The Apocalypse

[xpatUSA]

Please show me your perspective and the changes you would make

I reduced the glare from the unclouded sky. Then upped the contrast of the clouds. Then messed with color toning of the open sky. Then sharpened up the tree branches. All done globally in FastStone Viewer with color Levels and two stages of Unsharp Mask.



HTH

[Manfred M]

Please show me your perspective and the changes you would make, I always look forward to be open to learn,Manfred you have been extremely helpful in you comments, thank you.

The problem is that there is nothing that can be done with some of the key parts of your image; once you have lost all detail, there is nothing to recover in post. The biggest "flaw" in your image, in my view are the trees along the bottom of the image. The other areas would be fairly minor, as you do have data in the sky and clouds.

[Manfred M]

There is a way to determine a "level of subtlety" for digital. In the case of the example 8-bit image by Newton, first convert Dan's 2,8,4 to luminosity. It comes to about 6/255. Then go to a graph like this one from DPR:



There we see that 6/255 is equivalent to about -5 EV (depending on camera model) relative to mid-gray (Zone V). That puts us firmly in Zone I, or even Zone 0, as already claimed earlier. Since Zone I has no texture, there is no "subtlety" to be seen, QED.

First of all the Zone system does not map to the digital world as it is based on the response curve of film. There is some correlation to the visual response of the human visual system, as it is non-linear and the highest sensitivity is to the mid-tone range. I agree that there is no texture in Zone 0 or Zone 1 and we start seeing individual textures in Zone 2. However, if you put a mix of Zone 1 and Zone 2 elements in a real image file, the differences in real life images can have a mix of these two (or three) areas and individual textures can be seen. I can certainly make them out when I am working on my screen.

Let me throw up one of the test print templates that I use when evaluating new papers on my printer;



I have no issues making out tonal differences between any of these patches in my post-processing workspace, although I will admit, the two darkest patches are the ones that are hardest to see at the relatively low output level on my screen (80 candela / square meter).

Also; based on past posts, you tend to get worked up when a single channel clips, but seem to have no issues when all channels are clipped. Why?

[xpatUSA]

First of all the Zone system does not map to the digital world as it is based on the response curve of film. ...

I did not say "map to". The well-respected Hannemeyr said:

" However, it was not immediately obvious to me how I could continue to use the system when I moved on to digital photography. After a lot of trial and (mostly) error, I found that the Zone System is just as useful with digital as it is with film. However, shooting digital is different from shooting film, so the Zone System must be adapted to be useful to digital."

http://kronometric.org/phot/exp/zone...e%20System.htm

Following the term "adapted" rather than "mapped to" my position remains unchanged.

Also; based on past posts, you tend to get worked up when a single channel clips, but seem to have no issues when all channels are clipped. Why?

Straw Man alert!

You have omitted to mention the context of those past posts which is only in the case of over-saturated images, often but not always flowers.

I think I'll leave the Last Word to you, Manfred. I'm done.

[DanK]

I think this debate has taken on a life of its own, divorced from the real question. Manfred, in post #43, you are discussing whether one can see differences between Zones 1 and 2. That wasn't the starting point. The first issue of contention is whether it is OK to obliterate detail by including pure black. You say no, I (and Ted?) say yes. The next issue of contention (posts 35 and 36) was something entirely different: whether a black that is not 0,0,0 but is not distinguishable by the eye from 0,0,0 is pure black. Post 43 is a different issue entirely.

I think for purposes of the OP, this may be confusing. I would simplify it this way:

1. the op had an image that exceeded the dynamic range of the camera. Unless he wanted to have crushed shadows, blown highlights, or both, the only option was to use multiple exposures with either exposure blending or HDR.
2. If he wanted crushed shadows: you consider this unacceptable, while at least one or two other of us don't, as long as it is part of the photographer's intent. That's not to say that we will necessarily like the result.

Is that a fair summary?

Re the zone system: I think this is a digression. As I understand it, the core of the zone system was visualizing in terms of 10 stops and then exposing and developing to obtain them. The elaborate steps needed to obtain them in Adams' day was a consequence of his using film, but that's IMHO incidental. That was just the tool at hand. As a simpler example: split toning is changing tones in either the dark parts or light parts of an image without doing so in the rest. In Olivia Parker's work, this entailed bathing the print in a selenium toner. (Adams, who originally hated the results of split toning, was so impressed by Parker's images that he had her teach at his institute.) However, it wouldn't be correct to say that this doesn't map to digital because at the time, people used chemical processes to obtain the effect, and we simply move a few sliders.

The zone system principles can be applied to digital, and many people have written about this. My own opinion, for what little it's worth, is that apart from encouraging people to visualize the tonal range they want, this is a somewhat pointless exercise. Given the nature of digital photography, the path to maximizing tonal differences is entirely different; the core elements before processing are avoiding clipping and maximizing detail by ETTR. If we end up with fewer steps than we want, it is trivial in post to expand the tonal range. We even get the luxury of deciding how much to expand it. So in practice, when I am shooting, all I worry about is making sure that I don't have excessive tonal range for the camera and then metering correctly for whatever areas should be the brightest without being blown. (That's one of many reasons I often use a spot meter.) The rest happens on the computer.

[selig1656]

Manfred, I always have the raw saved,I will go back and rework the capture using the suggestions as I hope I understand.Thanks to all on their input.

[Manfred M]

Dan - I agree with much of your summary, but just want to point out that I am not arguing that there should be areas of full black, crushed shadow detail (0,0,0), especially in a B&W image. What I am not in total agreement with is the overall quantity of "pure black" in an image. The comments about very dark values are essentially what I prefer seeing instead of 100% 0,0,0, for both aesthetic and technical reasons.

I am aware of the arguments for black backgrounds, especially in studio photography. There are similar arguments made for pure white (255, 255, 255) values in backgrounds and I find that these usually work less well than pure black as these tend to cause a softening wrap around the subject (a "hot" white background is effectively a large white reflector). I also tend to prefer silhouettes that are not pure black and show some subtle gradation; they just look better, but are more difficult to do.

[Manfred M]

Manfred, I always have the raw saved,I will go back and rework the capture using the suggestions as I hope I understand.Thanks to all on their input.

Raymond, with your raw converter, slide the "shadows" slider over to the right to see if that opens up some detail in the trees.