March 2010 Digital Group

Meeting Notes March 2009 to 2018.
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peterjones
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Apr 06, 2008 1:56 pm

March 2010 Digital Group

Post by peterjones » Sat Mar 06, 2010 9:45 am

Thank you all for attending and for your input; thanks also for bringing your images to share.

In the beginners section we looked at filters and concluded that many filters were a throwback to the graphic design origins of Photoshop; however each of course to their own and some that are useful are Gaussian Blur which can be used for blurring backgrounds and creating recession; also the application can be utilised for smoothing skin tones in portraiture; motion blur can be used to create an impression of speed; the clouds feature can be used to place clouds where none existed, also useful for creating extra steam for the steam railway aficionado. We had an interesting discussion on the watercolour filter which can be utilised to give a painted look to your image.

We also discussed Sharpening particularly with reference to the Unsharp Mask (USM) and the High Pass filter; more and more photographers are preferring the High Pass method of sharpening particularly where small detail in concerned.

Unsharp masking = masking the unsharp areas

Unsharp masking increases the contrast between two or more pixels

Settings:

Amount controls the degree to which edge contrast is increased. The higher the number, the more contrast is added along whatever pixels are determined to be edge pixels in your image.
Radius determines number of pixels affected.
Threshold determines how much contrast must exist in order for a given pixel to be considered an edge pixel; if set too low it will apply the effect to every edge and change in tone; too high and it will see no edges and no sharpening will apply.

Watch out for the new breed of Digital cameras based on the Micro Four Thirds system which are giving results comparable to DSLRs e.g. Olympus EP-2 and EP-1; the Panasonic Lumix range and models soon to be announced by Sony

We mentioned the Digital Economy Bill about to become law where your images can be utilised by corporations for web use without any reference to you; if indeed you should spot the image then recompense may be paid to you; the only solution is to watermark every image wherever you post it; I demonstrated a method of watermarking however there are other ways of achieving the same; a Google search will reveal third party software that specialises as such.

Watch out for an extension to Data Protection; a document is at a consultative stage where the results may include a restriction on photographing people in public places particularly applicable to professional photographers however should this become law you can reckon the public will imagine that any DSLR is a professional camera; it looks as though we may consider junking our DSLRs in favour of the micro four thirds sensors.

We looked at RAW conversion and found that many adjustments to an image can be carried out in RAW conversion (commonly called ACR) thus leaving fine tuning to Photoshop; it was interesting to note that about 50% of the audience shoots RAW.

I think that I have covered the important points; I hope you came away with a few ideas.

Peter Jones

peterjones
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Apr 06, 2008 1:56 pm

Re: March 2010 Digital Group

Post by peterjones » Sat Mar 06, 2010 12:50 pm

more details on USM here: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutor ... -usm.shtml

Peter Jones

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