Reading mode: Light Dark

Dragons Lair

Go to last post
Sid in SE Texas said:
Thanks for the aluminum pic link. What surface finnish do you usually get ?
And, thanks for the pic locations.
Click to expand...
Most comon and the default is high gloss. All of my pictures have been high gloss. Satin is sometimes used for people portraits because of the softer look. Satin is also used when light glare or reflections might be an issue. I have not used or seen the clear bushed aluminum look, but I suspect it is a specialty modern art look.

--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
(nt)
 
KatManDEW said:
Your photos always look good to me.
Click to expand...
Thanks,
KatManDEW said:
What DPI do you need for those aluminum prints? I looked at the site and it mentions 200-300 DPI.
Click to expand...
It is my understanding that 300 DPI is the native resolution for most professional printers. I usually upres a picture for printing to 300 DPI. For the very best print results, most people recommend 300 DPI, but will accept down to 200 DPI.

Without Upresing, those pictures are:

Valley: 240 DPI
Arch: 115 DPI

Both are full frame pictures, not cropped. I took the Arch one with my 8 MP 350D a couple years ago, the Valley one with my 12 MP 450D last year.

At 300 DPI you can view a print from six inches and the fine detail should look great. Heck you should be able to use a magnifying glass and see detail. But who views a 20x30 print from six inches? Realisticly, the valley one is close enough at 240 DPI and should be great for viewing from 1 feet. I expect the arch one to be slightly less quality, but still be fine for viewing the entire picture better than 2 feet a more normal viewing distance for that size picture.

Both of these are going to be put on a wall above a beds where you won't be able to get within 4 feet of it without climbing on the bed. Sometimes, you just have to have realistic expectations, but we shall see when I get the prints!
KatManDEW said:
I used to get 20-30's, and larger, from a place called Ofoto. It appears that Kodak has taken over that place. Who do you recommend for paper prints that size?
Click to expand...
Recently, I have been getting all my prints done on aluminum plates. The results have been fantastic and I love not having to frame them. I get them from http://www.magnachrome.com

I used to get big paper prints from my local sams club. Quick and easy to get small proofs. Quick and easy to check for print flaws and have them reprint anything not right. I haven't done any paper prints there for about a year, but when I was doing a lot, they would see me coming and start tearing down and cleaning their machine for my order. ;)

I had one 6-foot by 4-foot print made at a local professional print shop. That was the only one I had done there and I know they have gone out of business since then. It was about 100 DPI from a 6 shot panoramic. I have it hung in a stairwell where you can't get within six feet of it. At that viewing distance it is incredible. I feel like I am going to fall in every time I look.

It is this one:
http://www.pbase.com/citylights/image/67394524

Magnachrome is about $30 per square foot. If I had done that 6x4 in aluminum it would have been about $720. By the time I had the paper printed and custom framed (with a 50% off sale price on the framing), it was $650. Dang, I wish I would have done it on aluminum! I wonder if they can do pictures that large?

--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
Thanks for your comments. It is a little pumped up for screen viewing. I hope the print shows it toned down just a little.

I like your warmer version. I may have pushed it a bit too cold trying to preserve highlights in the sky, though I did white ballance off the white shirt.
imqqmi said:
The first one has a bit of a green cast to it. Here's a corrected version:
  • Other improvements would be to lower contrast a bit
  • remove the shadows/highlight artifacts around the ridges
  • Adjust the skintones separately from the rest of the image
Click to expand...
 
It kills me the difference technology makes in just a couple of years!

I assembled this panoramic a couple years ago. It took about 4 hours for the computer to grind through the assembly and I had some troubles with it. There was some ghosting and sharpness issues, but it was still great.



More recently, I have been using PSE7 for pano assembling. I thought wow, this is much easier and the results are better.

How much better? I went back to the original shots for my panoramic and reassembled. Assembled in less than a minute! No ghosting! Sharp as a tack! Automatic distortion correction! I just assembled this and did minimal post processing. I may have to get this reprinted! I may have to reprocess all of my panoramics.



--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
CityLights said:
Thanks for your comments. It is a little pumped up for screen viewing. I hope the print shows it toned down just a little.
Click to expand...
Those Magnachrome guys seem to know what they're doing. I wouldn't be surprised if they covertly corrected all the images they receive ;)
CityLights said:
I like your warmer version. I may have pushed it a bit too cold trying to preserve highlights in the sky, though I did white ballance off the white shirt.
Click to expand...
Try to see the scene as different zones with different white balances. If the sun or cloud shaded sun hits red rocks first and bouncing that reddish light toward your wifes shirt, the shirt will be redder compared to the rest of the scene. If it contains some of magenta (like most reds) the rest of the scene will have a green cast. Green is opposite to magenta in the color triangle.

And the correct wb for skintones can be different to wb for landscapes/mountainscapes, especially if they're partly lit by sunlight and indirectly by the blue sky. WB ranges from 5500 K to 12000 K. That's why I proposed a different wb for skintones and another for the rest of the mountains using layers and masks.

I've also played around with some hair retouching making her beautiful hair a bit redder and seem to glow, but I figured that wouldn't really fit your style :) Or go one step farther and add rays of light, letting her bask in glorious rays of sunlight. Yeah ok, too much I know, I'm a romantic type ;)
CityLights said:
CityLights said:
The first one has a bit of a green cast to it. Here's a corrected version:
  • Other improvements would be to lower contrast a bit
  • remove the shadows/highlight artifacts around the ridges
  • Adjust the skintones separately from the rest of the image
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
--
Kind regards
Imqqmi



http://www.pbase.com/imqqmi

The DSLR jargon cheatsheet:
http://www.jmbfoto.nl/dslrcheatsheet.pdf
 
It certainly is amazing how far computers and software have come in the last few years. All other differences aside, I like the landscape crop better than the more square crop in the new version.
--
http://araasch.zenfolio.com/
 
I prefer the landscape crop and I think the colors on the old one have more "pop"' and sharpness.
--
The first camera bag you buy is always too small

http://www.flickr.com/geofiz
 
Made the changes you recomended and sent it off to print. I experimented with warm and cool tones and went with a cool, slightly bluish tone. I think it makes the photo more edgy. We will see how I do. It is being framed at present. I need to turn it in on August 19th. If I make the cut, the show will start September 10th.

--
The first camera bag you buy is always too small

http://www.flickr.com/geofiz
 
Oilman said:
I prefer the landscape crop and I think the colors on the old one have more "pop"' and sharpness.
Click to expand...
No problem there, I probably spent 8 hours correcting the original, and some more time adjusting the web sized image too. I just spent 5 minutes on the new one. I think I can get the landscape crop back too. Let me tell you, I see so much more image quality in the new one.

I just realized why there is a big difference in the color tones of the two pictures too. The original was processed using adobe camera RAW picture style because that is all that was available at the time. Since then adobe has "copied" the canon picture styles and the new one was processed with canon Landscape Picture style.

--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
technophile said:
It certainly is amazing how far computers and software have come in the last few years. All other differences aside, I like the landscape crop better than the more square crop in the new version.
Click to expand...
Hmmm.... the distortion correction is the difference. The first one is bulbous at the top allowing the landscape crop. The second one is bulbous at the bottom leaving me with a pinched top. Rather than putting much effort into it, I just cropped square.

With a little cloning in the sky and possibly stretching the sky a little bit, I can get the landcape crop back.

--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
Nice job.

I prefer the second one with respect to saturation. Maybe some 'selective' popping would improve it but it looks more 'realistic' than the earlier version to my eyes.
--

'The whole idea of learning Photography is to reduce the number of Monkeys it takes.'
 
I get thrown off by the shadow on the right. It has an arm raised while both yours are down. Is it someone else off-camera, or have you PPd two shots together?
 
I had taken few shots during my recent visit to Zion. Unfortunately, I didnt have a polarizer or a ND filter and hence couldn't save some of the skies. Today, while playing around with my Lightroom trial, I came across the Gradient Filter feature and applied it on couple of shots. I somehow like the results, what do you think? Any suggestions to further improve always welcome.

Without Lightroom Gradient





With Lightroom Gradient





Without Lightroom Gradient





With Lightroom Gradient





--
-dibs2010
http://flickr.com/dbjunction
 
I prefer not to blow out the highlights to start.

The easy way is to set your exposure for the highlights which will make the forground a little dark. Then you open up (lighten) the shadows a little in post process. This results in a little extra noise in the shadows, but an overall good exposure.

A little bit harder method is to take two exposures, one optimized for the shadows and the other optimized for the highlights. Then manually blend them in post process.

I do like the gradient pictures you posted better than the originals.
dibs2010 said:
I had taken few shots during my recent visit to Zion. Unfortunately, I didnt have a polarizer or a ND filter and hence couldn't save some of the skies. Today, while playing around with my Lightroom trial, I came across the Gradient Filter feature and applied it on couple of shots. I somehow like the results, what do you think? Any suggestions to further improve always welcome.

Without Lightroom Gradient





With Lightroom Gradient





Without Lightroom Gradient





With Lightroom Gradient





--
-dibs2010
http://flickr.com/dbjunction
Click to expand...
--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
Newbie here with a shot of an almost dry streambed. (Yeah, we need rain bad!) I tried to make the best of what I had here. Decided to get low to take the picture. This one is f5, I also took one at f11 but for a number of reasons it just didn't come out as good.

I like how the streambed trails off to infinity. I also found it an interesting the contrast between a parched stream and the lush green canopy above.



 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Keyboard shortcuts

f
Forum
m
My threads
Mobile site
About
Editorial content
Cameras & Lenses
Community
All content, design, and layout are Copyright © 1998–2025 Digital Photography Review All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction in whole or part in any form or medium without specific written permission is prohibited.
When you use DPReview links to buy products, the site may earn a commission.
©GPS Media - Guides, Products, Services.
Back
Top