Photography...

[SamNabz]

Impressive portfolio, Paul!

 

[KaotikJezta]

I think it depends on what you mean by manipulation. Converting from RAW changes the photo straight away, no way around that when you shoot raw. Converting to B&W is the only way to do B&W on a digital camera when you shoot RAW. As for contrast and colour/tone adjustments, photos have always been manipulated for perfect contrast/colour/tone, it was done at the printing stage in the darkroom, now it is done with a PC program.

 

[slim6y]

Unedited - Shingle Creek - the reason the water looks as it does is because the shutter on the camera was open for 15 seconds - it takes all that light for 15 seconds and records it!

Compared with this - absolutely NO editing of the photo - but because it's 3 or 4 photos they all need to be stitched together to give this panorama shot.

This compared to:

Not a single bit of photoshop in that at all - it's exactly as the eye would see it in that very tunnel

The one above has some darkening for the silhouette to work properly - otherwise that was pretty much as is - it was during the dust storms a couple of years back.

See - these are all pretty much unedited... As is!

 

[KaotikJezta]

I think we have it pretty good these days as far as digital cameras go. When you had to shoot on film you didn't have a memory card full of shots to choose from and photos rarely came out perfect first printing. I have been in a darkroom since I could walk just about as my father is a photographer and it is a lot of stuffing around sometimes. These days, people with a point and shoot and minimal photography knowledge can pull off a lot of pretty good shots. The real art is in the composition and no amount of post processing will make a badly composed or uninteresting photo look good. If you don't have a well composed photo to start with, or you have no idea how to crop to make the composition interesting you will never have a good photo edited or not. I do agree with Paul on the redbubble thing though, so many photos get applauded for being fantastic shots when they are so obviously manipulated it isn't funny.

 

[jordanmulder]

Ok so what do you call manipulation? The only thing I do on photoshop is saturation and contrasting..... the water looks like that because of the long exposure that paul has just explained... no photoshop to make the water look like that.

 

[KaotikJezta]

I don't know if that was aimed at me Jordan but I call manipulating adding layers, changing colours, using the clone tool etc. All of which can have their place, for example, in portraiture, instead of using a soft focus filter you can add a Gaussian blur duplicate layer as an overlay and it give the same soft effect. Or if an otherwise good photo is a little flat but contrast adjustment would add too much noise you can add an overlay of the same image at 50% saturation, something you wouldn't need to do with a film shot because film doesn't have the noise issues digital does.

 

[KyuCop]

Trying again:
Seems that there is only pro-photographers here ... so some quick shots from yesterday morning from amateur:
Morning was a bit cold and there was some ice on the ground ... you lucky guys there ... downunder

rgds
Ari

 

[ozstorm]

Just to clarify, by "manipulation" I am referring to using photoshop etc to modify/brighten colours (so an object looks better/brighter), alter what is in the image, reduce or remove objects you don't like (I am not including minor photo shopping or long exposures)
As an example, magazines and portrait places. A person gets photo's taken, they are then "manipulated" to make said person look beautiful/thin/longer, fuller hair etc. You are who you are and changing what you look like in a photo isn't going to change what you look like in real life

 

[Nadzzz]

Tried this the other night.

 

[KaotikJezta]

Just to clarify, by "manipulation" I am referring to using photoshop etc to modify/brighten colours (so an object looks better/brighter), alter what is in the image, reduce or remove objects you don't like (I am not including minor photo shopping or long exposures)
As an example, magazines and portrait places. A person gets photo's taken, they are then "manipulated" to make said person look beautiful/thin/longer, fuller hair etc. You are who you are and changing what you look like in a photo isn't going to change what you look like in real life

So, which of these photos do you feel has been manipulated as that is what you said in your first post.

 

[SamNabz]

GREAT shot Nadzzz!!

 

[Nadzzz]

Thanks, i should stop been lazy and post other stuff i have done..


LX5 In The Backyard by Nath Photography, on Flickr

 

[saximus]

Nadzzz that one with the sparks is awesome. What is it actually a pic of?

 

[Nadzzz]

Thanks, its steel wool in a cheap wire whisk. You can get the super fine grade steel wool they use for wood working and it burns and sparks when you spin it. So the whisk is just to hold it and then a dog lead to spin haha, and 30 sec exposure.

The colours have been edited ( original is orange)

 

[jordanmulder]

Nadzz that is an amazing shot! great comp!

 

[ozstorm]

So, which of these photos do you feel has been manipulated as that is what you said in your first post.

I never said any pics here were manipulated (although some have admitted they do manipulate their pics), just stated that IMO a photo shouldn't have to be manipulated to make it a great photo. The pics I posted were just point, shoot, ,download, post. With the exception of the night shots which had longer exposure.

If you really want an example:

The colours have been edited ( original is orange)

The colour looks great and obviously makes the photo "pop" more then the original colour did (just using this as an example Nadzzz, are you able to post the original pic ?)

 

[dickyknee]

A few pics I have taken over the year that I really like ....

 

[Nadzzz]

I think it wasnt bad out of the camera like this, but i have done a few different ones and wanted to change the look a bit on this one.

 

[SamNabz]

Fantastic shots as always, Brett.

Did you use the 'miniature' mode on that last shot with the boats?

 

[Dragonwolf]

I dream of taking photos like these - envious of your skills. I would love to have a poster of the Stradbroke Island photo to stare at when I needed a happy place