Pages: 1 [2]   Go Down

Author Topic: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes  (Read 9947 times)

giancoli

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 15
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #20 on: October 17, 2014, 10:35:44 am »

Hi Guys, sorry for not coming back before now.
I thankful for all the responses,awesome to share and learn. I have a long way to go, in terms of both shooting in the field and the post processing.
I'm going to look into lumosity masks. I never had much success with HDR, not sure I'm going to give that up entirely. It sucks spending hours on a image that turns out looking like crap.
I recently did a photo where I added a layer of a longer exposure on top of the normal one, then I used a brush with low opacity brushing on the black parts of the image. What I dislike the most are small black shadows that look like dots, big dark areas isn't necessarily a problem, and can look good. But those spots often look like crap.
I wasn't really happy with the result though.
Here's the image:


It's okay, but nothing special about it. You watch it for a few seconds then move on. But there are no completely black spots. The problem was mainly on the grass in front, especially on the right side.
Logged

LesPalenik

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 5339
    • advantica blog
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #21 on: October 17, 2014, 11:06:34 am »

This is a rather bleak looking place, I'd suggest to travel further west.
The picture lacks a central focus point. So, I lightened it a little bit and enriched the scene with a handsome native specimen.


« Last Edit: October 17, 2014, 11:11:59 am by LesPalenik »
Logged

giancoli

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 15
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #22 on: October 17, 2014, 11:10:02 am »

haha, ur a funny guy.
Logged

Tim Lookingbill

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2436
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #23 on: October 17, 2014, 11:20:26 am »

Hi Guys, sorry for not coming back before now.
I thankful for all the responses,awesome to share and learn. I have a long way to go, in terms of both shooting in the field and the post processing.
I'm going to look into lumosity masks. I never had much success with HDR, not sure I'm going to give that up entirely. It sucks spending hours on a image that turns out looking like crap.
I recently did a photo where I added a layer of a longer exposure on top of the normal one, then I used a brush with low opacity brushing on the black parts of the image. What I dislike the most are small black shadows that look like dots, big dark areas isn't necessarily a problem, and can look good. But those spots often look like crap.
I wasn't really happy with the result though.
Here's the image:


It's okay, but nothing special about it. You watch it for a few seconds then move on. But there are no completely black spots. The problem was mainly on the grass in front, especially on the right side.

You might  want to start embedding the sRGB profile in your posted images especially for shadows to look as intended because the sRGB profile has a shadow bump lifter designed into its TRC that's not a mathematically normal power function shaped 2.2 gamma curve. It makes shadows look darker on 2.2 gamma calibrated displays when the profile isn't embedded after converting to sRGB. See the screengrab below.

I don't understand why you have to make your shadows so dark and dense. I can't make out any detail in either of the two in the screengrab that would register to a viewer at best on a display and worse on a print.

I see a lot of course looking noise but that might be from the jpeg compression. I've shot plenty of similar night scene single exposures with a 2006 6MP Pentax K100D DSLR and got decent shadow detail as long as I used ACR/LR Noise Removal and applied a flattened portion of the point curve close to black to bring out detail without kicking up noise.

Could you post a 100% crop of the area you see spots? I can't see what you describe because that area is too dark. You do realize night scenes invoke their own adaptive effect where the eyes open up and see more detail in the dark. We humans have excellent night vision. Note the screengrab of the default Raw preview of my previous landscape without edits.
Logged

giancoli

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 15
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #24 on: October 17, 2014, 11:39:18 am »

hmm, I checked my photoshop and it's in RGB mode. I don't really know much about this. I tried saving a sRGB file, I used save for the web. Is this one better?


the full size can be seen here:
http://giancoli.deviantart.com/art/Dsc2973-489017320?ga_submit_new=10%253A1413560310
Logged

Tim Lookingbill

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2436
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #25 on: October 17, 2014, 12:15:30 pm »

No embedded sRGB on your posted image. See Photoshop screengrab.

You'll need to read up on color management, about assign/convert/embed color space profiles in Photoshop and display calibration if you're expecting to get any headway learning how to edit shadows. It's pointless to offer any meaningful editing tips if we're not even seeing the same thing in our browsers on a calibrated/profiled display which we're having to now assume is the state of your display especially if you have concerns about shadow detail.
Logged

TonyW

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 643
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #26 on: October 17, 2014, 12:56:01 pm »

I agree with Tim it is really difficult to offer meaningful advice if we are not sure about the state of your display.

If your monitor brightness is too high or too low you will be compensating in your editing attempts and while it may look fine to you in your particular viewing environment with this monitor others that view your images will not be seeing what you are seeing.

FWIW brought your image into ACR and just tried pressing the Auto button and added an adjustment brush exposure contrast to the sky and mountains.  While it is my opinion that the image improved (I can see now little Red Riding Hood  :))I appreciate that your taste and visualisation may be very different, but I think illustrates the potential in initial processing in ACR or LR without jumping into filters or luminosity masks - of course they have their place and can be very useful but perhaps better to concentrate on getting the most out of your capture first within your chosen raw editor, then considering what 'improvements' can be made to meet your vision and what tools needed to accomplish such?



« Last Edit: October 17, 2014, 12:57:58 pm by TonyW »
Logged

Isaac

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3123
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #27 on: October 17, 2014, 01:32:41 pm »

In scenes like this…

That was good, thanks.
Logged

Tim Lookingbill

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2436
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #28 on: October 17, 2014, 01:40:07 pm »

You nailed it, Tony. I'm now convinced I should never underestimate ACR/LR "Auto" setting.

On close inspection of your corrected jpeg the artifacts in the shadows indicate either the OP shot jpeg instead of Raw or a Raw converter with poor noise reduction was used to generate the initial posted jpeg.

Don't know why clicking on the OP's linked full version launches my email program. That's odd. I even tried another browser and gave up attempting to download the image.

There's also no EXIF data embedded in the OP's jpegs.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2014, 01:42:11 pm by Tim Lookingbill »
Logged

Isaac

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3123
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #29 on: October 17, 2014, 01:49:09 pm »

I never had much success with HDR… I recently did a photo where I added a layer of a longer exposure on top of the normal one…

Instead of HDR or manually blending different exposures, you can try using Enfuse to automatically blend different exposures. (I find it helpful to use an alpha mask, to mark which parts of each exposure should not be blended.)
Logged

kirkt

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 604
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #30 on: October 17, 2014, 02:02:40 pm »

hmm, I checked my photoshop and it's in RGB mode. I don't really know much about this. I tried saving a sRGB file, I used save for the web. Is this one better?

the full size can be seen here:
---

can you make the two originals available?  were they shot in raw or jpeg?  There are ghosting artifacts in the trees and the general rendering of the image looks like it almost posterized at the small detail level in the mid and shadow tones.

kirk
Logged

TonyW

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 643
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #31 on: October 17, 2014, 02:16:56 pm »

.... I'm now convinced I should never underestimate ACR/LR "Auto" setting.
...Don't know why clicking on the OP's linked full version launches my email program. That's odd. I even tried another browser and gave up attempting to download the image.

There's also no EXIF data embedded in the OP's jpegs.
Hi Tim
TBH trying Auto setting is not something I normally do as I have an aversion to software that has such features feeling I can always do better on my own  :) ;) - seems like I have also underestimated the potential  ;D

The OP's link does launch my email program but this http://giancoli.deviantart.com/art/Dsc2973-489017320 I think is probably the one intended?  Hope giancoli is ok with me posting the link - I will remove if this is wrong

I guess the EXIF data is being stripped out either by Save for Web or being stripped when uploaded to Deviantart?
Logged

giancoli

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 15
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #32 on: October 17, 2014, 02:46:29 pm »

they where shot in raw. Postericed is exactly the word I was looking for, I don't like that look at all. Those greyish trees seems to give that look for some reason.
When I come to think of it, it was because of that postericed look that I eventually ended up with rather dark shadows in an attempt to hide it.
There should not be much noise there, cause I shot with ISO 100 using a tripod.
I think I mistakenly used insert mail instead of insert hyperlink, sorry.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2014, 02:56:01 pm by giancoli »
Logged

Mac Mahon

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 140
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #33 on: October 17, 2014, 03:28:21 pm »

I'm with Isaac

Faced with a similar scene and given that I was using a tripod, I'd have taken a range of exposures - to get good sky/snow exposure on the one hand, and a reasonable look into the forest, on the other.  I'd then use LR Enfuse to blend the exposures.  Used sensitively Enfuse doesn't result in the awful 'HDR Look'.

In my experience, I'm never able to successfully lift the shadow detail on scenes like the OP's 2nd image, using LR/ACR alone.  I almost always end up with excessive noise or a false grey-looking murk.

FWIW

Tim
Logged

ErikKaffehr

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 11311
    • Echophoto
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #34 on: October 17, 2014, 03:46:23 pm »

Hi,

Hard to say without a raw image…

The included screen shot from Lightroom shows what is possible with just a few mouse clicks.

Best regards
Erik

Hi Guys, sorry for not coming back before now.
I thankful for all the responses,awesome to share and learn. I have a long way to go, in terms of both shooting in the field and the post processing.
I'm going to look into lumosity masks. I never had much success with HDR, not sure I'm going to give that up entirely. It sucks spending hours on a image that turns out looking like crap.
I recently did a photo where I added a layer of a longer exposure on top of the normal one, then I used a brush with low opacity brushing on the black parts of the image. What I dislike the most are small black shadows that look like dots, big dark areas isn't necessarily a problem, and can look good. But those spots often look like crap.
I wasn't really happy with the result though.
Here's the image:


It's okay, but nothing special about it. You watch it for a few seconds then move on. But there are no completely black spots. The problem was mainly on the grass in front, especially on the right side.
Logged
Erik Kaffehr
 

Alan Klein

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 15850
    • Flicker photos
Re: avoiding black harsh shadows in landscapes
« Reply #35 on: October 17, 2014, 09:40:22 pm »

You said you don't like HDR.  Then your second picture also needed a graduated neutral density filter when it was shot.  You can only do so much with software when the dynamic range is so large and you need to capture it in one image.
Pages: 1 [2]   Go Up