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ISSUE 09 I VOLUME 05 I DECEMBER 2009 I RS.100
BLACK and WHITE SPECIAL
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Landscapes of the Soul Interview with Lynn Radeka LEARNINGS Basics of Photography (Flash, Part-I) An Introduction to Layers (continued...) 16 Receipes for B&W Conversion Rear Curtain Sync
REVIEWS ISSUE 09 | VOLUME 05 | DECEMBER 2009
Canon EOS 7D Canon IXUS 200 IS Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1 Fujifilm FinePix F70 EXR Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM AF-S Nikkor 500mm f/4G ED VR Olympus ZUIKO DIGITAL ED 14-35mm f/2 Canon PIXMA Pro9000 Mark II Epson Stylus Photo T60
KODAK - SMART PHOTOGRAPHY “FESTIVAL OF INDIA” PHOTO CONTEST
Photograph by
K .V .J .R. K. Rao Participate in the Picture of the Month contest and win a
Mr Site Takeaway website easy-to-use website developer tool. Worth Rs.2,999/-
A note to our readers 1. Kindlly ensure that your picture is of 17x11 inches in size, at 300ppi. 2. Ensure that the picture is horizontal. 3. Some readers are sending their images in low resolution. Such images will not be accepted 4. Please do not ask us to check your images on online galleries. 5. Kindly ensure that your picture does not have your name/logo on it.
Picture of the Month We are sure that all of you must be having some pictures that you think could be prize winning. It happens very often that you don’t know where to send the image that could put a feather on your cap. If you have such images (we’re sure you have many!), send us ONE such horizontal image. If we find it good, we shall publish it as a double-spread. a. You have to guarantee that the picture was shot by you. b. If there are people in the picture who can be identified, we’ll need a model release. c. The picture must not have been printed in any magazine/newspaper, or offered to any publication. d. The image has to be at 300 ppi for 17x11 inches. e. Mark it as the “Picture of the Month”. f. You may send a print/e-mail at sphoto.india@gmail.com
Kaleidoscope Finally, a platform for all photographers to exhibit their talent and GET NOTICED!
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Blessing On Earth
Innocent Look
Camera: Nikon D50 Lens: Nikon 18-55mm Sensitivity: ISO800 Aperture: f/20 Shutter speed: 3sec
Camera: Nikobn D50 Lens: Sigma 28-105mm Sensitivity: ISO200 Aperture: f/5.6 Shutter speed: 1/125sec
FACETS OF FACES Photography has always been an integral part of Samir Madhukar Mohite, an export manager at a private firm in Mumbai. “I developed the knack of capturing the world through my lens since my childhood,” says Samir. However, it was at a much later age that he took up a course in photography at Prof. Manohar Desai’s National Institute of Photography, Mumbai. Samir’s images expresses emotions, feelings, and drama. “Photography had always been my hobby and gradually it became an important part of me. What interests me most is photographing people in different moods, with different expressions, and in a variety of environment. And every time my effort is to create something new,” he says. For the past six years, Samir has been concentrating on outdoor photography. He has also joined The Photographic Society of India, Mumbai, FIP, Kolkata, and IIPC, Delhi. He attributes much of his learnings to various photography articles and magazines. Samir feels that studying his own images will help him improve his skill. As we go through his images, we feel that the concoction of light, expression, gesture, feeling, faces, is perhaps the true essence of his creativity, and an effort to break away from the mundane. December 2009 Smart Photography
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Showcase For the Love of Black & White Suman Srivastava, BSc, MBA from Patna is a Sr. Business Manager in a private firm. He is a regular contributor to National and International Salons of Photography since 1990 and has hundreds of acceptances to his credit. Suman was conferred an Associateship of India International Photographic Council (AIIPC) in 2006. He has conducted several seminars and
On Mission
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coaching classes in photography. Black and White photography has always been his favorite medium of expression and prefers pictorial photography to any other genre. Besides photography, Suman loves reading and listening to music. Sit back and enjoy his creations. Rohinton Mehta
Boats
SHOWCASE
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MASTER CRAFTSMAN
Copyright Š Lynn Radeka. All rights reserved.
Landscapes of the Soul
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Lynn Radeka It’s said that landscapes are laid out by nature, and all you have to do is to simply turn up with a camera when the light is doing its bit? But, the fact is that if you adhere to this maxim then you have got it all wrong in photography. This isn’t a passive expression of what’s there—it’s an active process that demands some knowledge, skill, and above all effort. And certainly, Lynn Radeka is one such contemporary landscape photographer whose body of work is simply beyond compare. But, he avers that landscape photography is one of the most difficult art forms to practice. And over the years he has consistently adhered to do good Black & White work, inspired by renowned artistes like Ansel Adams and Wynn Bullock. He believes that in Black & White photography there are no superficial colors that veil the image, but only luminous blacks, whites, and grays that stir the emotions. However, the difficulty in capturing stunning Black & White images still happens to challenge him all the more. And after more than four decades in the profession, he still has the passion to create something that satisfies his creative impulses, rather than to work in numbers and scientific absolutes.
Moon Over Zabriskie Point
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LEARNING
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Receipes for
Black & White Conversion Black & White photography is still as popular as ever. With the coming of digital though, one important thing has changed. In the days of film photography, you shot on Black & White film. Now, with digital cameras, you take photos in color and then convert them to black and white. Rajendra Prasad
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everal weeks ago, I was asked about my favorite workflow for creating Black & White images—whether I prefered to shoot in black and white mode in-camera, or whether I prefer to shoot in color and then convert them later on in Photoshop? I do all my Black & White conversion during post processing, because in-camera conversion usually provides us with poor, flat and washed-out photos as we do not have any control in the conversion. Instead, Photoshop offers a breathtaking array of techniques for converting color to Black & White and these enable us to control the process with a degree of finesse that would be difficult to match in the field. Converting to Black & White in Photoshop has a number of advantages. With film, the Black & White conversion essentially happened at the time of shooting. At that time, if we wanted to change the nature of the Black & White conversion, we could only do it by placing a colored filter over the lens (a red filter, for instance, makes blue skies much darker). Now, by starting with a color photo and converting it to Black & White in Photoshop, we have complete control over the conversion.
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Darkening a blue sky is easy, once we know how, and we can decide exactly how dark we want it to be. Hence in this Black & White Special from SP, I decided to give you recipes for converting color images to black & white. Please note that these are only recipes and not full tutorials. For the best possible conversion, start by shooting in RAW. Then, in your RAW conversion software, output the photo as a 16 bit TIFF file. 16 bit files have a lot more information to work with than 8 bit files, which makes for a better conversion with smoother tonal gradations. Just open your image and follow the recipes:
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CONVERT TO GRAYSCALE
Go to Image>Mode>Grayscale Then click OK to ‘Discard’ the color information. This is the simplest black and white conversion method. It is a quick and easy method but you don’t have control over the conversion.
LEARNING
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DESATURATE
Go to Image>Adjustments>Desaturate Your image will be converted to grayscale. The result is very dull; most of the colors fall into the mid-tone band and there is not much room for manipulation.
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USING FILL COMMAND
Using Fill command with color mode is another way to get grayscale output. Make sure that Black and White respectively are kept as foreground and background colors. If not, press “D” on the keyboard to get the required result. Go to Edit>Fill. In the box named ‘Use’, set Foreground Color. In the box named ‘Mode’, set Color. Set Opacity: 100 percent and click OK.
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USING LAYER BLENDING MODES Click F7 to open the layer palette.
Create a new layer (Ctrl + J) and fill it with white color (as in recipe 3). Change the Blend mode to ‘Hue’. You will get the same output with the layer filled with black color; always remember to keep the opacity 100 percent for proper result.
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GRADIENT MAP Press ‘D’ to reset the foreground and background colors to black and white.
Go to Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Gradient Map. Click OK. The Gradient Map tool maps a black and white gradient to the brightness values of your photo. Dark areas become black or dark gray and highlights turn white or light gray. This is a quick and easy non-destructive Black & White conversion method, a better option than the Grayscale or Desaturate method but you have no control over the conversion.
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USE THE HUE/SATURATION TOOL: Go to Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Hue/Saturation. Click ‘OK’
Move the saturation slider all the way to the left (-100) and press ‘OK’ This method gives exactly the same result as converting to grayscale. The only advantage is that it’s available as an adjustment layer, and can be used as part of a nondestructive editing process, but you have no control over the conversion.
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BRUSH TOOL IN COLOR MODE:
Open your image. Click ‘D’ on the keyboard to make the foreground and background color B&W. Click ‘B’ to select the Brush tool. Change the Blending Mode of the brush to color and keep the opacity 100 percent.
Paint your image with this brush. The part of the image that has been brushed will convert to B&W. This is an interesting method helpful when you like to partially/fully convert your image in Black & White.
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THRESHOLD
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LAB COLOR METHOD
Go to Image>Adjustments >Threshold. This method gives exactly the same result as we used to get with Lith film. You will get only two tones in your images—one black and the other white, but no intermediate tones. By moving the slider you will get the same effect as you used to get with different exposure time as you used to get with a Lith film. Good for abstract work, as it creates a very bold image. It is not suitable for normal day-to-day conversion.
Start with an RGB image. Go to Image>Mode and choose Lab Color. Go to the Channels palette—you’ll see four channels. Drag the ‘B’ channel to the Trash Bin, deleting it.
Now delete the channel called Alpha 2, leaving just Alpha 1 (which was the original lightness channel) Go to Image>Mode and choose Grayscale. This method gives a better black and white conversion than the ‘convert to grayscale’ and ‘Desaturate’ methods. It works well for some photos, but not for others.
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SINGLE CHANNEL
Click Ctrl+1, Ctrl+2 and Ctrl+3 to see b/w images of your red, green and blue Channels. Choose any channel you like and then click Ctrl +A to select the entire canvas of that channel and Ctrl+C to copy the layer. Open a new grayscale image (File>New) (PS will make the image the same size as what you just copied into the clipboard) and paste the image into the new file. You will get identical results as you used to get from using red, green and blue filter on a Panchromtic film.
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CHANNEL MIXER
Go to Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Channel Mixer and tick the monochrome box. Move the Red, Green and Blue sliders to the left/right to lighten or darken different tones in the photo. The total of the three sliders should be 100 percent at all times. Move the sliders until you’ve got the look you want, and then click OK. The Channel Mixer is the first black and white conversion tool listed here that begins to use the full potential of the information contained in the color photo. Color photos have three color channels—red, green and blue. These primary colors combine to make the millions of colors in your photo. The Channel Mixer conversion method lets you adjust the ratios between the red, green and blue channels. Lightening the value of a channel lightens colors close to it on the color wheel and darkens the colors that are opposite it. Increase the value of the red channel for instance, and you’ll make the red tones in your photo lighter, and the blue ones darker. This has the effect of lightening skin tones and darkening blue skies. December 2009 Smart Photography
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CANON EOS 7D
The Perfect Step-Up Price: Rs.1,09,950/- Final Score: 91%
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OS 7D is the latest entrant from the Canon stable. It incorporates a newly designed APS-C size CMOS sensor and Dual DIGIC 4 processors, along with a host of new features. With the 7D, Canon has thrown in another challenge to its rivals. Let’s see how strong this threat is!
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Beautifully designed and rugged. That’s how I would describe the EOS 7D. The outer shell is made from engineering plastic, with a handsome, rubberized hand grip, and well laid out buttons and switches. The internal chassis is made from magnesium alloy. I am very happy to inform that the on/off switch has now been repositioned—and its new position is adjacent to the Mode Dial to the left top of the camera—where it is more ergonomic. A perfectly matched thumb grip adds to its classic design. The EOS 7D body weighs approximately 900g with the battery.
KEY FEATURES
On/Off Switch 2 Mode Dial 3 Shutter Release Button 4 Metering Mode Selection/WB Selection Button 5 AF Mode Selection/Drive Mode Selection Button ISO Speed Setting/Flash Exposure Compensation Button 7 LCD Panel Illumination Button 8 Multi-Function Button 9 Main Dial 10 Accessory Shoe 11 Built-In Flash 12 Dioprtic Adjustment Knob 13 AE Lock/Index/Reduce Button 14 AF Point Selection/Magnify Button 15 AF Start Button 1
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The Canon EOS 7D body has an amazing array of features. It uses a newly designed APS-C size CMOS sensor (22.3 x 14.9mm) capable of producing about 18 million pixel output with an aspect ratio of 3:2. To obviate dust, a dust delete feature is incorporated, which can be used in auto or manual mode. The supplied software can also help you to get rid of the dust marks on your images (Dust Delete Data appending).
Images can be recorded in RAW (14-bit), JPEG or simultaneously in RAW+JPEG. Three RAW settings are on offer: RAW (25.1MB); Medium RAW (17.1MB); and Small RAW (11.4MB). Six JPEG recording quality settings are possible: Large + Fine (6.6MB); Large + Normal (3.3MB); Medium + Fine (3.5MB); Medium + Normal (1.8MB); Small + Fine (2.2MB); Small + Normal (1.1MB). Canon supplies a free software to process the RAW files. Six Picture Styles (Standard, Portrait, Landscape, Neutral, Faithful, and Monochrome) and 3 User Defined Picture Styles can be set. White Balance can be set to Auto or any one of the 6 Presets, plus Custom and Kelvin temperature settings. WB correction and WB bracketing are possible. Two types of Noise Reduction (NR)– Long exposure NR (for 1 second or longer exposures) and High ISO NR (particularly effective at higher ISOs)–can be set using Custom Function(C. Fn II-1 and 2 respectively). Shadow details can be optimized without clipping highlights using the Auto Lighting Optimizer (similar to Nikon’s Active D-Lighting). Detail in highlights can be improved using ‘Highlight tone priority’ (C. Fn II-3). Light fall-off at corners of the frame can be corrected (for about 25 lenses) by using Lens Peripheral Illumination Correction.
Inside the box • Camera body, with eye cup and body cap) • Battery Pack (LP-E6), with protective cover • Battery Charger – LC-E6/LC-E6E (Either could be provided; LC-E6E comes with a power cord; LC-E6 is direct plug-in) • Wide Strap (EW-EOS 7D) • Interface Cable (IFC-200U) • Stereo AV Cable (AVC-DC400ST) • EOS DIGITAL Solution Disk • Instruction Manual • EOS 7D Pocket Guide • CD ROM Guide
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Left: Battery Compartment Right: CF Card Compartment
Mahesh Reddy
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