A full belly. A little sunshine. Now time for a nap. . .
Canon 6D
Zeiss 80-200 @160 (or so)
1/1000 f/5.6 ISO 400
HH and MF
Taken at Duba Plains, Okavango Delta, Botswana
This was an exercise in judicious pp, so. . .
Very light touch on highlights/blacks/whites/shadows and slight crop for comp in LR5
Very light lumo masks (lights and midtones), smart sharpening 45/.5 in PS CC and save bicubic for Web
Remembering Steve's earlier comments stressing white balance, I made sure to set this first in LR and work from there. Setting a "good" white point in LR was helpful too. Both significantly reduced the need/temptation for other adjustments and made the rest go pretty quickly. Thanks for that. :)
Hi Edward, although away at present, the image looks way better. If you keep things simple, then 95% of PP is a breeze and if you do not get sucked into applying every conceivable bit of software & acton to it, then not only will you be able to have more time out in the field, but more importantly your images will be far closer, cleaner and nearer to the original capture. The best example is Gabriela's caracal in Wildlife, this highlights everything I have said.
A nice portrait of a sleepily lion cub, something they love to do & Duba have some of the biggest lions, best known was 'Silver eye'. If you have it, then a sliver more to the right would be good it's a fraction tight. BTW check your techs, EXIF says you had a 50mm lens, f/1.4, also I note you have GPS set. If you have shot any endangered species i.e. Rhino then please remove all location data before posting for obvious reasons, hence we will remove any info in the Wildlife Forum about the location if posted.
Thanks, Steve, much appreciated. I'm very familiar with that impressive caracal shot and have gone back to it several times for study. I need to post a sign above my monitor: Less Is More. :)
As for techs, the older glass I used here doesn't "talk" to the camera (no electronics) except for a beep when it thinks I've got focus. Therefore, the camera provides its default info in the EXIF. I have a PS plugin that records the correct lens info but I often forget to run that. I don't own any AF/IS glass, just rent them occasionally.
Hi Edward, it's so easy to get fooled into thinking I need this, that and the other because people tell me too and my image will shine, well IMHO you don't. Just get to grips with a good RAW converter i.e. LR, PS, Capture One, DPP and PS. Learn properly the basics in conversion, coupled with good fieldcraft and you are well set. I doubt the majority of people here have a full grasp of all the software, the majority stick to the essentials and build on that as these softwares are very powerful tools that need harnessing by us, you drive it, not the software. I think you are starting to see the benefits, just learn to walk, then you can think about jogging.
A very nice catch! The shadows indicate full sun but the image is very low in contrast and saturation (the two are strongly related). Raw captures (without any auto adjustments) are low in contrast in order to preserve the most tonal range detail, so often they need to be brought up judiciously in raw conversion. I think this one could benefit from a slight Curves to increase contrast and possibly after that some Vibrance. Or if the tonal flattening occurred after the raw stage, with the luminosity mask, I'd consider backing off of it. Unless you go to a 4th or 5th order luminosity mask, you are affecting a huge tonal range. Curves will often give better control.
There is also a slight blue cast, further contributing a little to the flatness. Here is a small Curves correction, for both neutralizing the shadows and bumping contrast a little, and a slight boost in Vibrance.
This is far from perfect but just to give you an idea. I think you could do much better starting over from the raw file.
Last edited by Diane Miller; 11-29-2014 at 03:32 PM.
Thanks, Diane. I really don't touch saturation or vibrance in LR. Why? Because someone better than me back in LR3 days said not to, ever. But yeah, here it does add some needed snap. Maybe best if I rethink that old advice.
Definitely rethink it. Vibrance, and sometimes Saturation, or a balance of both, is something I find helps with almost every file I work up. There are no hard rules, there is only what works, and that varies with each image. A raw file is flat because of its wide range of tonal information.
If you boost contrast (and all the sliders other than Contrast can do that, or reduce it) then you may not need to bump colors. Some people just reach for saturation first -- that's a mistake, for sure. Maybe that's what your adviser meant. It's generally best to fix any big problems first, then set white balance and tint, then set the tonal range, using at the histogram for a guide. Work from the top down in the General Tab, but you'll often have to go back and tweak things as you change others. It's all a balancing act.
Sleepy Baby
