Nala

[Sam W]

I'm having some trouble selecting the best sharpness. C&C welcome.




f/8, 1/320, ISO-100, 85mm, handheld, edits in LR

[rpcrowe]

beautiful shepherd

[Shadowman]

What was your sharpening method? Nice capture.

[Rebel]

Seems sharp to me?

People worrying about how sharp their image is, is pointless ... it looks fine.

[Sam W]

What was your sharpening method? Nice capture.

In most cases I just use LR.

[Sam W]

Seems sharp to me?

People worrying about how sharp their image is, is pointless ... it looks fine.

Thanks Matt. I'm not looking for ways to make it sharper but trying to settle on the right sharpness/softness. Eventually, it will become clear to me...I guess part of the growing process. It is good to know that you think it looks fine now.

[Sam W]

Thanks Richard!

[Ziggy]

Yours Sam? Great looking dog.

[Andrew1]

If you are worried about sharpness you need to work off of a print. On my screen it looks fine, others may not. I'll bet just pops in a well done 8x10 on an appropriate paper.

Just a suggestion, next time you do this, lose the collar and leash.

[NorthernFocus]

Nice looking animal. The sharpness looks good on my screen.

[Astramael]

Just a suggestion, next time you do this, lose the collar and leash.

But then his subject might decide to be altogether somewhere else!

Dogs present a unique challenge in portraiture. While human faces are pretty flat, dogs have long noses (Cue my "Why the long face? Because you're a dog!" joke that all dogs don't find funny.) This means while you can shoot a human bean at f/2.8 MFT or f/4-5.6 in 35mm, dogs need either a different perspective or a DoF compromise in order to keep those lovely snouts in focus. To make matters worse the ears are at the back of the head and also need to be in focus, especially in shots like this where the animal has such magnificent ears. That can give you Z-depth of over 1ft** which requires critical sharpness depending on the size of the dog.

I think all of your selections for technicals are just fine here. f/8 at FF is probably enough, and more than enough in any crop format. So assuming you nailed critical focus on the eyes, the extremes at nose/ears should all be in focus. However, I am also seeing funky sharpness artifacts here and I feel like it is more likely to be image compression than a photo problem.

Another thing to note is that while 80mm+ FF is fine for humans, and tends to be flattering, dogs have absolutely no problem staying adorable at other focal lengths. The longer focal lengths can compress perspective too much and collapse the nose into the face. The additional perspective provided at something like 50mm can help the look of the dog, and keep the nose appearing to protrude out as it does. I don't think this photo suffers from that especially, it's just something to consider if you do some more shots.

Overall I like the photo. It's a beautiful dog, and it doesn't help that I'm a sucker for GSDs. Does the black and white help it? I'm not sure. It might be nice in color because the colors may help improve the separation from the background.

** Pugs need not apply.

[IzzieK]

I enjoyed reading your post, Julian...

Sam...this would have been nice if the image is in colour. GSDs are beautiful dogs. I think you've lost that by converting to black and white. In any case, sharpness is not an issue here really because your presentation is just fine.

[Sam W]

Yours Sam? Great looking dog.

Yep, thanks.

[Sam W]

If you are worried about sharpness you need to work off of a print. On my screen it looks fine, others may not. I'll bet just pops in a well done 8x10 on an appropriate paper.

Just a suggestion, next time you do this, lose the collar and leash.

Great suggestions Andrew. Thanks! I agree about the collar & leash. This was more of a "by chance" photo than a planned portrait...excuses, excuses.

[Sam W]

But then his subject might decide to be altogether somewhere else!

Dogs present a unique challenge in portraiture. While human faces are pretty flat, dogs have long noses (Cue my "Why the long face? Because you're a dog!" joke that all dogs don't find funny.) This means while you can shoot a human bean at f/2.8 MFT or f/4-5.6 in 35mm, dogs need either a different perspective or a DoF compromise in order to keep those lovely snouts in focus. To make matters worse the ears are at the back of the head and also need to be in focus, especially in shots like this where the animal has such magnificent ears. That can give you Z-depth of over 1ft** which requires critical sharpness depending on the size of the dog.

I think all of your selections for technicals are just fine here. f/8 at FF is probably enough, and more than enough in any crop format. So assuming you nailed critical focus on the eyes, the extremes at nose/ears should all be in focus. However, I am also seeing funky sharpness artifacts here and I feel like it is more likely to be image compression than a photo problem.

Another thing to note is that while 80mm+ FF is fine for humans, and tends to be flattering, dogs have absolutely no problem staying adorable at other focal lengths. The longer focal lengths can compress perspective too much and collapse the nose into the face. The additional perspective provided at something like 50mm can help the look of the dog, and keep the nose appearing to protrude out as it does. I don't think this photo suffers from that especially, it's just something to consider if you do some more shots.

Overall I like the photo. It's a beautiful dog, and it doesn't help that I'm a sucker for GSDs. Does the black and white help it? I'm not sure. It might be nice in color because the colors may help improve the separation from the background.

Thanks Julian for the detailed comments. This photo has sparked my interest in doing better on the next try. The information you provided will save me a lot of time in trial-and-error. The setting on this shot were just luck for the most part and I took it on a split second while on a walk.

Nala finds White Tailed Deer irresistible to chase so we keep her on a leash just in case.

The B&W removes the color distractions for me. I'm adding it below to see what you think. I have not spent a lot of time PP on it, thus, it still needs some adjustments IMO.

[Sam W]

I enjoyed reading your post, Julian...

Sam...this would have been nice if the image is in colour. GSDs are beautiful dogs. I think you've lost that by converting to black and white. In any case, sharpness is not an issue here really because your presentation is just fine.

Thanks Izzie! I appreciate your comments. I added a color version for reference.

[Astramael]

For my part I prefer the color version considerably. It mostly just needs the black level played with a bit. I do find that the colors help separate the puppy and the background. A superb image.

[Donald]

Sharpening for online display and for printing are two different things (or different sharpening is required).

I think the key question is not 'Is the sharpening right?'. Instead it is, 'Is this over-sharpened?'. Especially in a image like this in which over-sharpening would leave the hair looking 'frazzled'. It is most certainly not that. So, to that end the sharpening is good.

[Sam W]

Sharpening for online display and for printing are two different things (or different sharpening is required).

I think the key question is not 'Is the sharpening right?'. Instead it is, 'Is this over-sharpened?'. Especially in a image like this in which over-sharpening would leave the hair looking 'frazzled'. It is most certainly not that. So, to that end the sharpening is good.

Thanks Donald. I rarely print but hope to some day. When that time comes I will be keeping your advice in mind.

[rpcrowe]

I think that the structure slider of NIK Viveza can be used on an image like this to add definition without artifacts. This is with the NIK Viveza Structure Slider at 40%

In using the Viveza Structure Slider, I placed control points on different areas of the dog to pick up the different colors in the coat.
In this version I also added a 10% contrast increase in Photoshop CS6.
I think that this version has the gorgeous dog standing out from the background.
I have found that the structure slider works quite well on dog's coats.
What do you think?