another of my portraits

[pauln]

Here's another one,

Feel free to leave any crit  I would have liked more detail in the eyes but I missed the focus so ive darkened them right down, that's the problem with shooting through glass sometimes

[Kobione]

We did a recent zoo trip, Paul and I found the shooting through glass very difficult. Did nowhere near as well as you anyway!! NIce!!

[NannyFerret]

I love the shot.

I think the darkening of the eyes worked, but it would bring him more to life if the catch lights in his eyes were lightened using a white random shaped brush.

[FUJI]

Your Chimp studies a very special, you seem to have a knack of catching them just at the right moment............or......are you bribing them? ;-)

FUJI

[pauln]

Your Chimp studies a very special, you seem to have a knack of catching them just at the right moment............or......are you bribing them? ;-)

FUJI

I think it's more of a case of take loads and hope for the best. I take anything from 10-20 shots at a time and I may if I'm lucky get 3 or 4 workable images. It doesn't always go to plan though, I remember a few weeks ago I was snapping away and one of the chimps took offence, sprinted towards me and karate kicked the glass, needless to say it made me move fairly quickly and I called an end to the session lol

[FUJI]

I think it's more of a case of take loads and hope for the best. I take anything from 10-20 shots at a time and I may if I'm lucky get 3 or 4 workable images. It doesn't always go to plan though, I remember a few weeks ago I was snapping away and one of the chimps took offence, sprinted towards me and karate kicked the glass, needless to say it made me move fairly quickly and I called an end to the session lol

 

 

I recall, that many moons ago, when I used to take my young students to Twycross Zoo, the chimps were behind double wire enclosures, not glass......there was one particular male that could be easilly wound up into a frenzy of loud Whooping, the more noise he made the young visitors would copy it.......the eventual outcome was that he would hurl a handful of Faeces with very accurate aim........my students learned how to didge, leaving some unwary soul in line for the HIT!

 

What Fun!  

 

On a more serious note, perhaps you could take us through the basics of using the High Bypass Filters to best effect....Ive never dared toouch them previously:

 

Cheers!

 

FUJI

[pauln]

I recall, that many moons ago, when I used to take my young students to Twycross Zoo, the chimps were behind double wire enclosures, not glass......there was one particular male that could be easilly wound up into a frenzy of loud Whooping, the more noise he made the young visitors would copy it.......the eventual outcome was that he would hurl a handful of Faeces with very accurate aim........my students learned how to didge, leaving some unwary soul in line for the HIT!

 

What Fun!  

 

On a more serious note, perhaps you could take us through the basics of using the High Bypass Filters to best effect....Ive never dared toouch them previously:

 

Cheers!

 

FUJI

by all means, I'm at work at the moment so I can't really do screen shots etc but I will explain the best way I can.when I get home I'll try and find the original raw files for comparison so you can see the before and after. So using high pass filters, well for me the reason I use them is because they're very good at highlighting edges without adding undue noise so what I done with these is step one open the raw image into ACR (adobe camera raw) step 2 take an adjustment brush and reduce the exposure, highlights and shadows and increase the contrast until it appears black then use the brush to paint up to the edge selecting a feather of around 50 step 3 select sharpening and set between 80-100 with a radius of 5 (as a guide) step 4 adjust exposure, shadows etc to whole image to suit then open image step 5 in the layers palette, right click on the image and select duplicate image then select filters/other/high pass step 6 select your level of high pass (I usually start at around 2 pixels) and move the slider until you can see the edges of your image.the image will appear grey at this stage but that's normal. Once you have decided your pixel level, select the blending option in the layers palette and select "overlay" step 7 dodge and burn as required and your done :)

[pauln]

Oh I forgot to mention to flatten image when done. The same applies to "grunge" portraits but you also use desaturated layers with high pass and then a curves adjustment layer to lighten to taste

[ChrisLumix]

There was a fascinating experiment done with chimps:

 

Basically, they were offered a choice of either a small number of beads or a large number. However, if they chose the larger quantity, some were taken away, whereas if they chose the smaller number, beads were added until it was more than the large quantity. Eventually they learned this principle, and EVERY time they were offered the choice, they went for the small number. Intelligent, eh?

 

However, beads were then exchanged for sweets. Even though they had learned the principle - which was also applied to the sweets - they ALWAYS went for the larger quantity and had to endure some being taken away. It's as if their sweet tooth overrode their intelligence and they couldn't help themselves.

[pauln]

They are incredibly intelligent creatures which I try to get across in my portraits, I don't know if I always succeed but it's always at the fore front of my images rather than incarceration or ridicule :)

[pauln]

here's the raw in jpeg as promised

[ChrisLumix]

here's the raw in jpeg as promised

 

Wow, that's some processing. Apart from the obvious stuff, what did you do to eliminate the background - masking off and replacing with black?

[pauln]

Wow, that's some processing. Apart from the obvious stuff, what did you do to eliminate the background - masking off and replacing with black?

all done in ACR select adjustment brush with exposure,shadow and highlights on minimum and contrast on max and feathered at 50 then paint up to the edges

[Denis]

all done in ACR select adjustment brush with exposure,shadow and highlights on minimum and contrast on max and feathered at 50 then paint up to the edges

 

Beautiful images and very well processed....however...

 

I have said before on numerous occasions,and to different members, that I for one do not understand a single word you lot use when describing processing!

 

[ChrisLumix]

Beautiful images and very well processed....however...

 

I have said before on numerous occasions,and to different members, that I for one do not understand a single word you lot use when describing processing!

 

 

All I know is that ACR is about RAW processing, but as I never shoot RAW it's all Greek to me

[Denis]

 I do shoot only in RAW, but only use Nikons ViewNX software That Colin B has kindly assisted me with a few times.

Apparently my son is buying me 'Lightroom' for my upcoming birthday...lordy helpy me! I'm dreading trying to learn that!

[pauln]

Beautiful images and very well processed....however...

 

I have said before on numerous occasions,and to different members, that I for one do not understand a single word you lot use when describing processing!

 

sorry guys, when I refer to ACR I'm talking about adobe camera raw which is the raw reader and adjustment contained in photoshop programs, it automatically opens when you open a raw file in photoshop. I'm a Canon user so I'm not familiar with nikon software but I'm sure it's similar. What were looking at in my images is a dark background and high detail. Now if you could get close to the subject you could do most of it in camera just using a small f stop and flash which would make the BG black and the foreground (subject) correctly exposed and detailed even in the middle of a bright sunny field but unfortunately I can't do that at the zoo as most of the animals would eat me before I got a shot off so I have to rely on PP (post processing) so a simple way to describe it is, I take an image at the correct exposure then in photoshop I paint the BG black and increase the detail. The way I do that is by using a filter called a high pass filter found in filters at the top of the screen. All that does is increase the edge detail without adding too much noise. It's pretty simple once you have a go