Ulff, we are all different. I know some more sensitive to leaning lines than I am. I'm just sensitive. Other things I don't like is CA (longitudinal is worst but lateral CA is also bad for my eyes) and blotchy patterned noise. When the Pentax K10D was released i made half a Pentax forum upset by pointing to the pattern noise.
Common noise doesn't disturb me nearly as much, I'm generally not worried about vignetting or "soft corners". When there is smearing close to the borders or the corners it is harder for me.
Your image... I like it a lot. The tones and levels are all what i could wish for and the blown outside is the right level. I'm also fund of the sort of image with the windows being a subject and a frame at the same time. But... it isn't straight and somehow that disturbs me when looking at it. It should be easy to fix though and then you have a great image instead of just a good one.
Jonas, I will straighten the lines for sure, thanks again for the hint! Somehow all my (original) images lean at least 2 degrees to the right when I take them. This hasn't changed a bit in the last 10 years, I just don't see it. I even thought once that the sensor of my 10D must have been misaligned because every single photo showed the same leaning to the right. But if this is the explanation my current camera must have a misaligned sensor, too...
Very nice processing on those images, Markus! Very moody! I do miss the colour that I know is there in some of those images, but these B&Ws look great.
carstenw wrote:
Very nice processing on those images, Markus! Very moody! I do miss the colour that I know is there in some of those images, but these B&Ws look great.
Thanks Jonas and Carsten for your examples. I can see the difference, but to my seemingly "not so great eyes for straight lines" the difference is very small. By the way I did my correction in LR, since I don't use/have PS.
This is how the uncorrected version looked: http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7165/6442450573_48c39e6ef6_o.jpg
Markus, you have some great moody images in your last series.
Here it started immediately with a bunch of stairs. I won't say anything more about images leaning in different directions as that topic is getting old and the majority seem to like the skewed view of the world.
Lurker X gave us an image identified as S7: http://www.camerata-wannsee-bilder.de/fm/_DSC8405_DxO.jpg
...which I like as it so impressively shows us such an impressively building in such an impressive state of decay. My heart cries seeing a beautiful building getting ignored and abused that way.
The "Master Sports" image is also nice and here it probably is my background in documentary speaking.
Philippe showed us why the small pool image is much better in with a more narrow FOV. I agree with everyone (but I still think it is too greyish). The roof with the tiles is a pleasure to look at.
Bernhard gave us verticals and this one is much to my liking: http://gallery.me.com/alba63/100002/_MG_7351/web.jpg
As I wasn't there I can't say if a colour version possibly would look better but the shapes lends themselves for a B&W so why not?
At this point I again started to miss the exterior and so Boris' image #5 cured parts of my curiosity, and an excellent image it is: http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7149/6419864293_83144d3b2c_o.jpg
What is there not to like? I wish there was a good 24/1.0 or so for us with APS-C cameras?
Well, there you have my initial impressions/reflections from looking at page 30.
Philippe, I really like the spiral staircase photo, although I might be tempted to crop a little off the top, to get rid of the small area of peeling paint staircase which doesn't connect to anything. Boris, somehow I missed that balcony shot the first time, great shot!
Philippe, the desaturated version is more in accordance with my memory and gives (for me) a better picture of the mood. And your window/stair combination above is very much to my to my taste.
Boris, phantastic. All of them.
Ulff, as I said, B/W works for your images very well IMHO.
Carsten, you explained your approach, but for me they are just a bit too euphemistic. Perhaps I can find a counterexample on my disk.
philber wrote:
Also, a number of positive comments on my fist shot (empty bath) have nonetheless indicted that my use of desaturation, leaving the picture a greyish colour, was a mistake. (...)
My comments were not supposed to be taken as about the level of desaturation. My bad. I tried to communicate that the bath need to have its black and white -points adjusted along with a small adjustment of the gamma curve. "Greyish" as in "lack of contrast".
Well, I have been wrong about everything lately, so...
LurkerX wrote:
Carsten, you explained your approach, but for me they are just a bit too euphemistic. Perhaps I can find a counterexample on my disk.
R7
Carsten, this is my counterexample for comparison and illustration as to what I meant.
You mean that R7 is the counter-example? And it is presumably the counter-example to the following earlier statement:
LurkerX wrote:
Carsten, your pictures are technically perfect, showing huge detail, but for my taste the technical perfection overlays to a certain extend the tristesse I felt on location. Nevertheless, excellent work!
I see what you mean. You prefer a more "emotional" processing for these shots, to emphasize the sadness of the place? Phrased like this, you could have a point, although I am not sure that would prefer that approach. I will try one or two with more drama in the processing and post for you to comment on.
Carsten, Philippe, Boris and LurkerX: thanks for your comments!
Jonas: I find your comments (from someone who wasn't there and is not biased by knowing the place) very helpful and interesting!
Philippe: Regarding your bath-image there's really not much to improve IMO. If you want to play with this image nevertheless, I would suggest (1) trying out a b&w version of it, (2) cropping a few pixels from the top (although this would result in a format change) and/or (3) straighten the verticals within the bath. But without trying this out I'm not sure if any of these changes will actually further improve the image.
Carsten: I like that you have developed a personal style (technical perfect, same focal length, similar viewing heights, reduced contrast) in all these pictures making it easy to assign them to you. What I've personally seen different in this place are the highlights: IMO the bright light from the windows should not be dampened in post-processing.
LurkerX: My favorite is R6, although I like R5 and R7, too. R3 has also a lot potential, maybe the right border could be reduced in thickness?
Philippe, although I often prefer satureted colors in your example I prefer the desaturated version, because in the other version the colorfull leaves are distracting me from the main subject.
Your Carstenified staircase version is also very nice.
Here is an experimental set. The processing here is a bit different, more contrasty, a click *down* on saturation, black borders, 3:2 ratio, the whole shebang. I could go even further in this direction, but I am not sure I want to
The last one looks unsharp, it isn't. It just isn't in focus I decided to focus near the camera and use f/2.8, for whatever unknown reasons. I would not do that again if I were going back.
Hmmmmmm.... interesting! This looks darker, as though the shadows held a sinister and threatening alternate reality...
So it definitely works for me, from a photography point of view. Whether it is what I want to see from a gestalt point of view from this Beelitz site is a personal decision for each...
Ulff, thanks a lot for these additional images. My earlier comments were doing nothing but showing I'm bad at English so I skipped commenting the last pages and went back to the thread now.
It was a joy scrolling through these two last sets. Down, up and down again. Well balanced in every way, some interesting spots and a good overall performance by you.
# 12-14 and 20-22 are my favourites here with the last one being top notch, #13 is also worthy of some contemplation. There is nothing (=not much) wrong with the images 15-19 either, they are just a notch less appealing to my tired eyes.
Now you can tell I'm one of those loving natural frames in images. Simple but in many cases effective.
