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Archive 2015 · ISO12800 event

  
 
ben egbert
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · ISO12800 event


It was so dark at my Grand daughters concert last night that I wanted to light a candle to double the light. I have no idea why they keep it that dark. Last event I was able to shoot at ISO4000, but last night I wanted 12800 to avoid motion.

I did get brave and dropped to ISO400 toward the end, with 1/13 second using a 100-400 lens. See EXIF.

I also tried Camper Jims idea of shooting raw plus jpg. It looks like the lpgs did a better job on balancing noise/sharpness, but I was able to pull out some shadow on the RAWs. I suspect I could match the JPG on noise with some further work.










RAW version







JPG version







Raw version iso 4000 1/13 second







Jpg version




Dec 17, 2015 at 02:00 PM
beavens
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · ISO12800 event


Wow... as someone who cringes when I have to go to 1600 I am very impressed here!

Jeff



Dec 17, 2015 at 03:42 PM
lighthound
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · ISO12800 event


I'd say your in camera settings are working excellently on those jpegs!

I wish I would have used my 100-400 lens last week at my GD play. I used my 17-55mm instead and couldn't pull her in like you did.

Dave



Dec 17, 2015 at 03:43 PM
ben egbert
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · ISO12800 event


Thanks Guys. That 100-400 IS is amazing. My hands are not as steady as 1/13 would indicate. Also, these are really grainy at 100%, but the downsizing really cleans them up.

Like to hear which version RAW or JPG you prefer. The raws have some exposure work done during conversion, the only thing I did to the JPGs was adjust WB. I clicked the same spot for raw and jpg but got different results. This is probably because I have a color profile for RAW which is ignored when opening jpg.

I am also looking for processing suggestions.



Dec 17, 2015 at 03:50 PM
beavens
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · ISO12800 event


Ben, your RAW edits are looking cooler. I prefer the look, especially in the reds, with the JPG processing.

My big question for shots of this nature is in terms of cropping.

To my eyes, the other girls in the background are competing for attention with your subject. Might be worth the awkward crop on the background girls to put your granddaughter from and center.

OR it might make it look super weird with sliced off faces.

Looking forward to hearing from those who have shot more event stuff.

Jeff



Dec 17, 2015 at 04:40 PM
ben egbert
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · ISO12800 event


Thanks Jeff. I always think print size when I do the crops, 3x4, 5x7 for snaps. I don't do the printing I just give them to my daughter to order at Costco. She will actually cut them down for the scrap book so I need to give her some room.

I do try to make an intelligent choice based on what is there. I also move around and zoom in to avoid extraneous subject, but it is what it is. I agree however. I did get one shot with only my granddaughter.

I am processing a raw now without my custom profile but using the Adobe Standard which more or less matches the JPG. I still have more DR, but the colors more or less match. I converted without NR or sharpening and now am running NR to see if I can get back to the jpg look.

If it turns out, I will post it. My first cut with Topaz strong NR was not enough, I am doing strongest now.

How is this? Zero sharpening by the way.





Using adobe std profile, Topaz strongest NR no sharpening




Dec 17, 2015 at 04:58 PM
beavens
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · ISO12800 event


Colors looking better now!


Dec 17, 2015 at 05:16 PM
Camperjim
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · ISO12800 event


I always shoot raw+jpeg since I like to review my shots by looking at the jpegs and I can do that on any computer with any available software. For a lot of shooting the out of camera jpeg is all but print and internet ready. Jpeg results are so good that I often avoid shooting raw. This might include BIF where I want the burst speed and camera buffer capacity. Jpegs are all I need for Facebook and album-sized prints.

Recently I shot a 70th birthday party with about 75 guests. I shot around 250 images and well over 200 were good enough to give to the host. Unfortunately almost every image required a WB adjustment because I had a variety of lighting...tungsten, fluorescent and flash. Many of the jpegs had excessive warm hues. I suspect Canon processes jpegs on the warmish side because that is what is popular. Working with the jpegs was really fast. I used the WB stopper on something white in the foreground. Sometimes I had to select a couple of different places and got substantially different results. I had a couple of problem shots where the jpegs went from excessively warm to excessively cold. For those I made a layer and used opacity to select the amount of correction. For every shot I also used Levels to adjust white and black points and overall brightness. I did not have issues with color saturation. I did have to straighten and/or crop about 20% of the pictures. I was able to do all of the processing in an afternoon. By comparison I recently worked on a couple hundred raw edits for my landscape images. I took days and days to finish and probably 20 maybe even 40 hours of concentration and effort. The jpegs were printed 4x6 and some might be later printed at 8.5 x 11. I expect my landscape to hold up for printing at least 16x24 so I put in maximum effort. Even then working with raws is often overkill.



Dec 17, 2015 at 09:01 PM
ben egbert
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · ISO12800 event


I take lots of images, but I typically select very few for processing and of course I spend at least as much time processing as I do shooting, but that's what I do. I basically don't do much else.

But I was really surprised at how good the jpgs turned out, and with Breeze downloader pro, it put all the jpgs in a separate folder so I did not have trouble keeping them separate as in the past.

Having the jpg as a reference is a great thing. But it did not apply lens correction for one thing, nor my camera profile for another, so I would probably not use them as is. Also, for landscapes, I have a really neat ACR workflow now that pulls shadows up good enough that 90% of my images don't need multi shot blends. In fact I usually can process a RAW in under 10 minutes to this level. But if its a special shot, I may spend weeks on it. Usually for color more than anything else, but also to get the degree of shadow recovery to look natural.

This sort of image is different, can't blend them anyway and I am not looking for 24x36 print quality.

Anyway you were the inspiration to try is so thanks a lot for that.



Dec 17, 2015 at 11:01 PM
beavens
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · ISO12800 event


Jim - that sounds like a fantastic idea the next time I get a family request for some snapshots. I have such a hard time processing those pictures. Thanks!

Jeff



Dec 17, 2015 at 11:26 PM
Camperjim
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · ISO12800 event


Ben, for me it is convenient to keep the jpegs with the raw files. First I review the jpegs as soon after downloading as possible. I often cull out way over half of what I shot. If I am shooting macro flowers, handheld, I might dump 70-80% immediately. When I look more carefully and try to decide on images to process, I again review the jpegs. If I decide to process, it seems convenient to have the raw adjacent to the jpeg file. When I finish processing, I keep the TIFF in the same folder so all three files are adjacent to each other. If I am not happy and try another processing version, I also keep that with the others to make comparisons easy. When I make a print, I make a copy of the processed TIFF and keep the second copy in my Qimage print files.

I am puzzled. Why would you want to separate raw and jpegs into separate folders?



Dec 17, 2015 at 11:57 PM
sbeme
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · ISO12800 event


I often shoot RAW + jpeg, esp for images I consider BW possibilities (I know that's not you, Ben). One advantage for that situation is previsualization of BW conversion on the LCD on the camera.
I generally tweak whatever I have and obviously there is more headroom in the RAW but sometimes not needed.

These images are amazing in terms of control of noise, even after NR and downsizing,and even more amazing in terms of sharpness without sharpening and low shutter speeds handheld.
I prefer the look of all the jpegs. Not there, of course, but I suspect the color of her shirt is more accurate in the jpegs.

Scott



Dec 18, 2015 at 08:01 AM
ben egbert
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · ISO12800 event


Camperjim wrote:
Ben, for me it is convenient to keep the jpegs with the raw files. First I review the jpegs as soon after downloading as possible. I often cull out way over half of what I shot. If I am shooting macro flowers, handheld, I might dump 70-80% immediately. When I look more carefully and try to decide on images to process, I again review the jpegs. If I decide to process, it seems convenient to have the raw adjacent to the jpeg file. When I finish processing, I keep the TIFF in the same folder so all three files are
...Show more

So I know what I have and where it is. I select images by the image not the name which is too small to read. If I want to work on a raw, I want to know where to find just RAWs. Besides, I have never shot jpgs since my very first digital a Nikon 990 accept for experiments so I don't have any habits for them.

But I am pretty sure I like them separated. I do all my culling in Breeze Browser. If I have them in the same folder, it shows the RAW and then the JPG sequentially (or the other way around) and is very confusing.

If I start shooting jpg, I may use my Mirrorless camera and ditch the 5DS R. My goal has always been large prints, but large prints and web posting are incompatible. But if I decided to take web posting seriously, an all jpg non calibrated workflow might be the way to go.




Dec 18, 2015 at 10:15 AM
ben egbert
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · ISO12800 event


sbeme wrote:
I often shoot RAW + jpeg, esp for images I consider BW possibilities (I know that's not you, Ben). One advantage for that situation is previsualization of BW conversion on the LCD on the camera.
I generally tweak whatever I have and obviously there is more headroom in the RAW but sometimes not needed.

These images are amazing in terms of control of noise, even after NR and downsizing,and even more amazing in terms of sharpness without sharpening and low shutter speeds handheld.
I prefer the look of all the jpegs. Not there, of course, but I suspect the color of her shirt
...Show more

I think the difference in the shirts are brightness, the JPG is just too dark for my liking. I could probably match the JPG in RAW, but have not done so, I purposely lift the darks.

I think the key to the noise reduction is the very large number of pixels I am starting with. The noise looks terrible at 100%, but compression probably mergers them and it also sharpens the image. I have a value of 15 for sharpening in ACR (disabled here) and do no further sharpening unless I am printing. I do use some dehaze and clarity however for landscapes which does add a degree of sharpness.

The shutter speed amazes me too. After I got enough shots at the highest ISO my camera supports, to know I had some keepers, I started down to 6400 then 4000 where I finished. I was amazed at the lack of motion blur.





100% crop of sooc raw







100 % crop of jpg




Dec 18, 2015 at 10:17 AM
lighthound
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · ISO12800 event


ben egbert wrote:
Like to hear which version RAW or JPG you prefer.

I am also looking for processing suggestions.


I'll leave the color aspects of the processing to others for obvious reasons.

My personal choice of your OP images is the very last jpeg. She looks very happy as well as the girl behind her. In the other shots they all have their mouths open singing but it isn't very flattering.

One thought is to maybe crop in a fair amount to make her more prominent and to make the nearly blown girl in front of her go away. This is a tricky one to crop and get right. When doing this though you might want to tone down the bright spot on what's left of the girls neck in front of your GD. I tried a hack clone job to simulate this. Just an idea that would still retain the concert look (multiple kids) but put the focus on your happy little one.

Dave









Dec 18, 2015 at 10:50 AM
ben egbert
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · ISO12800 event


Thanks Dave, you are correct about the poses. I came home with 160 images. I just kept shooting in an affort to catch here without the eyes closed, or with a pleasing mouth position. Of course she is singing and after a while you can almost guess which sound she was working on.

I have not shown my favorite here which has her completely isolated. Not sure how that happened, but it only happened one time. Maybe they were still lining up. Anyway, this post was more about the image quality and processing.

The image quality is all due to my gear not me. But the processing is mine and it looks like the in-camera jpg processing was better than mine.





the one shot with her isolated.




Dec 18, 2015 at 11:13 AM
sbeme
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · ISO12800 event


with portraits you can get away with more aggressive NR and loss of detail..."skin smoothing"....especially on those a bit younger than us
Interesting how the downsizing also helps in that area


Scott



Dec 18, 2015 at 12:27 PM
ben egbert
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · ISO12800 event


sbeme wrote:
with portraits you can get away with more aggressive NR and loss of detail..."skin smoothing"....especially on those a bit younger than us
Interesting how the downsizing also helps in that area

Scott


The pre downsized cropped image was 5792 high, downsizing to 800 is a 7.24 to 1 reduction.



Dec 18, 2015 at 01:01 PM





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