My first shots at CiC (by Sparsh)

[sparsh]

Hi All,

Posting some of my first shots. Need your comments to improve.

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/fo...hp?albumid=453

I have uploaded 4 pictures to the album and 1 as an attachment here.









Regards
Sparsh

[Dave Humphries]

Hi SParsh,

As you will see, I have moved these to another forum because not many people will comment if they are buried in the middle of the Intro thread. I also added the other 3 here as there's not too many - all part of the service

Unfortanately, I can't see the EXIF data on these, but looking at your profile, I see you have a Canon 1000D with kit lens, so would I be correct in thinking that's what was used for these shots?

I also wonder whether you have any Post Processing software and what that might be?

Here's your original;


Here's what I did with Elements;


Crop
Tone down the over exposed foreground
Adjust White Balance
Increase saturation (except on the yellow board)
Selectively sharpen mainly the face

Cheers,

[sparsh]

Hi Dave,

Yes i am using a EOS 1000D and 18-55mm lens.
I just took the shots and for couple of them just used the DPP software of Canon itself .Any idea of the options as in a postprocessing software to be used,that is user friendly for a novice like me.

Thanks for your help and advice in advance.

Regards
Sparsh

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Sparsh,

That was quick, I have updated the post above and probably answered some of these

Cheers,

[sparsh]

Hi Dave,

Thanks i can see the difference .I saw a discussion in the forum about elements.
Maybe will check further out on it and get one.

Regards
Sparsh

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Sparsh,

You could do about half of what I did just with Canon's DPP software.

The bit you couldn't do (I believe) is the selective sharpeneing - and that was only necessary because the image was sharpest on the 'foot spray' and splashes behind the swimmer - better focusing would have rendered that unnecessary.

As it was, I had to give the face (on a separate 'copy of background' layer) three passes of (differing) USM sharpening to get it looking semi-reasonable. You could have more success working with the full sized image - all I had was 437px after the crop.

Possibly the localised exposure and saturation tweaks I did would have been beyond DPP too.

Elements did me OK for over 3 years - I have only just got CS5 and haven't used it much yet, it is overkill for quick tweaks on little pics like these.

Skyscapes aren't my speciality, so I'll let someone else 'dive in' with advice on those

Cheers,