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You say they "all" got rejected. If any of them did not have a reason listed for rejection they are OK. Only one has to be bad for all to be rejected and on your first submission they check all of them. It would help people to advise you if you give us the reason for the rejection.

 

Paulette

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You seem to be misunderstanding what is required to get accepted for Alamy. All you need to do is show that you are competent to produce a picture in which the main subject is sharp, reasonably well-exposed and free of flaws such as dust spots, in other words a picture that is suitable for professional reproduction. You don't need to submit beautiful artistic images or images that require special techniques such as focus stacking - just 3 pictures that demonstrate your competency to produce professional quality pictures is sufficient. These days, the level at which professional quality is measured in the media is low so the level of competency required is not high but keep it simple for starters.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'm new and wondering how we are to have it sharp enough, when shooting raw files always require sharpening and Alamy doesn't want them sharpened? I submitted my first trial, was rejected because of one and now can't upload new ones because it looks like the program is still trying to process the first ones. I already rebooted my computer.

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Alamy don't object to default sharpening. RAWs (well, my RAWs) can appear off without it. David Kilpatrick of renown used to recommend LR 25/detail 25 and I've followed that. The few exceptions are only for those steely-eyed missile men with a good QC record.

 

If you've failed QC you may be locked out for a few days, although I understand that's unusual for a first trial sub. Maybe drop Alamy a line.

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Don't sharpen any of my RAW files. If it isn't sharp enough it simply gets binned and I try again.  I will downsize though to improve focus of the image.

 

Jill

 

Downsizing is really a form of sharpening but with little control over the process in Photoshop besides the interpolation method used. The sharpening tools in ACR/Lightroom actually provide very advanced sharpening capabilities and are generally recommended by those who spend a lot of time thinking about this sort of thing (Jeff Schewe and Martin Evening come to mind). Each image (type of image for most practical purposes) has its own requirements. For example, sharpening an image with lots of detail is very different to sharpening a facial portrait.

 

Incidentally Alamy no longer says no sharpening but it is now don't oversharpen (at least it was the last time I looked at the guidance).

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Think this is great topic & want to say few words.

 

Big reason to stick with Alamy is because it teaches you things and helps you be better photographer. This is true both for their QA and what you gain from vast contributor knowledge in this forum

 

I.e. sharpening:  Before Alamy I'd sharpen my images liberally.  Thought it was a good thing.  Now I look at some of my old images and find edges ruined if I zoom high enough.  Same can be said for several other things I'd not check for before,  chromatic aberration, dust specs etc.  I think one of best ways to move forward is to be able to look at some of your older images you once thought were great, and now realize they maybe were not so great, had this or that issue.  I had no problems passing initial and subsequent Alamy QAs, but by being constantly on the edge and looking at things I'd not before raised the bar.

 

So on topic of sharpening, let me ask you good people one thing.  I know all about Photoshop  Filter - > Sharpen - > Unsharp Mask (and other submenus), but now in my workflow for Alamy submission I use only Camera Raw:  3rd Tab (sharpening), then slide Amount to maybe 30-35% and holding down "Option" key (Mac) slide Masking till I am satisfied by ratio of black areas (not sharpened) and white (sharpened);  usually somewhere betwen 65-70%.  Nothing after that, although I do more post-processing later in CS6.

 

How do you do it?

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On 6/3/2017 at 10:29 PM, Autumn Sky said:

How do you do it?

I sharpen to 25 in Lightroom.  That is enough to overcome the RAW softness of my camera without overdoing it.

It should be noted that a 'sharp' photograph has little to do with 'sharpening'.  If it isn't 'sharp' as in "in focus" no amount of 'sharpening' is going to help.

Sharpening is also a process and should have several stages.  The initial sharpening, like my 25 in Lightroom, is to overcome the softness of the RAW file.  After that you have creative sharpening which should be done with masks or other techniques to only emphasize what you want.  And lastly there is output sharpening which is done only when the final size and output device is known.  For Alamy we should do the initial sharpening if the camera we use requires it, not all do.  And perhaps on a special image a bit of the creative, though I never do for Alamy.  But output sharpening should always be done by the end user, as we have no idea what the image will be output to.

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On 6/4/2017 at 0:29 AM, Autumn Sky said:

Think this is great topic & want to say few words.

 

Big reason to stick with Alamy is because it teaches you things and helps you be better photographer. This is true both for their QA and what you gain from vast contributor knowledge in this forum

 

I.e. sharpening:  Before Alamy I'd sharpen my images liberally.  Thought it was a good thing.  Now I look at some of my old images and find edges ruined if I zoom high enough.  Same can be said for several other things I'd not check for before,  chromatic aberration, dust specs etc.  I think one of best ways to move forward is to be able to look at some of your older images you once thought were great, and now realize they maybe were not so great, had this or that issue.  I had no problems passing initial and subsequent Alamy QAs, but by being constantly on the edge and looking at things I'd not before raised the bar.

 

So on topic of sharpening, let me ask you good people one thing.  I know all about Photoshop  Filter - > Sharpen - > Unsharp Mask (and other submenus), but now in my workflow for Alamy submission I use only Camera Raw:  3rd Tab (sharpening), then slide Amount to maybe 30-35% and holding down "Option" key (Mac) slide Masking till I am satisfied by ratio of black areas (not sharpened) and white (sharpened);  usually somewhere betwen 65-70%.  Nothing after that, although I do more post-processing later in CS6.

 

How do you do it?

Much the way you do it on a few. Most are ok with average of 25 no masking.  I've never had a fail for over sharpening doing this. I have gone up to 38% then liberally used the masking slider and they've looked good, passed well. I only do it on a few here and there. Then if it doesn't look good, I bin it.

Betty

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My approach is slightly different. I have sharpening turned off in LR (sharpening amount slider set to 0). After basic tonal corrections (WB, shadows, highlights etc. - using preset according to the camera in use) and lens distortion and CA removal, the RAW images are batch converted to 16 bit PSDs. I then open each image in PSE where I may crop, align verticals/horizontals etc., carry out localised adjustments, cloning etc. The image is then downsized to somewhere  between17MB and 25MB (depends on image sharpness - for example if my image was taken at F16 to increase depth of field it will be softened due to diffraction). Then I might apply a touch (<25% amount, radius 1) of sharpening if required in PSE being careful to avoid halos or noise in shadows. Then I apply a touch of noise reduction (which I find also does a wonderful job of tidying up any remaining purple fringing on twigs agains the sky etc.) . Then save as 8 bit jpeg for Alamy.

Why do I apply sharpening at the end of my process rather than in LR? Because at the start of the process (in LR), I've no idea what level of cropping or perspective distortion I will be applying later. I can therefore only judge the final level of sharpness (and tweak if needed), after these adjustment have been done. I also much prefer working in PSE to LR, so my interaction with LR is confined importing into catalog, batch application of a preset, bulk conversion to PSD, then removal from LR catalog. 

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Do you think that QC is now done by a computer ? Or is it done by real people ? I  have just had an image rejected and have been given a one star QC rating . Thats after being with alamy for 14 years and 5000 plus images with hardly ever a rejection . Strange.

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