Exercise: Colours into tones 2.

Outline: Make practical use of channel adjustment to achieve a specific effect.

For this exercise I have opted to use the portrait example, of using the channel adjustment to lighten the complexion without significantly changing the tones of the rest of the image.

This exercise consists of altering the red channel to lighten the tones in the subjects skin tone, much the same as the effect altering the red paint tray in the previous exercise.

This is the image in colour.

Then we need to change the image into black and white (greyscale) to create the default black and white image.

And then to lighten the complexion slightly we just need to simply increase the red channel slider.

Now the skin tone is lighter but none of the other tones in the image have been altered, making the channel adjustment useful for a specific effect.

Conclusion:
This exercise has shown how a simple change to one slider can change one aspect of the image as opposed to altering the key or contrast which effects the entire image.

Exercise: Colours into tones 1.

Outline: Choose an image with at least two strong contrasting colours. Using the channel sliders available in your software, create two opposite versions of the image in black and white.

Well this exercise was a pain from the start but only down to a software issue. I have photoshop elements 9 and much to my annoyance, altering the channel sliders is not a feature this software has! Looking at the RAW converter, these are the options I was faced with:

The sliders available only deal with the overall image and you are unable to alter individual channels. Using a JPEG image is the same:

This is the nearest you can get to altering the shades of the image in black and white. It does give you preset options for the overall contrast of the entire image, and then gives you the option of tweaking each individual channel but this affects the whole image and not an individual colour tone.

So I have had to download a trial of photoshop which I'm pretty sure I had to do during 'The Art of Photography' as well, to undertake a fairly similar exercise. But after 2 hours It's actually uploaded and the exercise completed.

I started with a JPEG image of a childs painting set

This has a large space of red colour with other colours around the outside. I converted the image to greyscale to create a default black and white setting.

This shows all the colours as a pretty similar grey tones. By increasing the red slider, the tones change.

The red coloured area has now turned lighter to white.. But moving the slider in the opposite direction creates the opposite effect.

In this image, the red area has turned more to black.

The above showed the effect of changing just one slider. Next I wanted to explore the options using a RAW image and as advised the sliders were available in the RAW converter. Here I have an image consisting of two vibrant and contrasting colours.

This image was taken for a previous exercise and serves this purpose well. Here I can show the same effect as above but using two sliders, the red and the green.

Increasing the red slider and decreasing the green sliders as much as possible creates the following effect:

But to create the opposite effect, all we need to do is swap the sliders, so increase the green and decrease the red as much as possible:

Conclusion:
This is an important exercise which continues from the previous exercise highlighting contrast. Where as the contrast and tonal range can play a huge part in creating tones and defining texture in an image, altering the colour tone can also play a large part in altering a specific tone as opposed to that of the whole image,which is very important in black and white photography.

Exercise: Strength of interpretation.

Outline: Use two photos that you think would best suit the following adjustments:

• A strong increase in contrast that will include clipping (loss of detail) in at least the shadow areas.
• Low key or high key treatment, in which the entire brightness range is shifted down or up the scale.

Create these effects, one for each image, but in two versions - in colour and in black and white.

I am using two different styles of images for this exercise. I wanted to use one with natural vivid colour and also one with limited colour to explore the extremes of both types of image.

My first image I will be using is the one below:

This was taken on a lovely sunny day and is full of green and blue tones.

By increasing the contrast and making a definite S curve, the tones in the image have become more defined. The image overall is darker and the shadows have been increased making the tones of the greens and blues appear to have more of a range of colour.

This image shows the effect of shifting the values of the levels down the scale, fitting into approximately half the range than the original. The shadows have been lightened and therefore more detail is seen but we have now lost a lot of detail in the highlighted areas for example the sky and the reflections in the water.

Converting the image to black and white and increasing the contrast, again with an S curve, again makes the image darker but I feel that we are starting to lose data in the some of the shaded areas which is more noticeable than in the colour version. The different tones of colour can be differentiated through the tones of the black and white But I prefer the colour version of this effect.

Again in black and white, this is the image once the values have been shifted down the scale. The tones corresponding to the different shades of colour have been lost as has a lot of detail in the highlighted areas. It reminds me of snow, as though the image was taken in the middle of winter. However, the texture of the scene is more defined with a lot more subject detail showing through than in the other versions.

To repeat this exercise I will be using this original image:

This image is a lot 'flatter' with less tones and a dominant blue colouring with less texture. It is completely different to the previous image and it will be interesting to see what these effects have on this image.

The increase in contrast works wonders on the colour in this image.We can now really see the difference between the deep blue sea and the bright blue sky. But the shadowed area in the foreground of the image has been completely lost in a mound of black, so much so that we cant see any detail at all. The same with the sun and reflection on the water. As the image would already have had a large highlight clipping warning in the first place, increasing the contrast would have increased this and also increased the shadow warning too.

By increasing the brightness, shifting the values down the scale, a good chunk of the image has been washed out and all detail lost. We can now see a bit of colour and definite detail in the bushes in the foreground however most of the sky , the sun and the reflection in the water has all fused into a big patch of white with no detail to be seen.

This black and white conversion with the increased contrast is definitely one of my favourites. Although we still have the issue of losing data in the highlights and shadows, I feel that we also gain detailing in this version as well. The sea has more texture and the sky appears to have more tones. This effect makes the image look a bit more fierce than the original and I like it.

Finally we have the image with increased brightness and it's true to form. As with the colour version, a big chunk of detail, including the main subject of this image has been lost in the highlights but the brightness has increased some detail in the water and the sand bank to the right of the image. We also get more detail in the bushes but none of that matters if the subject has been lost in a big sea of white.




Conclusion:
This exercise explored the extremes of interpreting the tonal range of the image. Each version of both sets of photographs has pros and cons and it's all down to personal interpretation. As you can tell by now, I like things to look slightly different, especially darker and more fierce when it comes to photographing the sky so this has been an excellent exercise for me in that respect. Pushing the values to the limits of their scales can produce completely different outcomes. Going back a few exercises to interpretive processing, it will be interesting to re process my 'fierce sky' image using these techniques and to see if the outcome would be any different.

Exercise: Black-and-white.

Outline: Choose a subject, lighting condition or picture situation you think may look better in black and white. Process the image for black and white and discuss what effect shooting in black and white had on your shooting decisions.

While undertaking 'The Art Of Photography', I had to undertake an exercise exactly like this one. The assignment was to explore shape, form, texture and colour and I felt the best way to explore texture and form was to shoot in black and white, to focus on these aspects of the subject instead of the colour. 

While shooting this image, it was important to forget the colour aspect. This vase is extremely colourful and would be the main focus point of any images taken of it. I wanted to highlight the other aspects of the vase, including the fabulous shattered glass texture of it. I also wanted to give the vase as much depth as possible to show the form really well.

 I needed to think hard about the camera angle to include all detailing of the vase for example, the ball on the lid, the lip of the lid and the vase itself. I found above and to the side slightly worked best. I only used half of the vase in the frame because I found that trying to photograph the whole vase just made the subject flatter.

The lighting was an important factor too. I needed some lighting above the subject to show some reflection in the uneven surface of the vase to make more definition of the texture.

Conclusion:
I know I have cheated a bit here, using a previous image but I remembered this exercise well and how difficult it was to get the right composition to show these details of the vase. And as I read this exercise, I remembered this image being a prime candidate to show how an image looks better in black and white than in colour.

Exercise: Interpretive processing.

Outline: Choose an image that you feel is open to creative interpretation(s) and find different ways to interpret the image.

I recently took some sunset images on the coast and decided to use one for this exercise.

Original Jpeg image

This is the original image. I decided to use the jpeg image for this as opposed to the raw version just to play around with the image without over thinking it, which I admit that I do tend to do sometimes when undertaking some exercises.

My first thought was to try and enhance the colour of the sky and make it more orangey and less blue. I decreased the hue and increased the saturation which did just that. The sky became more orange/pink. I adjusted the layers slightly which gave the sky more darker tones and then darkened the highlights which created more definition in the clouds and by increasing the mid-tones these were emphasized.

This is the final processed image:

Enhanced colouring image

I think the colours are enhanced very well and the image is a lot more clear and vibrant than the original image. I was tempted to decrease the brightness to tone down the overexposure on the sun, but this just dulled the overall image down so I decided the overexposed version fitted better.

For the next interpretation, I wanted to try and make the sky dark and almost night-like. After decreasing the saturation to turn the image to black and white,  I adjusted the levels to use the whole range of tones available. I then darkened the highlights and the mid-tone contrast to create texture and definition in the sky and clouds. Finally, I decreased the brightness and increased the contrast and the final outcome was a very fierce looking sky.

Fierce sky processed image

I really like the outcome of this image and it does look quite scary. The sun could easily be mistaken for the moon and the lack of colour really takes away and evidence that this is a sunset at all.

For my final interpretation, I just wanted to see what the software had to offer. I kept the image the same and decided to use the lomo camera effect available. This turned the image onto cross process which is one of my favourite effects. It's given the sky a full range of colour, from red at the horizon to orange to yellow to green then to blue at the top. I also added the vignette but wanted to really focus in on the sun to emphasize the main subject, so increased the vignette to make a very obvious circle.

Lomo camera effect processed image

The vignette really makes this image, the circle emphasizing the circle of the sun. Although the range of colour in the sunset is beautiful, it's almost unrealistic and still seems rather dull.

Conclusion:
Of all of the images, the first interpretation is my favourite purely for the vibrancy of it. The biggest change has got to be the second fierce sky image. This shows the dramatic effect you can create in, comparison the original. The exercise has been interesting. Playing about with the sliders and the different aspects of the image is a great way to learn which aspect change what feature.

Exercise: Managing colour.

Outline: Find a two or three images that have what you consider to be a significant colour cast. The main purpose of the exercise is to 'correct' it.
With the Jpeg image, use your processing software or the grey dropper feature to correct the image. The RAW image can be corrected using the white balance slider in the raw converter.

My first image was taken on a sunny day in the garden. The camera white balance was set to daylight but the image has an obvious blue colour cast.

original Jpeg version

This is the Jpeg version of the image as shot on the day. There is an overall bluey colouring over the whole image.

original Jpeg version histogram

This shows the histogram of the original jpeg version. The bulk of the values are all bunched in the middle as there are no black areas on the image. To remove the colour cast in Elements, I used the grey dropper, using the concrete slabs as the grey areas. The image was then corrected to remove the 'blue' colouring.

corrected Jpeg version

The image now looks more realistic however I feel now that there is a slight orangey tint but not a huge amount. The histogram has now altered as well.

corrected Jpeg version histogram

The histogram looks now as though it has been squashed down a bit. The values have spread out more along the bottom, more into the darker value than before making it overall flatter than before but with a more defined peak of values in the middle.

The RAW version of this image started darker than the jpeg version but still with the blue colour cast.

original RAW version

I also noticed that the histogram for the original RAW version was different to that of the Jpeg image.

original RAW version histogram

The values along the bottom go right along to the dark (black) on the left and the values in the middle don't read as high as the Jpeg version.
Using the RAW converter I experimented with the white balance feature. Even though the image was shot on a sunny day, the cloudy white balance setting, followed closely by the auto setting produced the best outcome.

processed RAW version

I prefer this version over the processed Jpeg version because I don't feel that this has an orangey tint at all and this is the most natural of all the images. The histogram for this processed version has only altered slightly from the original RAW version.

processed RAW version histogram

As we can now see, the base of the histogram hasn't changed at all, and the only real difference is, where the middle values slightly dipped before, they now have a peak instead.

I found another image taken indoors at night at christmas. The camera white balance was set to shade and therefore the tungsten light has created a slight orange colour cast over the image.

original Jpeg version

Using elements, the 'remove colour cast' feature has three droppers. There is a grey dropper but also a white dropper and a black dropper. For this correction, I used the white dropper on the reflection of the ceiling.

corrected Jpeg version

We can see that the orange tint has definitely been reduced but I think it's still present a little bit. But I am happy that this has been corrected enough.

processed RAW version

This is the RAW version after I have used the white balance feature in RAW converter.  This is the tungsten setting and the auto setting was pretty much the same outcome as this. As we can see, the orangeness has completely gone now, as it did with the white dropper on the Jpeg version but I feel the overall image now looks a bit dull in comparison to the corrected Jpeg version.

Conclusion:
This has been a great exercise to compare the difference between not only the difference between the original versions of Jpeg and RAW and how to correct them, but also to experiment with RAW converter. This and the previous exercise have really opened my eyes to the fact that shooting RAW is great to create an image with just the basic shot and then to 'create' your finished image through processing and also that having the two versions is better as each finished version can be different and  you can have a choice as to which version you would prefer to use.

Exercise : Managing tone.

Outline: Using any image, follow the two procedures;
Jpeg 

• set the black and white point
• assess and adjust the brightness of the mid-tones if necessary
• assess and adjust the contrast if necessary
• make corrections to localised areas if necessary

Raw

• using the highlight clipping and shadow clipping warnings, set the black and white points by adjusting the exposure
• assess and if necessary adjust the brightness of the mid-tones using a choice of methods including exposure, brightness and tone curve.
• assess and adjust the contrast if necessary.
• Make corrections to localised areas if necessary. 

This was the image I chose to use for this exercise. I tend to use RAW when I shoot anything nowadays so I had the two versions of this image.

original jpeg version

Jpeg:
This is the jpeg version of the image after I have altered it. The only changes I made were to increase the brightness of the mid-tones and also decreased the contrast slightly. When comparing the altered image to the original jpeg (above), there are minor differences. The shadows are slightly lighter and the colours are a little more vibrant due to that. Other than that, they are almost identical.

processed Jpeg image

RAW:
This is the raw version after processing. While amending this image, I had to decrease the exposure by 1 fstop to correct the shadow and highlight clipping. But following that I increased the brightness slightly and then had to decrease the contrast. In comparison to both the original jpeg and the processed jpeg, I am very aware of the background in this image. The image is nice and bright although I feel some of the vibrancy of the colour has been compromised, and there is more shadow on the background which is showing up unwanted detail.

processed RAW version

Conclusion:
I am happy with the original image however, I do prefer the processed jpeg image. It has a bit more colour and a little less shadow than the image as shot and I like the slightly overexposed version which makes the background nice and bright white. I am enjoying experimenting with the features of processing though, and am fascinated with the fact that the raw version can be a blank canvas to create the best outcome of the image, which could be completely different to the camera processed image through using the camera settings.