• Welcome Guest! If you are already a member of the BMW MOA, please log in to the forum in the upper right hand corner of this page. Check "Remember Me?" if you wish to stay logged in.

    We hope you enjoy the excellent technical knowledge, event information and discussions that the BMWMOA forum provides. Why not take the time to join the club, so you can enjoy posting on the forum, the club magazine, and all of the discounts and benefits the BMWMOA offers?

    Want to read the MOA monthly magazine for free? Take a 3-month test ride of the magazine; check here for details.

  • NOTE. Some content will be hidden from you. If you want to view all content, you must register for the forum if you are not a member, or if a member, you must be logged in.

Photo Assignment: Weekend 12/15/07

... and not 24 hours after agreeing upon their name, the EyeRiders encountered their first squabble with semantic technicalities.
Stay tuned for more... :lurk
 
... and not 24 hours after agreeing upon their name, the EyeRiders encountered their first squabble with semantic technicalities.
Stay tuned for more... :lurk

No squabble. Bricci is right. Exactly and precisely right. He's correct, irrefutably.
He missed the point, but he was very, technically, correct.

Ironically, it just goes to reinforce how valuable this forum is.
 
I too agree on the cropping issue as I too often "crop" while composing for the self-same reasons stated. However the removal of scratches etc would seem to me to fall under a gray area and I am not sure translates to digital, esp. since those that use a P&S should never have to deal with dust on the sensor, for the rest of us learn to clean it, it is really not very difficult to do. So again I would go with allowing cropping and resizing and leave the rest alone. That said I will go with whatever ruling is made and continue to enjoy participation in the assignments.
I would suggest that rules be set by Tom as this was/is after all Tom's idea.
And should a bit of a finger show up in the edge of a frame assume it was NOT that kind of finger motion!:stick :D

Either way lets have a ruling so we can get back to business before we run into 20 pages and still NO PHOTOS or we may send Tom screaming from the thread never to return.:D (with popcorn in hand)

RM
 
old school

I vote keep it "old school" as if you were using a totally manual camera; like my Olympus OM-1 that I still use frequently or like the photos taken by Ansel Adams. If the focal length of the lens/digital camera is not sufficient to frame the way you want then move to a location so you can frame the shot you want. If the light is not right, then learn to use fill flash or no flash; or maybe wait for the sun or a cloud to get in the right position. Fine photography, (for me anyway), is an art of seeing and capturing an image in the instant you snap the shutter. Granted some of Adam's images went from so-so to prize winning in the dark room but most of his work was un-altered in the dark room. For me, striving to emulate one of the greats like Adams is the ultimate challenge. I see this thread / assignment as a challenge to capture the image you (and the camera) see without alteration in the computer. just my $0.02 worth.
 
This week you are invited to take a picture of that sums up the Holiday Season and motorcycling. Could this be a motorcycle parked in front of snow?

How perfectly timed. While I got a nice ride in today, the weather is supposed to turn more "Christmas festive" around here:

Saturday: Periods of snow, mainly after noon. High near 29. East wind between 11 and 15 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible.

Saturday Night: Periods of snow. Low around 25. Blustery, with a northeast wind between 15 and 23 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 3 to 7 inches possible.


After I run the snowblower on Sunday I should have a good chance of getting that "bike in the snow" shot. :D
 
Ansel Adams said, ÔÇ£The negative is the score, the print the performance.ÔÇØ

My favorite photography instructor would grade us not only on our prints but also the processed film and contact sheets of our B&W or color negatives. The rational was to learn how to make consistently good exposures and compositions, creating a more efficient and productive darkroom and hopefully better photographers. Other reasons for examining our contact sheets were to see just how efficiently we used our film, meaning, shooting to fill the frame so we would need as little cropping as possible and to see how many exposures we used to get ÔÇ£theÔÇØ shot.

What IÔÇÖm saying is SNC 1923 has set up a great template for learning the most basic, often difficult, but essential step in creating a photographic image, that is to look at and constructively critique photos before any manipulations occur. Ansel Adams was a master of negative processing and print manipulation, but it all started with ÔÇ£the score.ÔÇØ

Its really difficult to not crop or tweak a photo before posting, but it is a terrific learning experience. Perhaps we could consider leaving the original guidelines in place, that is, post only one photo with no alteration (other than sizing for the forum.) And then those that want to could take there one image and re-submit a processed, altered, posterized, dodged, burned, cropped, split toned or just tweaked image for a second critique. Discussion of image alterations and techniques could follow the second submission. The second submissions could be on the same thread the following week or on a different thread. Just my two cents worth.
 
Sorry to barge in, but this simply is not a correct statement. Consider focal length and a subject that is beyond the reach of the lens to be perfectly framed. Even in the days of silver bromide, almost everyone cropped their images in the darkroom--if for no other reason to compensate for the different proportions that could exist between negative and paper. On many occasions a shot is made deliberately with the intent to crop. You're assuming the proportions of the sensor/film is an ideal proportion. Not to mention action shots, where most often "success" is more a matter of timing rather than framing.

Scott makes a valid point regarding film versus digital imaging. Plenty of enhancement occured in the darkroom with filters, frames, retouching negs, etc. It was a secondary process which is absent from digital. I shot photojournalistic work in the film era. The film was digitized for production. Acceptable corrections were sizing, cropping, removal of scratches/dust, and appropriate sharpening (unsharp masking--which is a film technique and not unique to Photoshop, who borrowed the term). Anything else was "manipulation." I don't think it matters if a shot is posted here under the journalism standards. Negating them seems somewhat arbitrary in my opinion.

All that said, most of what I have submitted has been untouched, but I have submitted a couple cropped and resized shots to the prior threads.

The progression from film-era technique/thinking to digital is not linear.

Some good points pro and con have been made in this thread. :violin

ThereÔÇÖs a famous photo of little John John Kennedy saluting his fathers casket as it passed him on the street during JFKÔÇÖs funeral procession. That image was shot from across the street with a normal lens, meaning that the image we all remember was made from a very small portion of the negative. Severe cropping made that an iconic image we can never forget.

Darkroom manipulation and Photoshop alterations have a permanent place in photography, IÔÇÖm a big fan of both and use Photoshop almost every day, but to create a really good photo itÔÇÖs always easier to start with a really good image. I think one of the goals of the thread was to level the playing field for those without Photoshop to be able to play with those that have image processing abilities. I like that premise, it keeps things simple and keeps more players in the game. Again, just my 2 cents worth.
 
I'm going to go out on a limb here and hope that Brad corrects me if I'm wrong.

On this thread, we should go with no photoshop because if an image is selected to be used for a holiday card, the designer may want to do a little work on the image her- or himself, without having to undo our best intentions. I'm also going to guess they should be shot in RAW or--if that is not an option--in the very least compression possible.

As far as our weekly photo assignments go, I've been wondering if we should distinguish between "light photoshopping" as Gail refers to, that is fixing little problems, and "major photoshopping" where a work of art is created from the basis of a photograph. I agree that we don't want to get into the latter, but maybe the former would be OK.

Anyone else care to chime in on this?

Okay, I will chime in here on this one. First, Thanks to Tom for organizing this effort.

I think that there is a fine line between Computer Correction and Computer Alterations. The key here is to avoid Computer Alterations and Mutations. I have some photos that I have done cropping and straightening on, as well as red eye correction. To me that seems in the spirit of it.

Here is an example of why I have that feeling. I currently shoot with a P&S camera with a 10Megapixel sensor. I turn off the digital zoom so at times I cannot zoom in as much as I want. There are times I want to crop out some of the picture but I know that I do not the ability to do it on the camera. An example is this photo.
214267284-S.jpg

I knew I was going to need to crop it to remove some of the building structure. I did not have a way to do it there while taking the shot. So I cropped it in Photoshop. To me that is fair.
231445629-S.jpg


I also know that at times what appears straight in the view finder or display is not straight on the bigger display of a computer. Especially if you are like me with an astigmatism.

However what would be improper Computer Manipulation would be a photo of a Christmas Tree that was taken and then a separate photo of a Motorcycle and then compositing the two together.

So if you feel you must Computer Correct, please post a link to the original and be ready to explain what you did to it and why.

Any questions, just ask.

Remember the goal of this thread and process is to get better at the process of photography and not digital manipulation. Also try to have fun.

I am looking forward to seeing the photos and hopefully having some cool things to pick from for next year's Holiday Card.:thumb
 
Cropping

I'd like to chime in on the cropping issue. I used to shoot with TLR (Twin Lens Reflex) cameras because I love the square format for framing. Unfortunately, they all use medium format film (120 or 220) that is now pretty expensive to process. I don't have room for a darkroom so I had to get my film processed in a lab.

Anyway, I switched to digital for the economy of it. But guess what. There are very few square format digital cameras. You can get digital backs for Rolleis and Hasselblads, but they are big dollar items. So I use "normal" digital cameras with rectangular sensors. But when I compose the shot I do it for a square and crop to that square on the computer. I don't consider this a crop per se, as it is what I intended the moment I pressed the shutter. Now, if I make that square even 1 pixel shorter than the height of the frame, then yes, that is a crop that alters my original framing.

Now I realize that a square picture is not going to be very good for a Christmas card, so I guess I won't start my active participation this week. But for future reference I'd like to know if correcting the format to what I intended (ie: a square), is cropping.
 
Now I realize that a square picture is not going to be very good for a Christmas card, so I guess I won't start my active participation this week.

How do you know if the square picture is going to be very good for a card? The card hasn't been designed and laid out yet. A good picture on a square card is still a good card. If you have something in mind I can speak on behalf of the Holiday Card Team of the Foundation we would like to see it. (Is it weird when I talk about myself in the first person plural?:brad )
 
How do you know if the square picture is going to be very good for a card? The card hasn't been designed and laid out yet. A good picture on a square card is still a good card. If you have something in mind I can speak on behalf of the Holiday Card Team of the Foundation we would like to see it. (Is it weird when I talk about myself in the first person plural?:brad )

Touche' I guess I was thinking "inside the box" (a rectangular one) :)
 
Ansel Adams said, “The negative is the score, the print the performance.”

My favorite photography instructor would grade us not only on our prints but also the processed film and contact sheets of our B&W or color negatives. The rational was to learn how to make consistently good exposures and compositions, creating a more efficient and productive darkroom and hopefully better photographers. Other reasons for examining our contact sheets were to see just how efficiently we used our film, meaning, shooting to fill the frame so we would need as little cropping as possible and to see how many exposures we used to get “the” shot.

What I’m saying is SNC 1923 has set up a great template for learning the most basic, often difficult, but essential step in creating a photographic image, that is to look at and constructively critique photos before any manipulations occur. Ansel Adams was a master of negative processing and print manipulation, but it all started with “the score.”

It’s really difficult to not crop or “tweak” a photo before posting, but it is a terrific learning experience. Perhaps we could consider leaving the original guidelines in place, that is, post only one photo with no alteration (other than sizing for the forum.) And then those that want to could take there one image and re-submit a processed, altered, posterized, dodged, burned, cropped, split toned or just tweaked image for a second critique. Discussion of image alterations and techniques could follow the second submission. The second submissions could be on the same thread the following week or on a different thread. Just my two cents worth….

+1

Alright, Guys.

We all must acknowledge the difference in the photographic technology available today vs. in the past.

The printing process of the past required a great amount of skill, and those most skilled could correct for errors on the negative, or could adjust the photograph slightly to suit their inspiration. Yes, some have done amazing effects with film photography, but like “heavy photoshopping” this is a subject for a different thread.

My point is that in the past, the exposure was difficult to achieve as was the actual print. Both of these skills needed development before one could be a good photographer.

With exception of very specific professional digital cameras and professional lenses, today’s digital cameras eliminate the need for post processing because they can store the image in the same medium in which they will be displayed. Most of the digital pictures which are taken never make it to paper; rather they are displayed on countless screens. Once a .JPG, the files never “need” to be adjusted. Few of us can study a negative and see subtle shadows and/or vibrant colors, so the traditional photograph must be printed to be appreciated (or not so).

Add to this digital technology which makes photography virtually automatic. The standard P&S cameras available to the general public today with auto focus, auto exposure, facial recognition (up to nine faces at once…and then finds the best focus!), vibration reduction, auto ISO, flash intensity, and a host of presets for “sports”, “portraits”, “landscape”, etc… which have been tuned so that we barely need to understand how the combination of shutter, aperture, flash, etc. should be used together for the desired effect makes great digital photography easy for virtually anyone.

My 10 year old daughter can take crystal clear snap-shots which are nearly always just what she wanted, or more because the camera “saw” subtle details in the image that she didn’t.


I think the question is:

Is this a PhotoShop class, or is it a Photography class? This is up to Tom to decide as it was he who set the rules, “No photoshop alteration (we're looking to improve your skills with your camera, not software).”

The challenge is to learn to better use the photographic instrument, and then to keep your wits about you in the heat of the moment. This is an essential piece to the photography puzzle; not to mention an important life lesson (particularly for those who voluntarily put themselves at risk for the sake of personal enjoyment).

Further, may of us have been impressed with Tom’s ability to see the process behind the image. This is possible because of his careful eye, and of his experience in this field of photography. Adding digital alteration to the submitted image may muddy the waters to the point where the teacher can not aid in the development of the student.

This has been a great discussion, I have to admit that few of my shots have ever made it to print or frame without some “post processing” in PhotoShop or the like. This is hardly scandalous as most of you have already pointed out the long-standing tradition of adjustment after the fact, but in the case of this exercise…

…I choose not to alter the images which I submit for Tom’s careful review.
 
Interesting the debate starts this week

What is interesting to me is that the rules are the same as last Photo Assignment, and the one before, and ... etc.

I am not against considering a photoshopped, digitally altered image for the Foundation Holiday Card, but the purpose of this thread and assignment is to better our skills as camera operators, not computer operators.

If you have something you would like to submit for the Holiday card that is computer composited, yes, it would still be welcomed with open arms and be considered for the card project.

-=Brad
VP of the BMW MOA Foundation
Beginning Camera Operator.
 
I vote for straight out of the camera, no Photoshop.

Images that might have been less than successful might be useful for a parallel PS thread, if we had someone on here that could explain basic PS operation and think of an assignment each week. Where each week the photography thread works on a composition theme, the PS thread could work on a specific task in PS. Participants could produce before and after images to show how they've applied the current week's skill to an image.

This would require significant time investment for the thread leader, as they'd have to essentially prepare a lesson each week. This might be better to do on a biweekly or monthly basis, I think. The result, at the end of a year, would be a rich online reference of how to use PS.
 
I vote for straight out of the camera, no Photoshop.

There have been some excellent points made about traditional film technique versus digital-age photography, and photography in general. I too believe the absolute best approach to this, keeping the nature of these threads educational, is to use an image that is as unaltered as possible. The one exception I see is cropping (see bluestune's posts above). If someone doesn't crop a poorly framed image, or doesn't see the finer image within the larger frame, then they are demonstrating a compositional weakness*. Composition (IMO) is one of the most critical artisitic skills a photographer can develop.

Despite this being the digital age, the print is still the standard by which photography is judged--because we can't share prints we're using this electronic medium to display our work. A submission should be posted as it would be displayed in a conventional sense.

I don't mean to get on a soapbox, but it doesn't make sense to me for Tom to point out a photo could be cropped differently if the shooter doesn't have that capability. Conversely, if they submit a shot that is cropped, and Tom (or anyone else) suggests better or different cropping, then the photographer is still learning from the experience.

*Recognizing the photographer should have strived to compose in a manner that would minimize the need for cropping.

Lastly, I think every comment made on this topic has merit. I see both sides of this debate. A few of the finer points have become a conundrum. (I know I am being annoying because I don't participate that much. I'll shut up now. Sorry. :rolleyes )
 
three pages of banter, I'm a true moderate. Post a topic, review the submissions. Crop, shop, whatever. Nobody's paid to get a grade, nobody's going to lose their job if they give a harsh review. Some folks want to get better at photo shopping, some want to improve their "in camera" skills. To each his own.

To put it another way, I don't photo shop cuz mostly I'm an old school guy, loved the thread about "the taste of it, the schmell of it, the texture" yeah, I could tell if I had fixer on my fingers in the dark....... BUT, I'm interested in seeing what people do when they photoshop. I suppose for me I'd like to see the before and after in a photo shop submission. But I don't think this thread should be overcomplicated or over governed. " Let them eat cake"

Merry Christmas y'all:buds
 
SNIP

*Recognizing the photographer should have strived to compose in a manner that would minimize the need for cropping.
SNIP

I'm glad for the rules to post the unaltered picture.

I took a slug of pictures this weekend at a friend's graduation. In the past, I would have cropped almost every shot, and corrected lots of other stuff. I found I was doing a more thoughtful first shot and rarely need to make changes.

Thanks, Tom, for helping me develop the composition skill I'm still finding.

Voni
sMiling
 
I'm glad for the rules to post the unaltered picture.

I took a slug of pictures this weekend at a friend's graduation. In the past, I would have cropped almost every shot, and corrected lots of other stuff. I found I was doing a more thoughtful first shot and rarely need to make changes.

Thanks, Tom, for helping me develop the composition skill I'm still finding.

Voni
sMiling
I think that's the objective. Consider that most of the people here are using their P&S to replace a P&S film camera. They wouldn't perform cropping or play with the prints. They'd take them to Walgreen's, right?
 
Back
Top