StarDestroyer.Net BBS

I spent most of Friday in Jerusalem, and took some pics of the market there while I was at it . Enjoy!


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a quickr pickr post

Did a quick retouch on one of your pictures, original on the left for comparison.
LAB colour is fun. Learn to love Photoshop!

Sorry dude, but the left one is way fucking better, the right one looks grey, washed out and grainy (without that adding anything). .
Your techniques work better with colourful shit I think . (Thanks anyway)

DEATH wrote:Sorry dude, but the left one is way fucking better, the right one looks grey, washed out and grainy (without that adding anything). .

Get your monitor calibrated, or get new glasses you doof!

aerius wrote:

DEATH wrote:Sorry dude, but the left one is way fucking better, the right one looks grey, washed out and grainy (without that adding anything). .

Get your monitor calibrated, or get new glasses you doof!

The right photo looks terrible, it's grainy, and very badly washed out with a grey colouring of washed out pixels. My monitor is fine...

Outside observation is needed.

I'm going to have to agree with DEATH, aerius. Compare the tile outlines on the ground. The left image looks so much better. The right image looks like ass.

I think both photos suck, but if I were forced to choose one I'd reluctantly side with aerius'. DEATH's photo is very "digital" looking, the highlights & brighter areas are great but the midtones and especially the shadow details are poor. There's a lack of gradations in the mids & shadows so the subtle changes in brightness and contrast aren't there, if we were using a brightness scale from one to ten for instance, the one in your photo would go 0-4-6-7-8-9-10, it's missing big chunks and isn't smooth, my husband's would be 2-3-4-5-6-7-9-10, it doesn't have the blackest blacks but the rest is more or less smoothly blended. There's no big discontinuities in the shades.

Of particular note is the man on the left holding the white bag. In the original you can't see the outline of his coat against the background to the left, all we see is an indistinct black shape. This is very unnatural looking, the human eye in real life does not see black blobs unless one is looking directly into the sun, which is not the case in the photo as the sun is at around 2 o'clock from the perspective of the photo. There should be some shading and shadow detail, yet there isn't any apparent in the original. In the edited version we see that yes, there is a person behind and to the left of the man in question, and he's also wearing lighter coloured clothes than the man with the bag. This is what one would see in real life.

Also of note are the 3 boxes in the stall just a bit to the right of bag man's white plastic bag. In the original it's nearly impossible to make out the outlines of the boxes against the background, all the darker areas & shadows are too similar looking & squashed to blackness. Once again, your eyes don't do this in real life and you should still be able to make out shades & outlines in the shadows, which you can in the edited version. Shadows aren't pure black unless one is staring right into the sun or other bright lightsource.

Where the edited version screws up is the underside of the green balcony, it should be darker & around midway between the two versions. The same is also true of the shop windows on the upper right, given the direction of the sun they should be in deeper shadow & darker.

Neither version is wholly real and true to life, however, the edited version is closer to reality. One trend I've noticed with digital is pushing the contrast for blacker blacks and brighter highlights, which is great for landscapes and other subjects which benefit from bright bold colours. Not so great with people shots & marketplace pictures since the gradation of shades isn't fine enough to differentiate between closely spaced colours & brightnesses, it tends to have a Technicolor effect which looks fake.

J wrote:I think both photos suck, but if I were forced to choose one I'd reluctantly side with aerius'. DEATH's photo is very "digital" looking, the highlights & brighter areas are great but the midtones and especially the shadow details are poor.

Fair enough (The shot is weak in IQ, but I liked the substance of it). I thought both versions of the women were a bit weak in lighting, etc', but made a nice frame (the version I originally posted especially) to make it a bit grabbing, even if it isn't something I'd show as an example of my work.
Second version: (better lighting, but not that good, and dull on the whole).


And, a rooftop scene (We climbed onto a rooftop on top of the market and took some shots from there).

IMG_0135 is hands-down my favorite of the lot.

IMG_0166 is really nice. If only he kicked away the cardboard box beside him. Photoshop?

bozazz wrote:IMG_0166 is really nice. If only he kicked away the cardboard box beside him. Photoshop?

Nah, it adds a lot (even if the coins/carton bottom are a bit burnt out). I defiently wouldn't edit out

Kanastrous wrote:IMG_0135 is hands-down my favorite of the lot.

Thanks! It's one of my favourites too!

DEATH wrote:

bozazz wrote:IMG_0166 is really nice. If only he kicked away the cardboard box beside him. Photoshop?

Nah, it adds a lot (even if the coins/carton bottom are a bit burnt out). I defiently wouldn't edit out

True enough. BTW That's my favorite photo of the lot. The way the tiles are laid out is just unbelievable. Do you have a website? Maybe you should start one and host some of your photos into galleries. Cheers.

bozazz wrote:

DEATH wrote:

bozazz wrote:IMG_0166 is really nice. If only he kicked away the cardboard box beside him. Photoshop?

Nah, it adds a lot (even if the coins/carton bottom are a bit burnt out). I defiently wouldn't edit out

True enough. BTW That's my favorite photo of the lot. The way the tiles are laid out is just unbelievable. Do you have a website? Maybe you should start one and host some of your photos into galleries. Cheers.

See my sig. Flickr and Picasa.
I'm currently considering to either open a smugmug account, or a website on an open host.