Today’s Call: We edit a Photo

To make things more transparent we will edit a photo step by step during tonight’s call. In fact we will all edit the same photo. Zo has sent in a Picture, the kind you just shoot out of your window towards the neighbor’s house, which is perfect for the purpose. As you will see the photo bears all the strong and weak points a ‘normal’ photo can have.

The Photo

Photo by Zo

Photo by Zo

We will spend one hour editing this picture using Lightroom. As the case may be we will find the time to do some post editing for various purposes.

Zo Image Color

Zo Color Image

Zo Old Timer

Zo Old Timer

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Smart Editing Digital Photos

At our recent calls we have been trying to crystallize a smart way to quickly edit digital photos. This post will resume the 3 steps we are following.

1. Camera Calibration

The camera calibration serves to correct systematic deviations inherent to the type and model of the camera. If you camera returns images which are too yellow or green, this can be corrected; the same applies to other lens corrections, like sharpness or distortions as the case may be. The corrections are saved as a Calibration Preset in Lightroom.

All photos you import from your camera can be automatically filtered with this calibration preset.

Astir Beach Snorklers

Astir Beach Snorklers on September 2, 2010

2. Photo Editing 1

This steps purpose is to recover a maximum of available data from your image. The image is brought down to a balanced close to ‘what you saw’ state whereas we try to recover data namely in the over exposed areas as well as in the shadow areas.

Most of the corrections are standard corrections by type of image (low-light, bright-light, sun-set and so on). These corrections can be saved as personal presets in Lightroom and you may then apply them to the corresponding type of calibrated image imported.

The corrections under this step do not yet tell the story or max-out the expression of the picture. They prepare the picture for best post-editing.

3. Tell the Story – Enhance the Expression

A good photo tells a story. If you shoot a landscape just before a thunderstorm, you may emphasize the the dramatic clouds with your editing tools for example. It’s about making the photo more expressive. When you shot the photo, you took it because nature was telling you a story; you ban that story in a photo and you try to express what triggered in you the emotion when looking at nature. If your picture can trigger that kind of emotion in a third person, then you have probably a good picture.

Seagull

Seagull at Astir Beach

Don’t forget: the picture works only with visuals while in nature you are also experiencing sounds, temperature, humidity, smells and so on. Your visual image must therefore compensate for the absence of these additional sensations. Visual enhancements help to trigger a maximum degree of emotion or impression without exaggerating the effects. If you overdo effects, your image loses in credibility and you shift from photography to “art”, or “illustration” or what ever people often call  their messed up production.

Also: keep in mind that editing for printing requires good density and saturation levels. The use online at 72 dpi means automatically a loss of 50% to 75% of points per inch; therefore, if you start out with a “thin” picture, it will only get thinner and flatter when publishing for the web.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Astir Beach is the Best Beach in Greece

From my previous posts you guessed it: Astir Beach is my number one beach. And every day the dedicated staff and management confirm this statement… since 1960.

Basketball World Championship Live at Astir Beach

No reason to stay at home to watch the basketball World Championship at a vulgar boob tube; Astir’s mega screen with exceptional luminosity and resolution is simply the best.
SIpping your Mojito, connecting with the world through the Wi-Fi net, watching the Greek team winning and all this while doing maintenance on your sun tan … Is that what crises means in Greece?
All photos live by iPhone.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Some clouds over Astir Beach in Vouliagmeni and great light create ideal photo conditions for the iPhone 4.

Astir Beach iPhone 4 Photos is a post from: iPhone 4 Photos All content Copyright © 2010 Yorgo Nestoridis. All rights reserved. Contact mail: iPhone (at) yorgo.net

Calibrate and recover a Maximum of Data

The purpose of this exercise is not to reach a final result but to prepare the image for editing and post-editing. When calibrating, we try to correct systematic shortcomings of our camera. When we edit, we try to drive a maximum of data out of our image, namely because the camera delivers jpeg files which compress away quite some data of which some can be recovered.

Once we have the best possible set of data, we can apply filters and presets with a foreseeable result.

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler

The Original

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler original

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler original

Edited Version

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler edited

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler edited

BW Version

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler edited bw

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler edited bw

Post-edited Version

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler post-edited

Photo © 2010 Ute Schaedler post-edited

Enjoy!

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke

A somewhat more difficult sample in the sense that this image is not ideal for calibrating because of the color range and because it’s zoomed (114 mm in 35 mm equivalent). The image is therefore not at maximum sharpness or detail.

However, it’s a nice bird, worthwhile to spend some time on :-).

The Original

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke as shot

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke as shot

Edited Version

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke edited

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke edited

Edited Version 2

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke edited 2

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke edited 2

Edited Version 3

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke edited 3

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke edited 3

Post-edited Version

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke post-edited

Photo © 2010 Bianca Gubalke post-edited

No comment, let the yellow bird tweet!

More later.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Image Editing made Transparent

Tomorrow, our call we will focused on Image Editing. For this exercise we need one photograph in original format as shot.

Preparation for the call

I order to be able to advise call participants individually, I would like to ask you to select your image (can be most anything, landscape, monument, animal, flower, portrait) from your collection and attach it to an email and send it to my email at yorgo(at)yorgo.net. Please make sure you send a photo as shot without any editing, cropping or clipping or filtering. Don’t even add Lightroom camera calibration filters.

Please send a shot which has been taken without zooming. In the worst case just set your cam on automatic and take a shot out of your next window without zooming and send that one.

The earlier you send your picture, the bigger the chance that we will have time to edit it and to help you with presets or filters which may serve your camera calibration and ’standard filtering’ for quickly develop and edit your pictures.

Sample:

Recco Italy Image

Recco Italy Photo

Recco Italy Photo © 2010 Yorgo Nestoridis

Recco Italy Image

Recco Italy Photo © 2010 Yorgo Nestoridis

Recco Italy Image Black and White

Recco Italy Image Black and White © 2010 Yorgo Nestoridis

Recco Italy Image Post-edited

Recco Italy Image © 2010 Yorgo Nestoridis

Image 1: as shot and delivered by the camera.

Image 2: basic editing – rotate the picture as the horizon was not horizontal and the verticals bend to the left side; a global vitamin pack gets the pic up to speed. As this is a heavily zoomed image, the sharpness and details cannot be recovered as should. That’s why we would like to get a image without zoom.

Image 3: Black and white version of version 2.

Image 4: Some post-editing to remove crane and construction works. This post editing job can be done much better: in this case I just blew in 3 strokes with the content aware healing brush from Photoshop CS5 – this takes exactly 3 seconds!

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Registration for Ycademy Seminar Participants

Today as planned we will start populating the Photo Media stock platform. The pre-launch is reserved for Ycademy August Seminar Participants. Those concerned will receive a personal invitation by mail from Bianca later today.

Vouliagmeni from the Marina

Vouliagmeni from the Marina

Beta Tests

During the next few days we will beta test the site extensively with the help of all venture partners. Today we focus on the sign-up procedure as well as on the identity verification. Also we will test upload capability as well as the resizing engine.

During the testing, the site will not yet be officially accessible from the home page link; please use the link contained in your invitation email.

Today’s task: Register with the site from the “Become a Seller” link on top right of the site and submit 10 Pictures for evaluation.

Administration

Bianca Gubalke and Zo Nicholas are the site admins whereas Bianca is focused on the Commercial end while Zo looks after Technical issues and Maintenance.

Tonight’s Call

Join tonight’s Ycademy call where we will analyze the site’s behavior and give support where needed. Also we will set up your Venture Partner’s accounts based on your registration.

I am looking forward to a great venture!

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Testing HDR Imaging with Lightroom 3

High Dynamic Range Imaging (HDR) is a ” set of techniques that allow a greater dynamic range of luminances between the lightest and darkest areas of an image than standard digital imaging techniques or photographic methods” (Wikipedia).

The below exercise is a simple test, using only two images with different exposures.

Image 1 – Balux Glyfada

Balux Glyfada 1

Balux Glyfada 1

The image has been taken inside a room exposing it to feature the colors of the interior. As you can see, the consequence of properly exposing the interior leads to over exposed areas, namely on the table and then all over the background where we basically see only white.

Image 2

Balux Glyfada 2

Balux Glyfada 2

The interior is underexposed, however the background or the exterior area shows colors and details as the metering is set to render a clear image in the background.

The HDR Image created in Lightroom 3

Glyfada Balux HDR

Glyfada Balux HDR

After the merger we end up with a nice compromise which can be adjusted in post editing. Lightroom did a good job on the background as wel as on the table where we get now some of the blueish shine as a reflection from the external tones.

HDR Image post-edited

Balux Glyfada edited

Balux Glyfada edited

For the purpose of this test I have just darkened the tonal range of the highlights a bit to see a real contrast to the previous image.

Conclusion

HDR imaging has become an easy task with Lightroom 3, even for beginners. The difference between the first and the last photo is simply smashing. The ability to edit HDR in Lightroom with just a few mouse-clicks will help many amateurs to get a more professional look to pictures featuring interiors.

Of course it’s also a great feature for night photography or anywhere where improved dynamic range cannot be reached with just one shot.

This and more we will demonstrate live and exercise with the participants at this week’s Ycademy calls as an add on to the Ycademy Seminar which took place during the past week-end.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Adobe Lightroom 3 Presets

Just 4 samples using some of my Lightroom presets for the purpose of the Ycademy Seminar.

Enjoy.

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece - Original

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece - Preset 1

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece -Preset 2

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece - Preset 3

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece

Ermoupoli Syros, Greece - Preset 4

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.

Lightroom 3 at Ycademy Seminar

Smashing the new Lightroom 3 from Adobe. While many features useful for the professional photographer have been improved, Adobe has also thought of hobby photographers and laymen. The new edition of Lightroom makes online publishing a Sunday walk.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3

Smashing namely the new slide-show function which provides a quick solution for people who have little time and great ambitions.

Here is my test run, loaded to YouTube

www.youtube.com/watch?v=epj_xS-aiSI

Quick Lightroom 3 Slideshow Quality

Lightroom 3 lets you export slide-shows in different formats; unfortunately there is not much flexibility there and the presets are 3:2 formated. However you can get 720p and 1080p as well, producing thus a YouTube HD movie as per above.

You can also export your slides in PDF format.

The images used are 4000 x 3000 pixels. Lightroom crops and compresses and in as much as I am concerned, much of the actual quality and detail is lost. here is an excerpt of one of the pictures as it came out of the camera:

Original Excerpt

Original Excerpt

When looking through the pdf or the YouTube clip, you will easily notice the difference. The images are not crisp, nor sharp and color gradients are washed away. The pdf is better than the YouTube version which is due to the YouTube compression.

Note also the Copyright mark in the slide-show frame on YouTube: I should have used a bolder face type.

In spite of the above, I am convinced that with Lightroom 3 will be a great help in publishing for many people and save a lot of time in the work-flow related to basic web publishing.

We will experiment with Lightroom 3 at the Ycademy Online Seminar which will start in just about 3 hours.

Author: Yorgo Nestoridis, Media Marketing & Publishing, Founder of YORGOO Publishing, YORGOO Press and Semiomantics. If you enjoyed reading the above, please consider following future tips and strategies by RSS reader, Email delivery, or Kindle subscription.