There are purists who argue that you should try to get it all perfect in-camera, right when the shot is taken. Heck, I used to be one of those people. And I still think there's nothing wrong with trying to get the shot as good as you can right when you press the shutter, of course. But consider this: even the venerable Ansel Adams spent far more time in his darkroom than he did shooting images, tweaking his prints to make them what he envisioned when he clicked the shutter. There's no difference in the principle today, it's just that we have digital tools where he had only analog. I often wonder what he might have produced if he'd had today's equipment and computers. :)
As for me, like I said, my goal is to enhance reality. I'll crop or clone out distractions when I can, like a sign in the background or an electrical outlet or something that tends to draw the eye without adding to the image. And temporary facial blemishes like pimples, of course. :) But I've never been one to do major manipulation like changing body shapes or compositing a person into a different setting. There's a line between enhancing reality and changing it completely, after all. :)
Yes, increasing the ISO setting is basically just amplifying the signal coming off of the sensor--and much like audio, as you amplify the signal, you also amplify the underlying noise, which is what shows up as grain in digital images. Some of that can be dealt with in post-processing too, but also at a cost, specifically a reduction in detail. Even on my current camera, I try to avoid ISO settings above 1600 or so--I'll go higher if it means the difference between a noisy image or no image at all, but it's rare. On my older cameras I usually draw the line at 800 and try to stay at 400 or below when possible.
Flash is another topic, really--though an important one! The problem with on-camera direct flash, as you've probably seen, is that it tends to wash out colors and gives a bit of an artificial look. The trick with flash is to blend it with ambient light, and/or bounce it off of large surfaces (the ceiling, for example) to better spread the light for a softer and more natural look. But that's tough to do with built-in flashes that only point forward. Some people use a sheet of craft foam to deflect the light from the flash--it's kludgy but it can work. :)
I've not used GIMP myself, and I'm actually not even particularly skillful with Photoshop. I know they do a lot of the same stuff, but that's about the extent of my knowledge. :) Lightroom is in the Photoshop family but very different--it combines an image library catalog (which allows for importing, organizing, keyword tagging, rating, etc.) with an image editor. The editor isn't as robust as Photoshop, mainly in that it doesn't allow for layers and real pixel-level manipulation. But it does everything I need to do in terms of tweaking color, contrast, tone curves, saturation, that sort of thing, and it has local adjustment and spot healing/cloning tools for removing those imperfections I mentioned. I presume GIMP has those basics well covered, though, it's just a matter of finding them. :) I happened to find this basics tutorial on YouTube, the first few minutes I've watched look useful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcIPME9X_r4
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branchandroot
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Date: 2014-03-05 03:42 pm (UTC)As for me, like I said, my goal is to enhance reality. I'll crop or clone out distractions when I can, like a sign in the background or an electrical outlet or something that tends to draw the eye without adding to the image. And temporary facial blemishes like pimples, of course. :) But I've never been one to do major manipulation like changing body shapes or compositing a person into a different setting. There's a line between enhancing reality and changing it completely, after all. :)
Yes, increasing the ISO setting is basically just amplifying the signal coming off of the sensor--and much like audio, as you amplify the signal, you also amplify the underlying noise, which is what shows up as grain in digital images. Some of that can be dealt with in post-processing too, but also at a cost, specifically a reduction in detail. Even on my current camera, I try to avoid ISO settings above 1600 or so--I'll go higher if it means the difference between a noisy image or no image at all, but it's rare. On my older cameras I usually draw the line at 800 and try to stay at 400 or below when possible.
Flash is another topic, really--though an important one! The problem with on-camera direct flash, as you've probably seen, is that it tends to wash out colors and gives a bit of an artificial look. The trick with flash is to blend it with ambient light, and/or bounce it off of large surfaces (the ceiling, for example) to better spread the light for a softer and more natural look. But that's tough to do with built-in flashes that only point forward. Some people use a sheet of craft foam to deflect the light from the flash--it's kludgy but it can work. :)
I've not used GIMP myself, and I'm actually not even particularly skillful with Photoshop. I know they do a lot of the same stuff, but that's about the extent of my knowledge. :) Lightroom is in the Photoshop family but very different--it combines an image library catalog (which allows for importing, organizing, keyword tagging, rating, etc.) with an image editor. The editor isn't as robust as Photoshop, mainly in that it doesn't allow for layers and real pixel-level manipulation. But it does everything I need to do in terms of tweaking color, contrast, tone curves, saturation, that sort of thing, and it has local adjustment and spot healing/cloning tools for removing those imperfections I mentioned. I presume GIMP has those basics well covered, though, it's just a matter of finding them. :) I happened to find this basics tutorial on YouTube, the first few minutes I've watched look useful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcIPME9X_r4