Bob Grier’s From the West: Beautiful light, Fading color.

October 26, 2011 Afield and Afloat No Comments

Revisiting a recent blog, I’ve continued to experiment with in-camera jpeg defaults, using a new set of jpeg defaults recommended by a photo forum author. Not too much drastically changed, but it was fun to see the difference between the in-camera’s jpeg, the really blah raw file when opened in photoshop, and a realization using photoshop tools to produce one rendition of the image.

I’d mentioned in the earlier blog that “you can set your camera’s jpeg defaults” that will directly impact the camera’s internal development of the image you’ve taken, and to experiment with the jpeg settings to find the rendition (renditions?) you might prefer. When I say renditions, it could also work that you will find several different jpeg defaults that would work for different types of subjects, possibly portraits for example, or different subjects that have saturated colors that you might want to make even more dramatic.

So here are different renditions of the same fall color scene from yesterday on West Ash Creek in the Pine Ridge, a favored fall color hike on U. S, Forest Service property open to the public. My in-camera jpeg defaults, as recommended by another photographer: ISO: 200; Saturation: -2; Contrast, Standard; Sharpness, +1; Brightness, Standard; Color Space, Adobe RGB; Creative Style, Vivid; Color Temp., 5500K, Magenta/Green correction, M1 and for my camera that has the previously discussed Dynamic Range Optimizer option, Advanced Level 2.

Out of camera jpeg with settings mentioned above

The second image is the out of camera RAW file, capturing everything the camera’s sensor recorded without compression that would “throw away” some of the sensor data. Of course it appears to be close to the jpeg, I’m not familiar enough with the RAW “development” to know if it matches the jpeg “thumbnail”.

Out of camera raw file, opened in PS and saved as a jpeg.

The last image shown here is one of many final image work-ups using the PS tools available to modify the RAW file.

And this brings me back to the previous jpeg default camera settings, the out of the camera jpeg produced with the above default settings offers a very nice capture AND USEABLE IMAGE of the intent BEHIND THE ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN ON WEST ASH CREEK, but again, the RAW file offers significant advantages if you wish to look at different color temperature, saturation and other PS tool settings on the original RAW.

I think I’ll continue to leave the camera set to these jpeg defaults, and immediately see their impact on the image.

Keep in mind your original intent for the image, how you would like it to be displayed, and if you’re working to flirt with producing images that are currently displayed in art galleries, perhaps adding a bit of “unrealistic reality” might work. I work for a fairly straight forward print without too much obvious PS additions but that is only a personal working decision, your mileage may differ..

While initially previewing this post, another rendition came to mind, and I’ve added this next image as another “flavor” of the moment, this rendition digitally framed and matted as well.

Perhaps after some 35-years of trying to be an Ansel Adams clone, or at least attempting to channel his vision, I still see most subjects in black and white!!

Bob