Favourite shots of 2015

afterburn wrote:

JimmyHBG wrote:

JimmyHBG wrote:

Pic Man wrote:

Very good idea for a thread. I love your last shot Dave, the one taken in the peak district. I'm a big fan of long exposure water shots.

My favourite shots in 2015 are all taken with the X100T.

I really like these photos alot, the framing and exposure is really good, and they all seem to tell a story. Are these ooc jpegs with film simulation or have you done some pp?

Thankyou.

These have all been post processed in Lightroom. I'm a RAW shooter mostly because I enjoy editing my photos and it's easier for me to get the look I want.

Would you mind sending me a pm telling me more about the pp?

I really like the look of your photos but I'm having a hard time getting it like that myself. I'm used to having rich color and high contrast, have been trying to change my editing in LR to accomplish the look you have but it ain't working out

Quick tip: Hit 'auto' in the basic panel. This may screw up exposure (or not, its hit and miss), but it sets the highlights/shadows/blacks/whites properly. Now adjust exposure back to what you want it to be, if necessary. Your image should now be pretty punchy already, but if it is not to your liking, adjust blacks/whites to your taste. Hold 'option' (mac) or alt (win) while moving the slider to see what part of the image is affected. White blobs mean clipping. Keep clipping to a minimal for whites; for blacks it is less important and more to taste.

Of course this doesn't work for every image and every look especially if the capture is significantly different from the final result you envision, but it will give you a good starting point. People also tend to freak out over using 'auto' buttons as they feel it takes away control, but in this case it just gets you in the ballpark quicker.

Good tip, I've never used the auto mode before but i'll give it a try next time.

I often just play around with the sliders till I get the look I want. Sometimes I come back to a photo and re-edit with fresh eyes. I always make sure I create a virtual copy first just in case I don't like the the new changes I've made.

I use the adjustment brush a lot so I can make more localised adjustments. As you can see below I've made many localised adjustments on this photo.

The grey dots are where I've made adjustments. It's often just dodging and burning but sometimes I adjust clarity, noise reduction etc.

I also use the tone curve. It makes it easy to brighten and darken different areas in the photo. Example of my tone curve for same photo below.

To be honest though I'm no expert when it comes to post processing. I just experiment and hope I get a look I like.

Hope this helps.