Turning a Simple Image into Something More Complex
It’s always a push to try out new gear and push the boundaries a little bit. I was taking the Lumix GH5 out for a spin with the Leica DG Vario-Elmarit 100-400mm lens which works well for wildlife and images that need a long reach. I was curious how I could use in my everyday art photography.
Since I was out in the wetlands and the birds were not cooperating I started playing. I had already experimented with motion while making exposures to get fantastic color palettes and forms. I would never have thought that a scene with great depth of field which I’m showing down below would have started with a lens of this reach. Here’s the scene. The Wind is blowing. Grasses are swaying gently. I focused in the middle on a single blade of grass. This emphasis point made for an overall softness on the scene due to the depth of field and the foreground being way out of focus and moving. The sharp piece of grass in the middle followed by more falloff and motion and in DOF with the background grasses.
First image Straight out of Camera as a RAW File.
“OK, Bob, I don’t get it. What do you see that I don’t?”
Here you go with a little processing in Adobe Camera RAW you will start to see where I am going with this.
Added a little Saturation, Clarity, Contrast, Shadows, Highlights and Whites up and Blacks down to get to this point.
Photoshop for a little clean-up on the grass stalk that had some scratches on it with the next stop MacPhuns’ Focus CK plugin to add a bit more sharpness and color and a slight vignette. Final settings were a change of Mode to Multiply and the use of MacPhun’s Luminar to add some more color and snap. I enjoy the feeling of depth and dimension achieved by this process. I’ve got a deal below for you to get Luminar and some other goodies below!
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One of the great pleasures of traveling to speak to photography groups is the fellowship with photographers. I met Ernst Ulrich Schafer while at the PPW Conference in Yakima, Washington. Ernst and I went out on an adventure and had a blast getting to know each other.
I asked Ernst to take a moment to pose for me to make a portrait. Found a decent spot for a nice lighting pattern on his face but the final portrait was completed in post-production. Here is the story of ‘The Making of Ernst”.
Final image of Ernst
Original capture. Looking for a soft split light pattern.
I looked for a background that had a little bit of a gradient and a soft shadow transition from light to dark. Accomplished but finding an overhead light block with two open sides. I placed Ernst closer to the left-hand side to make the short side of his face the lighted portion. The light coming from the other side worked as fill. If aI wanted a sharper contrast I would have moved him further left. Less contrast further right. Since we can’t move the lights in a situation like this moving the subject is the only way to go.
Process in NIK Silver FX Pro 2 with Sepia Tone. Note the difference between this image and the final at the top of the page. The white rim on the collar was removed as it was a distraction. Additional dodging and burning was done to lightly increase contrast and control some of the highlights. Check out the Layers Palette Screen Capture for more details.
If you don’t already have NIK filters be aware that they are a free download from Google. There is a great variety of filter effects available in the Suite. I often use Silver FX Pro 2 for my black and white and sepia tone conversions.
Layers Palette
Background is the original capture. Silver Efex Pro 2 is the Sepia Tone conversion. The copy Layer shows some retouching with the removal of the white collar. Layer 1 is a Soft Light Layer to burn in the sweater and add contrast to the shadow side of the face. Layer 2 is another Soft Light Layer to control some highlights and add a little sparkle to the eyes. I use the Soft Light Layer Mode to dodge and burn my images.
As you can see Adobe Photoshop with a pit stop in Adobe Camera Raw is a large part of my workflow.
Image made with the new Lumix GH5 and the 42.5mm f1.2 Nocticron lens @f1.2 1/320th sec ISO 200
Had a good time making photographs in Tampa with Rob Bird a couple of weeks ago. We were on the beach at Fort Desoto Park, and I was working with my Tiffen ND Pro 100 Landscape filters. I used the 10 Stop plus the three Stop filters stacked together under overcast skies.
Made with Lumix GX8 camera and 12-35mm f2.8 G Vario Lens with a sixty-second exposure. Added a bit more blur to enhance the scene in post processing in Adobe Photoshop
I like the ability to add a sense of time to my images by using the deep ND filters. Clouds and water merge into an otherworldly look. I’ve only just begun to experiment with this type of photography and look forward to getting better.
When working with the Tiffen Filters, I feel confident that the glass will protect the actual filter material. In the past, I had been using plastic filters and often ended up with scratches making replacement frequently a necessity.
This image had the same settings and gear as above. Added just a bit of grain in post-production. Also removed a tower that was in the background that was a distraction.
Please note that this is not documentary photography. I am working toward giving you the vision I have for the final art piece. I am always adjusting my artwork to suit my vision. With that said, I am onboard with Julianne Kost in using the term ‘Lens Based Artist’ or ‘Lens Based Art’ to differentiate this work from my more realistic work.
I work light when on location. Here’s my gear list that is pictured above. MeFoto Road Trip Tripod. Lightweight yet solid. Packs up small for travel. Think Tank Mirrorless Mover belt bag. Hold three lenses, spare batteries, lens cloth, mini-tripod and extra SD Cards. Lumix GX8. 12-35mm f2.8 Lumix Vario Lens, 7-14mm f4 lens, 35-100mm f2.8 Lumix Vario Lens, 20mm f1.7 Lens. Also on my belt the Tiffen Filter kit mentioned above. On my shoulder is a Lumix GX85 and the 100-400mm Lens.
Walt Richardson & Friends at Sound Bites Grill Sedona
What a great show! Walt is known for his reggae music, but he is so much more. He’s a legendary songwriter with a big heart, and it shows during his performance. His friends are entertaining and talented musicians. There’s a reason Walt is in the Arizona Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame.
Walt’s own words say it best, “I am a Soul, Living out my life as a Songwriting, Storytelling, and performing Musician.”
Learn more about Walter Richardson & Friends.
Art with signatures for the Wall of Fame
If you have followed my work you know I photograph the musicians live while they are performing for marketing of future performances. In addition, I create an image for the ‘ Sound Bites Grill ‘Wall of fame’. These art pieces are created with each individual member of the band recorded and then extracted from the image and rebuilt. It’s a great challenge to render each performer and band in a slightly different style. Here in a nod to the reggae, the red and green lighting pattern was utilized in the spot lights. The singer-songwriter and personality of Walt was highlighted by picking an expression with that little smile and wide open eyes.
Non-logoed version of the art.
Most of the images were captured with the Lumic GX85 and a 35-100mm G Vario lens.
Image of the full band for future marketing and appearances at Sound Bites
Back-stage view at SBG.
Walter Richardson black and white photo.
When I am creating the marketing photos I always make the conversion to black and white as well as a color version. There is more to creating a dynamic black and white image for printing than just desaturating the image to monotone. You need to control the contrast and the highlight and shadows properly to make a solid photo.
BJ’s Brewhouse Art Piece – ColoadoSprings, Colorado
Had a great time sharing Adobe Photoshop techniques from my PhotoSynthesis program for the Professional Photographers Guild of Colorado Springs. During my All Day hands-on class, I was charged with creating artwork from scratch live in front of the attendees including making selections and sharing the thought process as I created the image.
Here’s the image I made for the class with a few elements cleaned up for clarity
This technique was one I created for art application but I keep finding that it is working its way into my commercial work as well. You can see the original photo below. The textures I used were images that we had gathered on-site that morning. The idea is you can create a significantly different image using many different techniques, textures, masks and blend modes.
Here’s the Photoshop Layers Palette in a screen grab illustrating some of the techniques used.
The text was created using the fx palette. A large font was used for the name to attract attention. It was ‘dressed’ with bright color, an inner glow with a bright edge and a drop shadow. All of the text effects were chosen to help make the name stand out. The text for the address was more informational and was rendered white to be in high contrast with the rest of the image.
Here is the original capture SOOC ( straight out of camera) when my beer was delivered at the bar. Made with the LumixGH4 and the 35-100mm f2.8 G Vario lens
While I was in Florida for the Lumix Luminary summit on the GH5 I had scheduled a couple of extra days in Florida to photograph wildlife and nature scenes.
Thanks to fellow PPA member Rob Bird I was able to get to some cool areas with great subject matter. One of the benefits of being a PPA member is that you have photographer contacts who know the lay of the land all around the country. We got up and going for what I call dawn patrol to capture the city of Tampa at sunrise. I decided I’d work a couple of cameras with my Lumix GX8 capturing a time lapse of the whole sunrise while I used the Lumix GX85 for stills.
Tampa sunrise set to the music of Eric Miller – ericmiller-worldmusic.com The video was put together using ScreenFlow a screen capture program that has some pretty powerful video processing features.
The time lapse features of the Lumix cameras are pretty amazing. You don’t have to add an intervalometer because it is built-in. You can select your timing between image capture, the number of frames, start and stop times in an easy to use interface. But, here’s the incredible part. You can process the finished time lapse in the camera. Choices for how many frames per second and quality level is chosen. In this case, I prepared the files to a 4K .mov video. 4K allows me to move around within the image in post-production when using a smaller timeline.
For infrared conversion of my cameras I use LifePixel. Infrared allows you to put an older camera to use and opens up a new time time of day for productive image creation.
Fotopro tripods are well worth checking out. You can learn about the ones I use and recommend by clicking on the Fotopro Tripods link at the top of this page. If you want to see what other tripods might fit your needs check out the Fotopro.com website. Check back with me before you buy as a Fotopro Ambassador I’m able to get you discounted pricing including complementary continental USA shipping for my followers that you won’t find through retail outlets.
Learn Photoshop in a fun environment. Aaron Nace applies the right amount of fun with easy to understand and follow tutorials. Actions and brushes are included with lessons!
Lightning, waterdroplets, sound, time-lapse, HDR sequences, smiles and much more control for your camera!
Cameras Get Smarter -
A High Speed Smart Camera Remote
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Platypod has become a great resource for being creative in getting your camera gear easily into unusual places. As an Platypod Pro I get to work/play with the gear even before it comes out. Head over to Platypod, subscribe to the newsletter and you will get special discounts reserved only for subscribers.
First image Straight out of Camera as a RAW File.
Added a little Saturation, Clarity, Contrast, Shadows, Highlights and Whites up and Blacks down to get to this point.
Photoshop for a little clean-up on the grass stalk that had some scratches on it with the next stop MacPhuns’ Focus CK plugin to add a bit more sharpness and color and a slight vignette. 
