Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Hi folks, This is kind of an exercise on what decisions we make when taking and processing an image, so I hope this helps not only me, but also you on the way we all process and take our pictures. Kodakovic didnt like 3 of my images processing as he said in another post. Since one of them I am fond of I decided to ask what you guys think of my decisions when I took and, in the end, if you would upload this image or not. I have uploaded this image to my microstock agency 4 years ago, but it never sold there. So I deleted it from their database and decided to give it a try here just a bit diferent processing. That´s the image: This is the monument in Marienplatz in front of the New Town Hall in Munich. The decisions I made: 1) I used a polarizer filter.even though this helps make the sky more dramatic, I wonder if its really better. This image is 6 years old, I had a Canon 50D at the time, the sky gets a bit noisy with the polarizer so I have to boost the mask filter up to 55 to not enhance the noise in the ACR Photoshop converter. To compensate that I had to increase the sharpness to 55. 2) I used a 10mm wide angle lens to take this image getting very close to the monument. 3) I kept the bycicle sign which I have cloned out when I uploaded it in the microstock agency 4 years ago. I think one of the characterisitcs of Munich is that you can bycicle anywhere so I thought it would be nice to keep it. Also, because than the image is not digitally altered. Do you think I should have cloned it out? 3) I processed it using the Adobe RGB color space. In my other microstock agency, I used to process everything as sRGB, but everybody complained that my images looked dull in their web browsers, than the agency told me their preferred color space was sRGB, so I started processing everything as sRGB; After reading some forum members here, I decided to go to Adobe RGB in Alamy, not sure if my images are not showing as dull images to many buyers. 4) I did boost the shadows a lot and recovered the lights so the histogram is mainly in the middle, not that much light contrast in the image. 5) I didnt cloned out the clouds that looks like a vapor breath coming from the angel head (which I did in the microstock version of this image that never sold) 6) I barely corrected the verticals, thought this was exactly what made this photograph unique (it is a very well covered subject). The image doesnt have room for any extra type or text because of that. (in the microstock version I have strongly fixed the verticals). 7) Last, but not least, if this was your image, would you have uploaded it? Thank you very much for your sincere and helpful opinions. Alex Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Kuta Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 For me, the uploading question is moot because I wouldn't have taken it that way--way too busy for my tastes. Don't know what I'm supposed to look at first. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 For me, the uploading question is moot because I wouldn't have taken it that way--way too busy for my tastes. Don't know what I'm supposed to look at first. Point taken Bill, you like simpler, more focused on the subject compositions, did I got it right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Kuta Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 I think it's mainly the lantern on the left being so prominent. I might have moved up closer to exclude it. And maybe eliminate the flowers. But this is all just my personal taste. It is an interesting shot, and I could see it possibly selling. I don't have any argument with the processing, except I think I would have used noise reduction instead of additional sharpening. And in general I would never clone out a cloud, but I don't know what the original looked like. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Mitchell Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 I find it a bit busy as well, and the lantern is distracting IMO. However, I would have uploaded the image if I thought there might be a market for it. You never can tell what might appeal to a buyer. Likes and dislikes are always subjective, of course. Not sure I would have bothered using a polarizer. They generally don't work well with wide-angle lenses IME. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kumar Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Yes, I would have. Sure. But the bicycle signage is totally discordant, as is the building behind the lantern ! I would have cloned out both (yes, digitally manipulated). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joseph Clemson Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Yes, I would have. Sure. But the bicycle signage is totally discordant, as is the building behind the lantern ! I would have cloned out both (yes, digitally manipulated). I would be very unsure about cloning as suggested. In an image where the use is going to be soft editorial, illustrating a leaflet or website, then removing significant parts of the surroundings seems a little misleading. If is were an image intended mostly for commercial use then OK, but not with this kind of subject in my book. To the OP. Yes, I would upload it as it stands if it was the only one I had of the subject, though I wouldn't necessarily expect it to be a best seller. If I had a better one of the same subject then I would be happier. I would guess you took several in the area, so just be choosy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Definitely. It's an unusual view and that is to its credit- I've been to Marienplatz and I didn't recognise it. The bicycle signage is part of the scenery- if it's good enough for the town council it's good enough for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MDM Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 I agree with Philippe in relation to the flowers - they are a major distraction because of the blast of colour, pulling the eye away from the main subject (the column). I think the converging verticals work here because they contain the main subject - I generally do not like converging verticals and incidentally they have become even easier to correct in the latest update of Lightroom with the Guided Transform. What I would suggest is to put a grad filter in LR/ACR across the very top of the image to darken the sky across the top, more in the top right corner and make it the same in tone and colour as the rest of the sky - it is presently lighter and again is distracting to the eye. I saved your jpeg to my machine and a tweak of about -40 highlights and -15 temperature gets the sky reasonably even in colour and tone. EDIT I don't know if it's present in the larger image but there is really bad CA (visible at 200% and more in this small image) at the top and right edges of the image (cathedral). If it is in the larger image, then I definitely wouldn't upload it without correcting it as it would be certain QC failure if examined by QC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MDM Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 OP - I wouldn't worry about the opinion on that one person, especially when you've seen some of their efforts when it comes to processing (non-processing). I would upload it, I don't see a reason not to. I would straighten the main statue though (it needs a slight anti-clockwise rotation), and I agree with you about leaving the other lines as they are as that's part of the shot. Of course rotating it will also crop out the flower bed a the bottom and foreground object on the left a little more, when they're already pretty tight, but I'd give it a go and see how it looks as I think it will help the image. My main issue with it is that it's all too bright. The flowers, statue pole and building on the right are too bright and especially the flowers have lost detail. I would take down over exposure a tad and maybe compensate on the shadows by turning them up slightly. I'm nit-picking, but you did ask. Also I notice a hint of purple fringing at the top of the pole supporting the statue. It's a bit hard to tell without seeing it closer but it looks like fringing to me, where the lit-up and in-shadow parts of that pole meet each other. As others say, it's a busy photo but I think that's often fine, it just depends on personal taste and what the client is after. Geoff. Geoff - I wonder if you might have your monitor turned up very bright as the image looks fine in terms of tonal range to me, not too bright or blown out in the highlights, and the histogram (need to download it to your computer) verifies this. Also not entirely clear who you are referring to in terms of not worring about somebody's opinion - I've read the posts and can't figure out who it is - like to clarify? EDIT - Geoff -looking at your portfolio, the images look fine in terms of brightness so your monitor is probably not too bright. In relation to the OP's picture, a small reduction in the highlights (-5 to -10 max LR/ACR) would probably improve the image in terms of visibility of detail in the column but I wouldn't reduce the exposure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 I think it's mainly the lantern on the left being so prominent. I might have moved up closer to exclude it. And maybe eliminate the flowers. But this is all just my personal taste. It is an interesting shot, and I could see it possibly selling. I don't have any argument with the processing, except I think I would have used noise reduction instead of additional sharpening. And in general I would never clone out a cloud, but I don't know what the original looked like. I didn't remove the cloud, it comes from the head of the angel to the sky.Interesting thought, noise reduction instead of mask and sharp, you don't think the noise reduction would loose more detail than the mask? What software are you using for processing your images? I understand what you mean about the lantern, you don't know if it's the photo anchor leading to the building or if it is the subject because it's so prominent in the image. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 I find it a bit busy as well, and the lantern is distracting IMO. However, I would have uploaded the image if I thought there might be a market for it. You never can tell what might appeal to a buyer. Likes and dislikes are always subjective, of course. Not sure I would have bothered using a polarizer. They generally don't work well with wide-angle lenses IME.Also the polarizer vignettes the image many times with the wide angle.Nowadays I am rather editing the sky darkening the blues instead of using a polarizer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 Yes, I would have. Sure. But the bicycle signage is totally discordant, as is the building behind the lantern ! I would have cloned out both (yes, digitally manipulated). Interesting thought, only the monument than Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MDM Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Geoff - I wonder if you might have your monitor turned up very bright as the image looks fine in terms of tonal range to me, not too bright or blown out in the highlights, and the histogram (need to download it to your computer) verifies this. Also not entirely clear who you are referring to in terms of not worring about somebody's opinion - I've read the posts and can't figure out who it is - like to clarify? EDIT - Geoff -looking at your portfolio, the images look fine in terms of brightness so your monitor is probably not too bright. In relation to the OP's picture, a small reduction in the highlights (-5 to -10 max LR/ACR) would probably improve the image in terms of visibility of detail in the column but I wouldn't reduce the exposure. My monitor is calibrated properly, but I see after your edit that you probably agree with that now. I still think the overall brightness is too much, which does affect the highs of course but in my own experience of image processing, that image has more of an overall over-exposed look (the statue post, also the top in particular, the flowers and cathedral). You could be right that just bringing down the highs would be better, maybe as well as taking the exposure down slightly? The person I was referring to was the one the OP mentioned in his first post. I intentionally didn't write the name again as I don't want to offend anyone too directly. Geoff. He did say he boosted the shadows so that will give an over-exposed look but I think the histo is reasonably well balanced. Different monitors will have different abilities to render highlights anyway so, even if calibrated to the same brightness level, what I see is probably not exactly what you see. I know my wide gamut desktop monitor is way better in terms of highlight detail than my laptop or the monitor I use sometimes when I'm travelling. As for colour calibration, different devices and/or software can give quite different results. Sometimes I think that the more I learn, the less I know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 Yes, I would have. Sure. But the bicycle signage is totally discordant, as is the building behind the lantern ! I would have cloned out both (yes, digitally manipulated). I would be very unsure about cloning as suggested. In an image where the use is going to be soft editorial, illustrating a leaflet or website, then removing significant parts of the surroundings seems a little misleading. If is were an image intended mostly for commercial use then OK, but not with this kind of subject in my book. To the OP. Yes, I would upload it as it stands if it was the only one I had of the subject, though I wouldn't necessarily expect it to be a best seller. If I had a better one of the same subject then I would be happier. I would guess you took several in the area, so just be choosy. Hi Kumar, thanks for your thoughts. The New Town hall is one of the major landmarks of Munich so, cloning it out might make a better image, but might make it sell less, you are right. One point I forgot to mention is that getting closer to the monument I got rid of the crowd of tourists. Yes, I have several other images of the area, I usually take first those obvious images, kind of postcard images, than I go for the more unusual like this one. Dont you think I should upload both types of images, the more obvious and the more "creative" ones as well? I know its a balance between offering options to the buyers and our ranking, but for stock I think we need to offer options, specially if one image is very different than the other. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joseph Clemson Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Yes, I would have. Sure. But the bicycle signage is totally discordant, as is the building behind the lantern ! I would have cloned out both (yes, digitally manipulated). I would be very unsure about cloning as suggested. In an image where the use is going to be soft editorial, illustrating a leaflet or website, then removing significant parts of the surroundings seems a little misleading. If is were an image intended mostly for commercial use then OK, but not with this kind of subject in my book. To the OP. Yes, I would upload it as it stands if it was the only one I had of the subject, though I wouldn't necessarily expect it to be a best seller. If I had a better one of the same subject then I would be happier. I would guess you took several in the area, so just be choosy. Hi Kumar, thanks for your thoughts. The New Town hall is one of the major landmarks of Munich so, cloning it out might make a better image, but might make it sell less, you are right. One point I forgot to mention is that getting closer to the monument I got rid of the crowd of tourists. Yes, I have several other images of the area, I usually take first those obvious images, kind of postcard images, than I go for the more unusual like this one. Dont you think I should upload both types of images, the more obvious and the more "creative" ones as well? I know its a balance between offering options to the buyers and our ranking, but for stock I think we need to offer options, specially if one image is very different than the other. If you think that any image offers a different perspective of a subject which could be attractive to some buyer or other then I would say go for it. It's just a case of avoiding lots of similars which offer little or nothing new from one image to the next. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 Sure I would have uploaded it (would not have included the flowers, but that's personal taste) Never be upset by critique of persons who don't sell. Reminds me of a guy last summer who complained that his initial submissions (4 wildlife images) kept being rejected by Alamy. In a reply to give him advice, I showed one of my eagle owl pictures. He said - if he were a customer - he would definitely reject that image. Couldn't resist to chuckle when I showed him a publication of that owl in a National Geographic calendar Just looked up his name. Still 0 images. Still hasn't managed to pass QC Frustration is a bad counselor Cheers, Philippe Don´t worry about the other discussion, Philippe, I understand the guy was upset with my comment even though I was trying to help him. In the next posts he changed the tone and I think we are fine now, but I am enjoying a lot this discussion about my image. The people here at this discussion are only trying to help me and giving me ideas on a best version of this image I think I will post after the discussion warm down. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 EDIT I don't know if it's present in the larger image but there is really bad CA (visible at 200% and more in this small image) at the top and right edges of the image (cathedral). If it is in the larger image, then I definitely wouldn't upload it without correcting it as it would be certain QC failure if examined by QC. It's already on sale. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 Definitely. It's an unusual view and that is to its credit- I've been to Marienplatz and I didn't recognise it. The bicycle signage is part of the scenery- if it's good enough for the town council it's good enough for me. Hum, your comment makes me think. Yes, its a "cool" image, unusual view, but if you can´t recognize the place,..., than maybe that´s the reason why it didn´t sell, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 Yes, I would have. Sure. But the bicycle signage is totally discordant, as is the building behind the lantern ! I would have cloned out both (yes, digitally manipulated). You can't clone the sign out .......... because there's nothing to duplicate from. Cloning in architecture can only be done if there's a repititititve pattern. That isn't the case here. Cheers, Philippe I actually did clone it out in the version I sent to the microstock agency, but I have deleted it from there and have overwritten it in my Hard Drive with this new one. I think I copied the balcony details from the other floor, even though they are different it looked fine if I remember correctly. But I wouldnt do that again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexandre Fagundes Posted June 30, 2016 Author Share Posted June 30, 2016 I agree with Philippe in relation to the flowers - they are a major distraction because of the blast of colour, pulling the eye away from the main subject (the column). I think the converging verticals work here because they contain the main subject - I generally do not like converging verticals and incidentally they have become even easier to correct in the latest update of Lightroom with the Guided Transform. What I would suggest is to put a grad filter in LR/ACR across the very top of the image to darken the sky across the top, more in the top right corner and make it the same in tone and colour as the rest of the sky - it is presently lighter and again is distracting to the eye. I saved your jpeg to my machine and a tweak of about -40 highlights and -15 temperature gets the sky reasonably even in colour and tone. EDIT I don't know if it's present in the larger image but there is really bad CA (visible at 200% and more in this small image) at the top and right edges of the image (cathedral). If it is in the larger image, then I definitely wouldn't upload it without correcting it as it would be certain QC failure if examined by QC. Thanks MDM, it makes sense to darken the sky, the tower and the golden sculpture as well, there is no CA in the original. But what it does have is that I have fixed a bit of the verticals (yes the original was even more dramatic) so the resolution on the top of the New Town Hall is not as good as the bottom of the image, Interesting thoughts about the flowers, I thought without them the image was a bit lame, but you are the second one to point out they are discrating, colors pull a lot of the attention of the eye, and that´s maybe why so many people are saying this image looks busy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MDM Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 EDIT I don't know if it's present in the larger image but there is really bad CA (visible at 200% and more in this small image) at the top and right edges of the image (cathedral). If it is in the larger image, then I definitely wouldn't upload it without correcting it as it would be certain QC failure if examined by QC. It's already on sale. I know. The giant watermark is a bit of a giveaway. I should have said "wouldn't have". Do forgive me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Hi Alexandre For what its worth I would upload it, keep the flowers as I think they add a splash of colour to the image, but I would clone out the cycle sign Regards Kumar (Doc) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 (deleted - double post) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hdh Posted June 30, 2016 Share Posted June 30, 2016 Interesting perspective and definitely for sale. I like both the flowers and the cycle sign but wished the latter was more prominent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.