Hazy or Foggy Images - Black and white points

[Christy]

Hi,

 

I'm new to Alamy (just a few days old) and trying to familiarize myself with the requirements and guidelines for submitted images.

 

This morning I photographed some images of the hazy skyline in Vancouver (due to the forest fires in BC) thinking that perhaps they might be newsworthy. I photographed the scene as I would a foggy scene, exposing to the right. Anyhow in post-processing moving the black point to say 5 makes for an image that doesn't portray the scene as seen... ie; the haze makes for a low contast scene with a very small dynamic range.

 

So at this time I'm thinking that I shouldn't bother processing the images because if I follow the guidelines for setting the white and black points the scene is not true therefore not newworthy... If I process the image as seen I would guess that the image(s) would be rejected for quality.

 

Thank you in advance.

[JohnB]

I assume you've tried to brighten it again by moving the midtone slider to the left. They do seem to reject images if black and white points are not where they want.  Otherwise the only thing to do in fog/mist is make sure you have a foreground object with a good range of tone.

 

BTW love the  pigeon guillemot and pelican.

[spacecadet]

IME Alamy do know what effect you're trying to achieve. I have misty shots with very high black points.

for example. The first one is only 30-220.

[Armstrong]

Hi,

 

I'm new to Alamy (just a few days old) and trying to familiarize myself with the requirements and guidelines for submitted images.

 

This morning I photographed some images of the hazy skyline in Vancouver (due to the forest fires in BC) thinking that perhaps they might be newsworthy. I photographed the scene as I would a foggy scene, exposing to the right. Anyhow in post-processing moving the black point to say 5 makes for an image that doesn't portray the scene as seen... ie; the haze makes for a low contast scene with a very small dynamic range.

 

So at this time I'm thinking that I shouldn't bother processing the images because if I follow the guidelines for setting the white and black points the scene is not true therefore not newworthy... If I process the image as seen I would guess that the image(s) would be rejected for quality.

 

Thank you in advance.

News isn't QC'd like normal stock. It bypasses the QC queue however I'm sure if the images weren't up to scratch they would be pulled v quickly.

 

In this case I would have shot JPG without any Expose to the Right. With news speed is of the essence so I'd get an in camera JPG replicating what I saw and upload that. You could always shoot a RAW and JPG and use the RAW to upload a standard stock photo later if you wanted to work more on the image.

 

EDIT: If you are new to Alamy I'm guessing you might not have news upload yet. In which case I would say shoot a RAW without any ETTR. When you process if there genuinely no blacks or whites you'll have to use your judgement in what is the correct exposure.

 

Michael

[Jill Morgan]

I went through this dilemma awhile ago. Like Philippe, I ignore black and white points and I simply set my sliders to what visually appeals and looks great at 100%.

 

 

 

Jill

[Ed Rooney]

A histogram is just a graphic representation of the scene. If you can read the scene, which you should be able to do, you don't need a histogram. I never look at the histogram. 

[John Mitchell]

I tend to agree with Edo, Histograms are the work of the devil (he's gone digital BTW). I've ruined the appearance of a number of images trying to follow Alamy's specifications, but they did pass QC.

[spacecadet]

Never touch the things. The little gremlin inside the camera does it, I think.

[MDM]

Histograms are very useful when processing raw images as they are clear indicators of whether you have your monitor set to a suitable brightness level or not. Without a hardware calibrator, this is pure guesswork. Highlight and shadow clipping indicators in conjunction with the historgram are incredibly useful in LR or ACR.

[Niels Quist]

News isn't QC'd like normal stock. It bypasses the QC queue however I'm sure if the images weren't up to scratch they would be pulled v quickly.

 

Not only removed, but transferred to your stock image QC queue for normal QC and more than possible sin bin....

[Ed Rooney]

Histograms are very useful when processing raw images as they are clear indicators of whether you have your monitor set to a suitable brightness level or not. Without a hardware calibrator, this is pure guesswork. Highlight and shadow clipping indicators in conjunction with the historgram are incredibly useful in LR or ACR.

 

Total BS.

[MDM]

 

Histograms are very useful when processing raw images as they are clear indicators of whether you have your monitor set to a suitable brightness level or not. Without a hardware calibrator, this is pure guesswork. Highlight and shadow clipping indicators in conjunction with the historgram are incredibly useful in LR or ACR.

 

Total BS.

 

Strong stuff Ed. Explain your reasoning there perhaps?

 

The histogram in Lightroom is actually an incredibly powerful tool if you know how to use it. Rather than attempt to explain why, here are a few links to videos from Julieanne Kost of Adobe that wll save me the trouble.

 

https://blogs.adobe.com/jkost/tag/histogram

 

The following video demonstrates an amazing use of the histogram which many people will not know about but may find useful. For one thing, it shows why you should probably not use sRGB as a color space unless you are preparing mages for web use only.

http://blogs.adobe.com/jkost/2012/03/video-tutorial-soft-proofing-in-lightroom-4.html

[Christy]

Thank you, kindly to everyone for your helpful replies and for sharing your experiences with similar images. Truly appreciated and very helpful.

 

I haven't signed up for the news feed, yet and of course the images are old news now. However, I enjoy photographing images in fog and mist, and my personal preferences tend to be for a true representation of the scene, low contrast and/or tending to be high key so all the replies will serve me well for future. It's nice to know that others have submitted misty/foggy images without a true white or black point. And yes, jpeg for news is more efficient.

 

John, the tip about including a foreground object with a good range of tone is a great tip that I will keep in mind for future.

 

Thank you!

[Ed Rooney]

 

 

Histograms are very useful when processing raw images as they are clear indicators of whether you have your monitor set to a suitable brightness level or not. Without a hardware calibrator, this is pure guesswork. Highlight and shadow clipping indicators in conjunction with the historgram are incredibly useful in LR or ACR.

 

Total BS.

 

Strong stuff Ed. Explain your reasoning there perhaps?

 

The histogram in Lightroom is actually an incredibly powerful tool if you know how to use it. Rather than attempt to explain why, here are a few links to videos from Julieanne Kost of Adobe that wll save me the trouble.

 

https://blogs.adobe.com/jkost/tag/histogram

 

The following video demonstrates an amazing use of the histogram which many people will not know about but may find useful. For one thing, it shows why you should probably not use sRGB as a color space unless you are preparing mages for web use only.

http://blogs.adobe.com/jkost/2012/03/video-tutorial-soft-proofing-in-lightroom-4.html

 

 

You're right -- I apologies for the rudeness. I was trying to write "gobbledygook" but I had the spelling wrong.  

 

I did explain my reasoning in my first post in this thread, that's what you were commenting on.  Again: "A histogram is just a graphic representation of the scene. If you can read the scene, which you should be able to do, you don't need a histogram. I never look at the histogram." Both Philippe and John M are in step with me. That's pretty heavy company. If you feel you need to look at the histogram, please do so. 

 

Edo

[spacecadet]

 

 

I haven't signed up for the news feed,

You don't , it's by invitation. Unless you're actually a news photographer and apply, you have to build up a good QC record first so they can trust you to bypass it. I didn't get the tap on the shoulder for a couple of years.

But they do say that if you have something newsworthy, call the newsdesk and if it's warranted they'll take it.

[Christy]

 

 

 

I haven't signed up for the news feed,

You don't , it's by invitation. Unless you're actually a news photographer and apply, you have to build up a good QC record first so they can trust you to bypass it. I didn't get the tap on the shoulder for a couple of years.

But they do say that if you have something newsworthy, call the newsdesk and if it's warranted they'll take it.

 

Thank you for letting me know. Truly appreciated.

[MDM]

 

 

 

Histograms are very useful when processing raw images as they are clear indicators of whether you have your monitor set to a suitable brightness level or not. Without a hardware calibrator, this is pure guesswork. Highlight and shadow clipping indicators in conjunction with the historgram are incredibly useful in LR or ACR.

 

Total BS.

 

Strong stuff Ed. Explain your reasoning there perhaps?

 

The histogram in Lightroom is actually an incredibly powerful tool if you know how to use it. Rather than attempt to explain why, here are a few links to videos from Julieanne Kost of Adobe that wll save me the trouble.

 

https://blogs.adobe.com/jkost/tag/histogram

 

The following video demonstrates an amazing use of the histogram which many people will not know about but may find useful. For one thing, it shows why you should probably not use sRGB as a color space unless you are preparing mages for web use only.

http://blogs.adobe.com/jkost/2012/03/video-tutorial-soft-proofing-in-lightroom-4.html

 

 

You're right -- I apologies for the rudeness. I was trying to write "gobbledygook" but I had the spelling wrong.  

 

I did explain my reasoning in my first post in this thread, that's what you were commenting on.  Again: "A histogram is just a graphic representation of the scene. If you can read the scene, which you should be able to do, you don't need a histogram. I never look at the histogram." Both Philippe and John M are in step with me. That's pretty heavy company. If you feel you need to look at the histogram, please do so. 

 

Edo

 

 

OK Ed. No worries. We all have our own ways of working.

 

Me, I like working with numbers and quantifying things. This is the way my mind works. I am a self-taught photographer and, soon after I first got into photography many years ago, I came across the Zone System. While I never implemented it very strictly, it provided a great basic framework for me learning to expose, develop and print in black and white. I learnt how to control my workflow mathematically to get what I wanted back then and that is what I do now digitally. Using a calibrated monitor and having an accurate system for raw conversion, where I know how to control thel tonal range and capture detail in highlights and shadows, with good blacks and whites (if appropriate to the image), is the way I usually work. The histogram is an important visual tool for this as Julieanne Kost demonstrates in those videos.

 

In the case of the OP here, I agree with the others and would not be inclined to extend the tonal range if I was trying to convey the effect of mist which naturally produces very low contrast.

[Guest]

The histogram is not a graphic representation of what you see on the screen, it's a graphic of the file data. What you see on the computer screen is dependant on many factors such as gamut, luminance, calibration etc. It has it's place in digital file prep for many and validly so.

 

As ot the OP, Alamy will sometimes ping you for levels if they are too obviously compact - ask DavidK who fell foul of it in the past.

[Ed Rooney]

You're splitting tech hairs, Geoff. What was that word again? Gobbledygook. The important part of your cryptic comment about DavidK's problem is "in the past." There have been many changes in how QC approaches things in recent years. 

 

I've never had an image fail QC due to the misuse or nonuse of a histogram. The rejections I had were all due to mistakes I made in straying from my workflow. 

[Betty LaRue]

Histograms are very useful when processing raw images as they are clear indicators of whether you have your monitor set to a suitable brightness level or not. Without a hardware calibrator, this is pure guesswork. Highlight and shadow clipping indicators in conjunction with the historgram are incredibly useful in LR or ACR.

I agree about the monitor bit. I just got a new internal hard drive on my iMac, and when I started it up, the monitor was so bright it blinded me. First thing I did was bring the brightness slider way down. Then look at an image's histogram (not a foggy one, but one with high contrast) with the whites moved high but not clipping, and adjust again. After doing that, I applied a previously set calibration. Gamma, etc. but the monitor brightness was key to the image brightness to appear as it should, which is important as you develop an image.