Here's the first shot from my visit yesterday to Xi Tang, a water town (like a mini-venice, China has a lot of these 1,000+ year old villages dotted around). Most of my night time shots were all with a D800E on a tripod so not for posting here, but I do have a few daytime shots with the A7 and mainly (95%) the Zeiss ZF2 Makro Planar 100/2 .
I'm trying all sorts of programs for my PP so any C&C is very welcome as you know what it is like, you work on a shot for a while and then it just seems like nothing you do is right !
Frogfish wrote:
Here's the first shot from my visit yesterday to Xi Tang, a water town (like a mini-venice, China has a lot of these 1,000+ year old villages dotted around). Most of my night time shots were all with a D800E on a tripod so not for posting here, but I do have a few daytime shots with the A7 and mainly (95%) the Zeiss ZF2 Makro Planar 100/2 .
I'm trying all sorts of programs for my PP so any C&C is very welcome as you know what it is like, you work on a shot for a while and then it just seems like nothing you do is right ! ...Show more →
First what pops up in my mind; a little less hightlights to lift up the sky and get the whites on some of the walls down a little. And may be a little less (Local)contrast. Looks a bit to (unnatural) sharp to me.
What do you think?
A7 28-70FE. While I always criticize A7/r series for poor skin color renditions, when you take a minute to set the white balance manually, things become normal
Frogfish wrote:
Here's the first shot from my visit yesterday to Xi Tang, a water town (like a mini-venice, China has a lot of these 1,000+ year old villages dotted around). Most of my night time shots were all with a D800E on a tripod so not for posting here, but I do have a few daytime shots with the A7 and mainly (95%) the Zeiss ZF2 Makro Planar 100/2 .
I'm trying all sorts of programs for my PP so any C&C is very welcome as you know what it is like, you work on a shot for a while and then it just seems like nothing you do is right !
I'm with Michiel, I think it's oversharpened (or is it caused by tonal contrast boost?)
Ofcourse the final edit is personal choice and preference, but using this jpeg I would start with: brightness -25, then contrast +25
sculptormic wrote:
First what pops up in my mind; a little less hightlights to lift up the sky and get the whites on some of the walls down a little. And may be a little less (Local)contrast. Looks a bit to (unnatural) sharp to me.
What do you think?
reprazent1 wroteI'm with Michiel, I think it's oversharpened (or is it caused by tonal contrast boost?)
Ofcourse the final edit is personal choice and preference, but using this jpeg I would start with: brightness -25, then contrast +25
Thank you very much for the suggestions guys ! Yes, it was local tonal boost (I do have a penchant for HDR but try to keep it down as much as possible) !
Sorry I don't use PS so the values don't translate exactly and after using Perfect Photo for some mild PP the resulting TIFF doesn't show the original adjustments made in LR, everything's now levelled to zero. However you can see the new adjustments I made in LR to try to conform to your suggestions. -16 on the contrast, -50 on the Highlights and I wanted to get more black into the photo so -25 on the Blacks too.
I've also noticed that part of the issue is I have the screen brightness turned down for many of the websites I visit (white backgrounds) which then messes up my edits if I forget to readjust or I over-compensate. I guess the viewers' own screen brightness affects their perception too.
Here's a Before & After screen clip followed by the full rework. Does it look any better ? Anything I've missed or done wrong ? Still too crispy ? I'm really holding back on processing the others now until I can find the right formula.
Cheers ! Kevin.
Frogfish wrote:
Thanks Jochen - really appreciate the feedback ! Is that the HDR effect you're noticing or the actual level of sharpening (jaggies / artifacts) ?
It's the sharpening halos around the edges, especially along the sky. Can you show us the detail tab? Is something happening during your jpg conversion or upload?
The 2nd is much worse than the 1st which only showed slight halo at the top right sky interface.
Great set 
