We had three and a half presentations from club members Ray, David, Martin and Chris.
First up was Ray Foxlee talking to us about different methods for producing Black and White images.
His prefered method, bless him, is using film which he uses in his very high class camera to very good effect. Us more up to date digital guys, need software on our computers to produce decent BW pictures and Ray showed us how to do this. Firstly he showed us in Lightroom, which, with a show of hands, many of us use, and afterwards using a different software package called Silver Efex Pro.
Ray showed us a pretty flat and uninteresting image in colour which he then converted to BW and it suddenly came alive. Since Ray joined us and we have seen his excellent BW work, several of us have started to try producing BW images, some quite successfully. So after Ray’s demonstration, perhaps a few more will try. One does need the right kind of image. Most wildlife pictures are better in colour of course.
For further demonstration, Ray used an image of the interior of Lancing College where there was sunlight lighting one side of the chapel. leaving the other side in shadow. Using the software he was able to show us what a great improvement was possible. On another image, he showed us how in Silver Efex Pro. Here, there are coloured buttons, which when selected gave the effect that a coloured filter would have done if we had been using BW film, as in the old days! It is really fascinating experimenting to see what one can get out of an image, and I am sure after this talk, more members will be trying their hand at producing more monochrome images.
David Burton was next showing us Focus Stacking. This how to combine a series of shots taken of a subject, rendering it sharp from front to back. Again, software is required, but it is possible using Photoshop CC, (and even older versions of Photoshop such as CS4 which David uses). Another is called Helicon Focus which is designed just to carry out stacking. Having chosen your subject, you then take several images (the more the merrier) moving the point of focus along the subject, using manual exposure. You then load all the images into the software creating a new layer for each one; then you press the right button and lo and behold you end up with the subject more or less perfectly in focus from end to end. David showed us exactly how it was done and showed us several examples of pictures that he had produced. Sometimes backgrounds can be tricky and need to be carefully selected. The technique can be used on small subjects like insects or on much bigger subjects such as a large railway truck that David showed us.
David is kindly letting us have copies of his notes for the talk so that we can try for ourselves. [Ed. you can download them here]
When David had concluded, our Chairman Chris showed us a couple of examples of stacking that he had done this very afternoon using software he found Free on the web. My advice would be to use a programme that costs money!! Chris showed us his results when we were already overdue for a cuppa and frankly gagging, but full marks to him for trying.
After the break we had a presentation from our resident technocrat Martin on HDR imaging. He started by baffling us with some Physics comparing the difference between what our eyes can see and what our cameras can read. He showed us a calculation that started +/- 8.43…
He then reverted to normal English and showed us all the basics of HDR using an image he produced of the interior of the Church where his daughter was married. He had taken seven images each with a different exposure, starting with a very over-exposed image and progressing to the last one which was a very under-exposed shot, but which showed up all the detail in the bright window at the far end of the building.
All the images are then loaded into a programme which picks the best exposure for each part of the buildingin this case producing a final image in which detail was visible everywhere.
The software used to do this process is found again in Lightroom and AdobeCC but other programmes available include Photomatix and HDR Efex Pro 2.
The simplest HDR images can be produced just using three exposures, one for the shadows, one where most of the image is normally exposed and finally one for the hghlights and combining them.
As usual Martin made his talk very interesting and showed us several examples as he went along. When he had concluded his talk, once again Chris stepped forward and showed us a couple of (more successful) images taken using the HDR setting on his camera. These are now appearing on more and more cameras where the camera does the work to produce HDR pictures.
Our thanks are due to all three and a half speakers for a very interesting, amusing and informative evening.