What did I do wrong?

This is what my thought process was when I took it. I wanted it to look like the end of a long day with Big E heading home and the setting sun bouncing off him. I was thinking (which often gets me in trouble) if he was on the left of the shot, it would "feel" more like the start of a day with most of the frame to fly through so I cropped him to the right. The color turned out really flat and dark, and I added this black border and threw in the fancy name plate to keep it from looking so blahhh (not that it helped a lot). What should I do or have done to dress this thing up during or after capture, or should I just deep-six this thing and start over? The good stuff: Shot on 40D with a Tamron 70(?)-300 macro set to 259 at F/11 with a shutter speed of 1/1250 and ISO-400. I prolly should have dropped the shutter down a little to help out the ISO given the slow speed of the bird but only had the camera for a month at the time and wasn't for sure when things start to blur.


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Looks under exposed and over sharpened.

Your main problem is that you're at lest a full stop under exposed. The highlights are gray, instead of bright, which is why it looks dull. If you shot raw, start by boosting the exposure up to just before the highlights start to clip.


With the current image in photoshop, you can see the difference by using the levels adjustment, slide the right pointer over to the to last points on your histogram, then boost the brightness a tad with the center pointer.[img]/cfs-file.ashx/__key/CommunityServer.Components.UserFiles/00.00.00.27.60/20100619_5F00_2D00_5F00_j.jpg[/img]

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Originally Posted by iso79

Looks under exposed and over sharpened.
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[b][url="../members/iso79/default.aspx]iso79[/url] [/b]


I'm still new to digital, could you or someone else please explain what is wrong with a sharp crisp subject when that was the intent? Obviously you would not chose that if you wanted a soft appearance.


Thanks much


Wayne





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Originally Posted by Iguide

what is wrong with a sharp crisp subject when that was the intent?

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There's a difference between sharp and over-sharpened. Sharpening in post-processing is done at the expense of increased noise, so too much of it can be a bad thing (I don't thinkandnowimbroke's image is necessarily over-sharpened, just making a general comment).


I do agree that the original is definitely underexposed. Also, not sure what the WB setting was, but with an intent to show a sunset-lit scene, I think 200-300K warmer may help a bit.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Iguide

I'm still new to digital, could you or someone else please explain what is wrong with a sharp crisp subject when that was the intent? Obviously you would not chose that if you wanted a soft appearance.
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iso79 was probably referring to the first reply, which was way over sharpened (or high pass filtered, or something similar), but still...


There is a difference between a sharp, crisp subject because of the lens, focus and lighting, and because you cranked up the sharpness in PP. The latter can look cool when you first start playing around with digital, but you soon start to see how the dark outline / light halo doesn't usually add to the photo.

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Originally Posted by bardinjw

The highlights are gray, instead of bright, which is why it looks dull

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That made a huge difference! I've got the raw somewhere and will dig it out. I tried playing with the contrast before, but ended up even darker and the brightness made it just look more like a midday shot. Am I ate up with him being put on the right side instead of the left? I'm not trying for any prizes but would like to know for future references.

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Originally Posted by andnowimbroke

Am I ate up with him being put on the right side instead of the left? I'm not trying for any prizes but would like to know for future references.

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Well, it breaks the 'rule' about giving the bird flying room within the frame, but rules are made to be broken. In this case, I think there's a 'two wrongs make a right' going on, in that you're also breaking the rule about having the bird flying towards you, not away. So in this case, since the bird is angled away and 'leaving' the frame, I think it works.

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Originally Posted by bardinjw

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Iguide

I'm still new to digital, could you or someone else please explain what is wrong with a sharp crisp subject when that was the intent? Obviously you would not chose that if you wanted a soft appearance.
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iso79 was probably referring to the first reply, which was way over sharpened (or high pass filtered, or something similar), but still...


There is a difference between a sharp, crisp subject because of the lens, focus and lighting, and because you cranked up the sharpness in PP. The latter can look cool when you first start playing around with digital, but you soon start to see how the dark outline / light halo doesn't usually add to the photo.
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OK,,,, I understand what your saying about post processing, I think. I have done very little so far. What about the camera adjustments for sharpness, contrast, tone and saturation etc. These are some of the reasons that give me pause to think " do I really want to do this digital thing " ? With film/transparencies I was satisfied and comfortable with what I got for quality in my work. So far I have been more frustrated with digital more than any thing else and not happy with any of my work. While I see value in post processing, sometimes I get the feeling that it is just away to cover up deficiencies in the work and does not require paying as much attention to details actually taking the the photo. As it is I am learning the mechanics but have not been able to put it all together to produce work I would be willing to show to others.
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