use it:

Export/save your desired file as a DNG
Open it in the DNG Profile Editor (top menu bar)
Go to the Color Matrices tab and in the White Balance Calibration bring the Temp slider full left
Go to the Options tab and name the profile
Go to the File menu and Export Profile
The default folder should be correct for your system
Then you can quit the app without saving anything
For Lightroom, restart to have the profile available
Go to the Camera Calibration tab (LR or ACR) and choose the profile
Back in the Basic tab change Temp and Tint to get cyan foliage and rust skies
You can make a custom preset in Lightroom

I've also found that if I'm going to a B/W it isn't really necessary to correct the red color.

Those browns and grays make a wonderful background for the silvery leaves. Great composition, too.

I'm glad you posted this when you did. So far, I haven't succumbed to the temptation to have a camera body converted, but Singh-Ray recently had a sale, and I bought their external infrared filter. Tomorrow, I was going to shoot a clump of brown oak leaves whose fall was interrupted by the slender branch of a lower tree, but I hadn't thought of trying out the new filter. (I haven't opened the new Outdoor Photographer, yet, either.) The IR filter requires long exposures, but today's gusty winds are supposed to subside sometime tonight, so I'm going to see what I can do with it.

Diane, I like the subtle colors here and will have to find a copy of that magazine. Thanks for sharing her technique - my 30D is converted with a standard conversion so this should work for me. I have been considering converting my 7D but I need to call them and talk to them before I do. The 30D can only add +2 EV and sometimes I need more than that.:S3:

Cheryl, it's nice having live view, but if it's just for the exposure compensation, you can always go to M!:w3 With a lot of blue sky in the composition, I do need + EC, but I'm not sure I've ever needed to go beyond +2 (I have the same limitation with my old 5D).

Dennis, would love to see what you get!! Let us know how the RAW files compare, for WB. I don't remember what camera you use...

I've wondered recently if an IR filter like that would substitute well for a ND filter for long exposures. You'd get a skewed spectrum, sure, but it could be very interesting.

Lovely image.

Could you post the image that came right from your camera. I am interested in IR, but have heard that quite a lot of Post P. is needed. Just wondering what it looks like before PP.
Thanks.

Hi Diane, I like how this turned out and the details in the leaves is nice...well done :S3:

Here's the "OOC" for Mitch -- with the caveat that there is a huge change in color appearance with the WB. So this isn't really the appearance OOC but "into the converter" for LR/ACR. Since LR/ACR can't adjust to a low enough color temp. Temp = 2000 (the lowest it can go), Tint = -61. I don't low how it decides on the tint. DP can go down to the correct custom WB. If you shoot RAW + JPEG, the JPEG does have the custom WB from the camera and is cyan for blue sky and tan for green foliage.

With some images there is a more pronounced, brighter red color -- I think those are the ones shot in a greener environment.

If you just want to go to B/W I have quit bothering with any PP except tonal adjustments. When I go to Silver Efex Pro the result is almost the same as if I go to DPP and do the "correct" WB, or if I use the in-camera JPEG.

I posted one straight from LR just for fun a few months ago:
http://www.birdphotographers.net/for...-of-the-box-IR

IR will generally be lower in contrast than color shooting, which is why you can often keep shooting IR when the light gets too harsh for color. Many things, such as green leaves in the shade, will be very low contrast. And exposure will vary a lot with the amount of sky, so you need to keep an eye on the histogram and often adjust and re-shoot.

Very nice, Diane. I'm always fascinated by IR photos. Very interesting seeing the before and after. I love how the leaves pop out from the BG in a 3d look, and I also like the fine detail in the leaves.

Diane,

Greetings. I like the frosty look of the OP, the detail in the leaves and color palette of the bg. Still find the IR stuff puzzling. The white balance settings seem to suggest that much of the information is recorded in the red channel? So the blue and green channels need a boost to balance?

Thanks for posting.

Cheers,

-Michael-

That is apparently a different way of looking at it. I friend of mine process his IRs by boosting the other channels, and I keep meaning to sit down with him and do a side-by-side comparison of side-by-side shots. (I.e. go shoot and take our laptops to a nearby coffee shop...)

Everything I've seen about processing IR (which is miniscule, I'm sure) just talks about adjusting the WB, but I've actually found that makes a very small difference if I just go to Silver Efex.

If you go to that IR post I referenced above, which is a "way off" WB, and pull the image into PS, you'll see a distribution of tones in all the channels, but I've never been sure how the Y-axis scales....

These IR images are fascinating and I really appreciate the before and after images as well as the information posted.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Diane Miller

. . . Dennis, would love to see what you get!! Let us know how the RAW files compare, for WB. I don't remember what camera you use...

I've wondered recently if an IR filter like that would substitute well for a ND filter for long exposures. You'd get a skewed spectrum, sure, but it could be very interesting.

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Here are one of the IR shots with the Singh-Ray filter along with the middle shot from an HDR sequence. They're both untouched RAW. It was 10 degrees outside, yesterday morning, and breezier than I was hoping for. All the snow had been blown off the oak leaves. Both shots were f/3.2 and ISO 2500 to get a short exposure for at least the conventional shot. At 1/3200 sec, there was still motion. I did a quick estimate based on a guideline I'd seen and used a 1-minute nominal/62-second actual exposure for the IR one. The camera was a Nikon D3S, and the white balance was on automatic.

Except for looking at IR images, this is all new to me. I'm going to have to download the DNG editor and play around. My original intent was to just do B&Ws, but after seeing what you did, I'm going to try for color with the silvery leaves.

The top and bottom right of the IR image looks a bit strange. I'll have to keep my eye on that as I shoot more with the filter and see if it was just something related to the conditions during yesterday's attempt.

That is interesting -- thanks for posting it!! And it is odd about the corners, especially the LL. Try pulling up the contrast and then adding some Structure in Silver Efex -- you may be very pleased! I assume you could also get the same subtle color effect with the proper WB. IR is an adventure!

Look forward to seeing more!

Do you have any advice about white balance and IR?

LifePixel tech support has told me you want to set the "correct" WB, which appears to be the one that gives the best separation between tan skies and cyan foliage -- but that is for the SuperColor filter I have. I'm not sure how much separation can be achieved with other filters, which would have a different transmission spectrum. The "correct" one is at a lower color temp than LR / ACR can achieve.

Set the camera to shoot RAW + JPEG and set a custom WB with the filter in place, and tell the camera to use it -- it will be embedded in the JPEG, which you can compare to what you can do with the RAW. Various sources say to set a custom WB by shooting a white card, a gray card, green grass or a closeup of a tungsten bulb.... Go figure. I settled on a gray card, just because it seemed the most average.

No harm in trying the DNG Profile Editor -- at worst you will have a stray profile you don't like and can delete. (Using any profile is optional.)

Hi, Dennis, I have a custom white balance set in my IR converted camera based on shooting at green grass. Sometimes I only have to do a levels adjustment after shooting but a lot of times I'll convert to B&W in LR or Nik Silver Efex to get what I'm looking for. I'll be interested to see some of your IR images with the filter. I'm trying to decide if I'd like to use one on the 5DMkIII.

I found green grass worked about the same as a gray card -- apparently many different targets will give about the same WB t the IR end of the spectrum, when target color is extremely critical in visible light.

Cheryl, does the custom WB give you a reddish image, or a cyan-tan one? (Or something else?) Is it a JPEG or a RAW? A JPEG will have the camera's custom WB. If a RAW, what software do you use to open it?

If you're Canon, DPP will read the custom WB; ACR/LR will try but they can't go low enough, so the Temp slider will be pegged at the blue end, which still leaves a reddish image.

I'm curious how Nikons handle the issue.

Thanks very much Diane and Cheryl. I'll probably get some evergreen IR images before things green up in the Spring. And I'll try using my gray card for the WB.

Hi, Diane, usually I don't get a tint of any kind - just an IR black and white. I use LR and usually do nothing to the temp slider. I will sometimes change the toning in Silver Efex.

That must be one of the filters I don't know about -- maybe one of the ones predating the "color" filters that apparently transmit a little more into the visible spectrum?

But I'm curious to learn more about this IR stuff:
Are you getting a RAW file or JPEG?
If RAW, what software are you opening it with?
Do blue skies always come out black or do you have adjustment leeway in processing?
And what camera?
Did LifePixel do the conversion? Do you know what filter?
When I look at mine to clean it, it's orange. Some look black.

Ah, but -- Maybe it's the WB from shooting at green grass that removes or minimizes the red color. I remember trying that once but for some reason went back to using a gray card. Maybe it was because I thought I liked the red tint better -- don't remember. Need to experiment. I'm still scratching my head over LifePixel saying they do the initial custom WB by shooting a regular incandescent light bulb. I should try all 3 WB settings again...

Thanks!

Hi, Diane, I'm shooting with a 30D converted. I read a really good book by Deb Sandidge who does wonderful IR and pretty much followed her instructions for getting a good WB. I usually get black skies depending on the color of the sky I'm shooting - bright blue is ideal. Here's an image (I haven't done much post processing to it - in LR I increased exposure and used a medium contrast tone curve) that I took in Taos recently. I went back and looked at my notes and I used Silver Efex Fine Art which increased the graininess and I used Ilford Delta 100 Pro film which darkened the darks and brightened the whites.

OK -- thanks -- I'll check out the book. I didn't know about it.

I really like the very dramatic scene here!

I've always had leeway on how dark the skies are. If I shoot something against a bright blue sky, I can take the red-tinted RAW file go into Silver Efex and make the sky either black or almost white, using the Hue and Strength sliders in the Color Filter section.

I'll have to see how custom WB affects that.

I'm late to this long discussion. Before I read it, I want to say that I like that the leaves look as if made of silver. Lovely. The background is a bit distracting, but I know you were experimenting.

I agree, Anita, the BG is less than ideal. I was standing on a fairly good slope and was lucky to get this angle. The others were worse. This was the 50mm f/1.8 lens at f/6.7 in order to try to get enough of the leaf in focus. A tightrope.