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Archive 2013 · Rainier Reflection!

  
 
Justin Grimm
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Rainier Reflection!


This image "reflects" the conditions I had for my entire stay around Mount Rainier with Dustin Gent. Clear skies and beautiful flowers the whole time. This twilight shot was carefully put together from 27 separate images. 9 different focus points at 3 exposures each using my lens' sharpest aperture and to keep shutter speeds high enough to avoid blurred flowers. Perfect, noise free detail throughout, and I can't wait to print it huuuge! We also did some star stuff later this night, so I may post a similar image down the road with stars.

Thanks for checking it out Lots more to come eventually too!

http://500px.com/photo/42892668



Oh, please view it on a calibrated monitor. Anything less and it will KILL the details.

Edited on Aug 11, 2013 at 04:09 PM · View previous versions



Aug 11, 2013 at 02:12 AM
JimFox
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Rainier Reflection!


Hey Justin,

Whew.... I do have a calibrated monitor! I am glad you didn't ask for it to be viewed with a Color Management aware browser though...

Nice shot here, I sure do like it! 27 images? That is crazy! So 9 focus points? How do you decide those 9? Do you just focus close and just keep slightly adjusting the focus slightly more distant?

I will be in Rainier tomorrow. It's a bit more cloudy now, but hopefully I can get some cool shots too.

Jim

Jim



Aug 11, 2013 at 02:43 AM
Justin Grimm
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Rainier Reflection!


Thanks Jim. Yeah I haven't opened that browser can of worms yet. Safari is what Im on though and it looks pretty darn close.

As for the focus points, it depends on what aperture I'm using and how close the subjects are to the lens. I usually use F8 unless I need something faster. The flowers are as close as possible to the front of my lens (maybe 4") so smaller focus adjustments are needed at the start, and then larger adjustments are ok as you near infinity.

Good luck out there!



Aug 11, 2013 at 03:04 AM
Justin Grimm
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Rainier Reflection!


Any feedback, good or bad, is appreciated! Maybe the lack of clouds is just too boring for some? Im surprised at how different the reactions (or lack of) are compared to other places I posted this image.


Aug 12, 2013 at 09:03 AM
Steve Perry
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Rainier Reflection!


I like it. If there was one nit I'd pick it's that bright area next to the mountain - it tends to pull your eye away in my opinion. I wouldn't kill it, but maybe a touch darker (or maybe the rest of the image a touch lighter).

Just minor nitpicking (since you asked ), it's still a sweet shot either way and I admire your ambition with 27 shots! I thought I was nuts



Aug 12, 2013 at 09:35 AM
Justin Grimm
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Rainier Reflection!


Thanks Steve, I'll see what I can do with the highlighted area at home. I think I'll just avoid posting really dark images that might not show up even close for everyone. It looks terribad at work right now haha.


Aug 12, 2013 at 01:19 PM
kmunroe
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Rainier Reflection!


i agree with Steve about the light and dark areas.. but overall it looks great on my monitor


Aug 13, 2013 at 04:43 AM
JustinPoe
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Rainier Reflection!


The area of glow definitely looks enhanced, a Ryan Dyar style glow you often see in his images. I personally love the look, it makes the image pop. I might suggest the overall image be a tad brighter, but I'd have to see a physical print first.

You're right though, these dark images are really tricky when being viewed online, especially when they're "so small" as opposed to a print.

Great shot overall.



Aug 13, 2013 at 09:33 AM
Justin Grimm
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Rainier Reflection!


JustinPoe wrote:
The area of glow definitely looks enhanced, a Ryan Dyar style glow you often see in his images. I personally love the look, it makes the image pop. I might suggest the overall image be a tad brighter, but I'd have to see a physical print first.

You're right though, these dark images are really tricky when being viewed online, especially when they're "so small" as opposed to a print.

Great shot overall.


Thanks Justin. I love his style and have talked with him about how he gets his glow. However for this shot, instead of painting it in by hand, I used an exposure that was fogged from condensation on the lens for the LAST image in the focus stack. A little trick I figured out on my part It works a lot better for me this way to do it in camera.

And yeah, even the slightest difference in gamma or screen brightness will totally change this image. I'm assuming I'll have to make a few test prints to get it looking right, even though Im calibrated to the printer lab in town. Looking forward to it though because I know all the work I put into it will pay off when viewed in person, even if the online reaction isnt very great.



Aug 13, 2013 at 09:52 AM
JustinPoe
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Rainier Reflection!


Justin Grimm wrote:
However for this shot, instead of painting it in by hand, I used an exposure that was fogged from condensation on the lens for the LAST image in the focus stack. A little trick I figured out on my part It works a lot better for me this way to do it in camera.


That is an awesome trick. Thanks for sharing.



Aug 13, 2013 at 10:00 AM
nburwell
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Rainier Reflection!


I agree with Steve about the bright area to the left of Rainier, but it doesn't completely take away from the rest of the image. Great work overall! It's pretty ambitious to get this image from 27 individual images. Nicely done.

-Nick



Aug 13, 2013 at 10:00 AM
Mark Metternich
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Rainier Reflection!


Great shot Justin! I love your rendering of the highlights near the mountain. Nice job. Almost a Noriega/Dyar flare. Sweet.

And yes, photographers should use color managed browsers so we can get as close to the same page as possible, IMO.

Keep up the great work!



Aug 13, 2013 at 03:36 PM
skibum5
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · Rainier Reflection!


very nice!

speaking of calibrated monitor, actually it IS crucial that it also is viewed with a color-managed browser (unless you are one of the rare few who has calibrated their monitors to sRGB tone response curve instead of gamma 2.2). If you are set to gamma 2.2 and use IE then it will crush away some of the fine shadow details here. In Firefox it will translate from sRGb TRC to gamma 2.2 properly.

Yup I just viewed it in IE after switching out of sRGB sRGB TRC mode to sRGB Gamma 2.2 Broadcast mode and then compared to Firefox and using IE totally increases the overall image contrast and crushes away detail in the blacks, the plants below have a lot less subtle tone shades left and same for the evergreens up top.

People forget that a non-managed browser is NEVER good even for sRGB images unless you have calibrated your monitor to a true sRGB including the tone response curve and your calibrated monitor actually happens to hit sRGB primary locations (most non-wide gamut monitors don't). People need to start using nothing but color-managed browsers and photo sites need to start accepting wide gamut images too (only a few like flickr and perhaps pbase do, a shame since ones like Zenfolio are nicer otherwise). Sadly it seems that most photo hosting sites are at the forefront of holding technology BACK!! And the same goes for many photographers. The very two groups who should be at the forefront of pushing things forward! And the hosting sites refuse to even allow wide gamut images on their sites until every last person uses a color-managed browser and some users say they won't bother until all sites host wide gamut images and there it has been stuck for years now!

(of course even then it may look different monitor to monitor as monitors of differing gamuts may calibrate differently to probe vs eye due to metamerism and the metamerism actually varies person to person (ideally you'd give up tristim calibrations and go to full spectrum calibrations to get around this issue). And then lighting in the room and screen type (matte vs shiny, shiny actually stays somewhat more consistent although it seems many photographers prefer matte since they seem to hate sharp reflections, I sort of prefer glossy screens myself not you can find them much these days outside of apple and hdtvs) can affect how 0 black washes out or not. And the contrast ratio of monitor can alter a look too, many ISP screens have very washed out blacks, and it also matters whether you calibrate to true 0 or relative black point and whether compensatation is used or not and even then it's tricky if ratio is much huger on one screen compared to another especially if the image is small on screen, a large screen and a screen filling image gives a better chance to see shadow details properly without having the bright areas blind out the eyes)





Aug 13, 2013 at 08:57 PM
aFeinberg
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · Rainier Reflection!


Pretty freakin badass. And funny that people bring up noriega/dyer. I'm sure they would be flattered by that. Think you could have pulled this off in about 12 images max. The only one you need to blend for DR is the farthest focus point for the highlights. Great work sir.

aF



Aug 14, 2013 at 07:16 AM
Justin Grimm
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · Rainier Reflection!


aFeinberg wrote:
Pretty freakin badass. And funny that people bring up noriega/dyer. I'm sure they would be flattered by that. Think you could have pulled this off in about 12 images max. The only one you need to blend for DR is the farthest focus point for the highlights. Great work sir.

aF


Thanks bud. Its funny, this image made Noriega follow my work on 500px, and I've never even talked to him before

Technically I only used pixels from 19 images I think, but because of my stacking and blending workflow, omitting any of the 27 frames would cause some problems for me. I don't have that epic D800 dynamic range for clean shadows either :P



Aug 14, 2013 at 08:36 PM





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