Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Digital Image Processing => Topic started by: Tim Lookingbill on May 06, 2014, 10:25:58 pm
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This subject has had me puzzled for some time especially seeing web images of other photographer's work not having any blacks near 5 RGB. Some shadows in landscapes of shaded detail look murky/foggy with max black levels at around 20RGB, but the overall appearance doesn't seem to suffer with some having an added nuance or "soul" to scene ambiance.
I also realize this topic of discussion is going to be hard to answer due to its subjectivity since most shots edited in post don't allow the photographer to go back and make note of the max density of the darkest detail in the original scene outside of studio shoots. I used to take notes when I painted landscapes to block out blacks, mids & highlights. Thought digital cameras and proper exposure would not require this but I don't have paints to tell me RGB values in ProPhotoRGB shooting out in the field.
I just want to get some ideas on how others interpret max black and whether it's difficult and/or contributes to dark prints viewed in regular household light. I'm beginning to believe dark prints are a result from long edits on transmissive displays attempting to grab as much dynamics within the scene over allowing aesthetic tastes to render proper contrast brought about by NOT going for absolute black.
With all the edits under my belt shooting Raw I've always sought out the darkest part of the image and forced it to measure around 5RGB working in ProPhotoRGB output space either with the point curve, black slider and/or Parametric curve in ACR/LR and tone map up the tonal scale while bringing out all the modeling and texture of surfaces brightly lit and in shadow. To my disappointment what has resulted from this is somewhat over contrasty and dark images after a second look months to even years later. I actually started to suspect my display calibration was out of wack but that's not the case.
And another disappointment as a result from this obsession with mapping absolute black to 5,5,5RGB has been...you guessed it...DARK PRINTS! And here I thought I was immune to this. It seems it's not as simple as I thought.
I've found it's very difficult editing images on a transmissive display to override or even notice the affects of adaption spending too long pulling dynamic range detail out of both highlights and shadows in Raws that already start out flat, dark, colorless and murky. I do the before and after and I think I've achieved a bright enough rendering of the actual scene to be reasonably viewable in a print viewed in normal household lighting. They've done it with paintings in the past. I don't see why I and others are having an issue with inkjet prints.
I'm having to do reprints of images I worked on years ago due to the fact I tone mapped them in a way that brought out tons of detail but created darker prints than I realized. It has a lot to do with judging and gauging overall contrast that is tied to where absolute black falls within the entire tonal scale of the actual scene. I'm now actually having to force myself to edit shadow levels according to where the green channel reads 100 in ProPhotoRGB for detail I want viewable in normal household lighting.
The first image below demonstrates my attempt re-editing shadow detail gauging with the green channel to make it viewable in regular household lighting while allowing black to fall where it may so it blends into the viewable shadows. I really don't think this has anything to do with matching display luminance to print viewing booth brightness because I'm aware that you can't get exact matches for every lighting situations especially for those who don't display prints using proper gallery lighting. We should be able to get an overall impression of the scene photographed on a print viewed in normal household dim lighting.
The second image shows the re-edited brightened image with the weak blacks that still looks presentable under bright viewing booth conditions. You'll also note the actual scene was bright at the time of capture but because of the tone mapped first attempt at accentuating all the modeling and texture detail the judgement of overall brightness suffered.
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Tim: Please summarize with a simple question.
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Hi,
Just as a general note, the way I work with stuff in LR5 is the following:
- First I crop the image
- Second step is applying gradient to darken sky if needed
- Adjust exposure
- Reduce highlights for good tonal separation
- Adjust blacks so I just have some clipping
- Increase shadows to get some decent to in the image
- Adjust vibrance and clarity
This tends to be an iterative process
For printing I use soft proof. I have my screen calibrated at 90 cd/m^2, soft proofing works mostly well for me.
Best regards
Erik
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Erik, nice rundown on your LR workflow, but how do your prints look viewing them in normal household viewing light levels as most folks have done when we used hang paintings on our walls without spot halogens lighting them?
The main point I'm trying to make here is that the wider the dynamics of the image and the technology allows, the denser the blacks become, the darker the image is going to look to where we have to renegotiate what we want viewable in a print viewing in severely reduced dynamics settings with regard to light. Note the character of light (gradualness in diffusion) in my shot of the prints on my wall and what I had to to do to brighten the original source image. They don't match up. It's not the light level that's the problem. It's the character of the light we view prints with regard to contrast.
Mapping black to absolute densities and still retaining viewable detail in normal household viewing light can't work. In film prints and with paintings the densities of blacks and thus the scaling of shadow detail was much lighter and so we could get a general impression of the entire image viewing in dim light. With the expanded dynamics we're now capable of capturing and reproducing creates viewing problems under reduced dynamic environments. It's more complicated than saying my prints are too dark.
Alan, I don't know how to reduce what I'm getting at into a simple question. Sorry.
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To illustrate more clearly what I'm getting at with regard to black densities causing dark prints from expanded DR below is a link to a photograph of a print of a painting my grandmother displayed in her guest room we stayed on my summer visits as a child. This room was lit by one single 60 watt bulb six feet away from this print. No matter how dark and dim the room got I could make out every element in the image and could tell what it depicted. I could see the bird, the folds of the girl's dress, the bench in the woods (huh?) and bark detail in the trees. It wasn't an eyepopping image to begin with as you can see from the link.
http://www.antiquemystique.com/images/7158_jpg.jpg
In fact this was the typical dynamic range of most of the pictures we had hanging on our walls 40 years ago. When I hang my inkjet prints with more contrast, black densities and detail they're much darker under the same light just 2 to 3 feet away unless I intentionally lighten them and reduce contrast as I've shown above.
If I was to edit that old print so the darkest part under the bench went to 5RGB black or even 20RGB (currently around 50RGB) the rest of the tonal scale would have to descend into darkness in order to blend into black such as the bird, the back hills, the girls hair and folds of the dress. If I bumped the lightest part, the skylight above the back hill to 250RGB the only thing that would be viewable would be the girl's face.
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You've made a lot of statements about blacks, but I'm struggling a little to understand the precise issue you have.
Is it, for example:
- The difficulty in getting a print that differentiates different near-black tones
- The difficulty in getting a print that works in different lighting levels
- Something that occurs now, but didn't in the past with pictures 40 years old
- Something intrinsic to digital
I'm not meaning to be critical, just to try to narrow down the problem you're outlining to something we can get our teeth into.
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Not sure I fully understand as my experience of print viewing suggests a huge difference in how a print is perceived depending on the lighting level at the print surface.
Apologies in advance but just my thoughts and not trying to ‘teach granny to suck eggs’
I would expect that as the lighting levels drop to less than ideal for the print we are likely to see a loss in shadow detail and less saturation in the colours. If we then throw some bright display lighting at the print then it should lift tremendously in contrast deep blacks, plenty of shadow detail - assuming it is there in the first place :). So in the case of a print that will be viewed under known (dimly lit ) conditions surely it would be of benefit to Increase the lightness of the low value tonalities and add some saturation to the colours, without being too concerned with taking too much notice of the RGB values other than being aware how our printers respond.
Is it possible that what you are observing could relate to the printing of images and the reliance on particular RGB values for the lowest tonalities when your printer may not actually be able to produce values below a certain level for the particular paper you are using?
An image probably gives a better idea of where I am coming from and the attachment shows a test image I occasionally use when trying to evaluate papers. After printing and viewing in good lighting (daylight) I can discern tonality differences down to around the 12 point (=RGB values) and discern separation at 254 before paper white. Moving the image into another area with only marginal (subjective) change of lighting I cannot see difference in tonality between max black and a value of 22 (of course no problem with the highlights). So in this case a choice of either better print illumination or raising the black levels to compensate?
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I can understand how my approach to describing this topic is getting difficult to grasp mainly because I'll admit it involves my lack of organization in lining it out, but in addition its a subject that straddles between the aesthetics behind the choices we photographers make in post reconstructing what we saw at the time of capture on a transmissive display and the technical hurdles from a perception standpoint of editing in the gargantuan dynamic space of Raw and all the detail we want (and maybe shouldn't) show that even our eyes didn't see in the original scene mainly in finding and establishing black densities.
I see from the responses where I'm making my mistakes in trying to get to the point, but Simon's bullet point of "something intrinsic with digital" gets pretty close in that editing digital images especially in Raw after capture now requires an additional conscious adjustment or compensatory preemptive decision to achieve an overall rendered look of an image so that it at least registers to the viewer "aesthetically" in a print viewed in all possible lighting situations.
This observation harkens back to my commercial art school training instructing on what paints and substrates to use so commercial press technicians could reproduce our artwork to emphasize communication over exact reproduction. For example 30 sheet billboard painters (before commercial presses were used) gave us future illustrators at this school a tip about using a lot of white paint to make the image lighter than it would appear on our smaller and up close illustration board renderings. This lightening for outdoor billboard display was to assure the elements could be seen and communicated on a 3 second drive by from onlookers on the interstate. It made the image less contrasty than lightened from what I could see at the time.
For me it's getting difficult to establish overall brightness level of an image that doesn't destroy the aesthetics of what I want to communicate. I liked the modeling and texture variations of the rocks/water/leaves image above which induced me to make the scene darker than it actually was at the time of capture. I couldn't figure out how to judge my decisions in my edits image to image each shot in various lighting situations and dynamic ranges.
I forced myself to shoot a rare foggy autumn scene outside my window (shown below) to see if there was an actual absolute black in the scene such as in the deep shadows of the green bush and whether I should force it or just let it hover around 20RGB and sure enough the darker I made black the less foggy the image looked. I don't shoot a lot of scenes like that most are either dimly lit or blasted with bright sunlight. The foggy look has to fit within the aesthetics of the actual scene. But still the finished image shown below is too dark overall for viewing in my living room light, but at least it's a lot easier to lighten without destroying the foggy ambiance, a look I fought tooth and nail to maintain for hours attempting to expand the dynamics.
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Wouldn't you want to adjust your print to look best in the light you will be viewing it? Of course there's a tradeoff against detail. Beyond that, you really have no control if it's shown in brighter or darker light circumstance somewhere else.
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Wouldn't you want to adjust your print to look best in the light you will be viewing it? Of course there's a tradeoff against detail. Beyond that, you really have no control if it's shown in brighter or darker light circumstance somewhere else.
The only control is rendering the overall tonality at the beginning in post in order for the aesthetic intent of the photographer to register what is being communicated according to elements that can be made reasonably recognizable in the dimmest lighting situation as in a bar or at home.
I'm assuming you understand I'm not talking about screen to print matches under controlled lighting. I'm talking more about adjusting contrast/brightness in post to a level that still maintains reasonable aesthetics so the image can be seen in dim light. And I'm also not talking about viewing in dark rooms. We all know what a nice comfortably but dimly lit living room looks like. We don't live in a gallery or museum. Of course those who can afford a track lighting setup don't have to be concerned, but that's the exception.
A visual and psychological experiment came to mind in that I bet if someone taped a $100 bill onto an 11x14in. framed inkjet print hung in a dimly lit local bar depicting a beautiful landscape of mountains spot lit by an intense pinkish orange sunset with a naked lady lounging in the overcast darkly shaded foreground barely viewable because the photographer didn't lift the shadows enough for viewing in the dimmest light, the viewer would immediately zero in and recognize Ben Franklin's portrait which is at a significantly smaller and harder to see size.
IOW this is a different side of the coin concerning "My Prints Are Too Dark" that hasn't really been discussed if it hasn't already been lost in past discussions concerned with the technicalities of insuring screen to print matches.
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I see from the responses where I'm making my mistakes in trying to get to the point, but Simon's bullet point of "something intrinsic with digital" gets pretty close in that editing digital images especially in Raw after capture now requires an additional conscious adjustment or compensatory preemptive decision to achieve an overall rendered look of an image so that it at least registers to the viewer "aesthetically" in a print viewed in all possible lighting situations.
Hi Tim,
If I'm interpreting your question as you may have intended it to, I'm pretty sure you would want to take a look at Topaz Labs Clarity (https://www.topazlabs.com/clarity).
Also your example of the foggy atmospheric background with less foggy foreground can be tweaked quite well with Clarity, one can increase of decrease the fog. Don't think it does what the LR or ACR versions of Clarity do, it's much more powerful, including edge aware masking for local control.
Cheers,
Bart
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Hi,
I got my workflow funktional by going down to 90 cd/m^2. Ideally the white on your screen should match the weight in the viewing environment to get a good soft proof, AFAIK.
What I normally do is to make a small test print and check out in light similar to viewing condition. I am fortunate enough not to have my images to hang in really dark rooms.
What I do for dark viewing is to raise exposure little add some clarity and perhaps a little more of s-curve.
But, yes, making prints to hang in bad light is difficult.
I never tried it but there is a print adjustment in the print dialog in Lightroom. Perhaps it could help? Just adjust image optimally and find a print adjustment that works for weak illumination? Just an idea…
Best regards
Erik
Erik, nice rundown on your LR workflow, but how do your prints look viewing them in normal household viewing light levels as most folks have done when we used hang paintings on our walls without spot halogens lighting them?
The main point I'm trying to make here is that the wider the dynamics of the image and the technology allows, the denser the blacks become, the darker the image is going to look to where we have to renegotiate what we want viewable in a print viewing in severely reduced dynamics settings with regard to light. Note the character of light (gradualness in diffusion) in my shot of the prints on my wall and what I had to to do to brighten the original source image. They don't match up. It's not the light level that's the problem. It's the character of the light we view prints with regard to contrast.
Mapping black to absolute densities and still retaining viewable detail in normal household viewing light can't work. In film prints and with paintings the densities of blacks and thus the scaling of shadow detail was much lighter and so we could get a general impression of the entire image viewing in dim light. With the expanded dynamics we're now capable of capturing and reproducing creates viewing problems under reduced dynamic environments. It's more complicated than saying my prints are too dark.
Alan, I don't know how to reduce what I'm getting at into a simple question. Sorry.
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Quote from Erik...
I am fortunate enough not to have my images to hang in really dark rooms.
But, yes, making prints to hang in bad light is difficult.
I would think this would be of more concern for those who want to sell their prints (it can happen) to customers or friends/families who will be viewing in regular living room light which isn't dark at all. No one lives in the dark and if the lights are off, most likely they're not looking at prints on their wall, maybe watching TV or other activities one does in the dark if you get my drift. ::)
I just want to render an image so those that live in normally lit living room environments such as myself don't have guests look across the room and squint or walk by the print and have to say..."What's that a picture of?...can't make it out...ya' got a flashlight?"
After investigating this issue and adjusting the tone in certain images to establish the lowest possible shadow levels in RGB numbers that will be viewable under the dimmest lights, I don't have this problem NOW. The certain images in question I edited to look too dark are usually of scenes either having extremely wide dynamics like sunsets, brightly lit rocks next to dark water and foggy scenes (where black point is in question), all having default ACR/LR previews that start out way too dark due to exposing for highlights.
Hi Bart,
The Topaz Labs Clarity appears to be a very powerful and interesting piece of software. I'll have to give it a look see. Going by the Before/After samples in that linked site which are too subtle to make a difference to dimly lit prints, I can already make those kind of tonal adjustments with my current ACR/LR setup though it took me quite a while to figure out especially in how and where the sliders affect the tonal scale of the entire image. But thanks for giving me a heads up option to consider.
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Below is my present display of 8x10 prints lit under normal to very dim light that I can tolerate in my apartment where I can still see what the image is about. The top is lit by one 850 lumen LED bulb behind my flatscreen tv about 2-3 feet beneath the row of framed prints.
The bottom is another example of a re-edit of a dark print in order to suit a much dimmer lighting setup with the same bulb only six feet away and closer to the wall. For some reason I can see the image more clearly than expected with less light than I'ld expect from a simple edit, but I think the spread of the diffused light from the other bulb on the adjacent wall may be helping out. Or maybe my eyes are adjusting better to less glare from staring directly at the harsher light from the other wall.
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I honestly think that you are way over-thinking this. The viewer's reaction to a print is subjective, and when I am processing an image I do it subjectively. This is exactly as it should be! Thus, black in an image is "right" because it looks right to you and not because it is mapped to 5,5,5 or 8,8,8 or whatever. Yes, there's a lot of technical stuff in today's photography, and it is easy to get bogged down in that while losing sight of the real goal.
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I honestly think that you are way over-thinking this. The viewer's reaction to a print is subjective, and when I am processing an image I do it subjectively. This is exactly as it should be! Thus, black in an image is "right" because it looks right to you and not because it is mapped to 5,5,5 or 8,8,8 or whatever. Yes, there's a lot of technical stuff in today's photography, and it is easy to get bogged down in that while losing sight of the real goal.
+1 on that.
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I honestly think that you are way over-thinking this. The viewer's reaction to a print is subjective, and when I am processing an image I do it subjectively. This is exactly as it should be! Thus, black in an image is "right" because it looks right to you and not because it is mapped to 5,5,5 or 8,8,8 or whatever. Yes, there's a lot of technical stuff in today's photography, and it is easy to get bogged down in that while losing sight of the real goal.
I'm not talking about subjectivity of a print.
I'm talking about rendering scenes of various dynamic range and contrast characteristics in post long after the memory of the original lighting characteristics has faded where fighting the adaptive effects on the eyes in attempts to reconstruct the character of light causes misjudgements in brightness that wind up making the print too dark for the dimmest lighting situation.
Here's another one I reworked today where I thought the first attempt done a month ago was bright enough because I wanted to bring out all the detail in the texture of the petals only to go back to discover it was WAY too dark. It took me quite a while to arrive at the brighter version on the right in order to maintain the modeling in the texture of the petals. I REALLY thought the one on the left one was bright enough. I'm glad I didn't waste a print. I don't have this problem on most my images, but I've found this is a real problem and thought others experienced the same and found other solutions to overcome it.
Now you're not going to notice much difference between those two edits because you are viewing them on a transmissive display but when they are printed the differences are amplified viewed under dim lighting. That's my point.
I don't need condescending responses that question my thinking. That helps no one.
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Now you're not going to notice much difference between those two edits because you are viewing them on a transmissive display but when they are printed the differences are amplified viewed under dim lighting. That's my point.
Avoid dim lighting. Not good for your eyes either :-\
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Avoid dim lighting. Not good for your eyes either :-\
Normal living room lighting that encompass most of the homes of regular folk (I've visited) who don't have track lighting and big bay windows is dim similar to my living room. Same for restaurants I've visited with even dimmer light but I can still see what's depicted in the paintings and prints hanging on the walls.
Thanks for the well thought out responses BTW.
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Normal living room lighting that encompass most of the homes of regular folk (I've visited) who don't have track lighting and big bay windows is dim similar to my living room. Same for restaurants I've visited with even dimmer light but I can still see what's depicted in the paintings and prints hanging on the walls.
I don't know what 'normal room lighting' implies but if such environments have any kind of art work, and the people there want to see it represented as best as possible, they need adequate lighting. Simple as that. I don't know why a digital print hanging there would be any different from an analog print, painting, or similar in that respect. If someone is more concerned with dim lighting for mood than ideal lighting for the artwork (the restaurant scenario), so be it. Got no problem with that.
This isn't much different from the recent discussion about showing images on the web and adjusting them because some people have displays that are too bright. The viewing conditions are all over the planet and you simply can't produce anything that is ideal for all conditions so adjust as best as possible for something in the middle (not a 6 watt nigh light blub, not a 1000 watt lamp 5 feet from the image).
I have to wonder why in the digital age, so many people have these issues when mankind has been creating art work for centuries before we even had man made lighting!
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I have to wonder why in the digital age, so many people have these issues when mankind has been creating art work for centuries before we even had man made lighting!
Because mankind by and large never had to edit or create their images on a transmissive display and certainly not with captures whose dynamic range contains tons of data we can now zoom in with a simple keystroke better than a loupe on a light table and massage all that detail out of Raw captures. Zoom out and look at the overall results and not note that we made the image either too dark or low contrast or high contrast or too sharp or saturated.
This has nothing to do with the discussion of editing images to compensate for various differences in display contrast and brightness for web viewing. This is about editing the image to a minimum brightness that can at least communicate what the scene is about in all normal light levels.
It doesn't change the image that much aesthetically by conducting a reality check like this. We're here for the print, RIGHT?, not what people see online on uncalibrated displays.
This is an old issue that goes back to my training preparing and designing images for mass production before digital imaging came along and made things so much easier with far more options. We should use those options and I'm just illustrating from my own experience how I have to be mindful when using these fantastic digital tools.
I don't know what 'normal room lighting' implies but if such environments have any kind of art work, and the people there want to see it represented as best as possible, they need adequate lighting.
The minimum light level I demonstrated in the image above. Anything darker is pointless. Those compensatory edits don't affect the overall image that much aesthetically when viewed in a controlled viewing booth situation.
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Because mankind by and large never had to edit or create their images on a transmissive display and certainly not with captures whose dynamic range contains tons of data we can now zoom in with a simple keystroke better than a loupe on a light table and massage all that detail out of Raw captures.
Fair enough and I totally agree about the part using the emissive display, an intermediate part of the final process of which results in a print. But then how do you account for the print? People view the display, most likely incorrectly calibrated to match the print, ignore the mismatch believing the display is 'right' and don't look at the print? Doesn't make much sense. Do we have an issue with a disconnect between an emissive and reflective representation of an image, even with the best soft proofing the technology provides? Sure. But the proof is in the proof (or print). So what's the problem?
This has nothing to do with the discussion of editing images to compensate for various differences in display contrast and brightness for web viewing.
It does in the context that print viewing conditions and display viewing realities are all over the map and you can't hit a prefect middle ground.
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Fair enough and I totally agree about the part using the emissive display, an intermediate part of the final process of which results in a print. But then how do you account for the print? People view the display, most likely incorrectly calibrated to match the print, ignore the mismatch believing the display is 'right' and don't look at the print? Doesn't make much sense.
I'm not advocating adjusting the image or calibration for variances in web viewing. That's way too much work. Stick with a calibrated display and print matching viewing booth and forget what others see on uncalibrated displays. That's why this thread has nothing to do with the other.
Do we have an issue with a disconnect between an emissive and reflective representation of an image, even with the best soft proofing the technology provides? Sure. But the proof is in the proof (or print). So what's the problem? It does in the context that print viewing conditions and display viewing realities are all over the map and you can't hit a prefect middle ground.
The problem I've already illustrated in this thread and offered some type of solution which is to be mindful of what editing images on a transmissive display can do to the eyes and how it affects perception and brightness judgement. I've never had any issues or need for soft proofing because all my images, regardless if I made them too dark or too light or saturated, look exactly as they appear under my controlled print viewing environment.
I'm talking about initial editing of the overall image to a minimum brightness/contrast so the overall look of what's depicted in the image can be seen in minimum lighting environments. We're not talking about a major edit here.
For example prints of cityscapes at night aren't going to fair well in a dimly lit restaurant but then most wouldn't care if detail in the shadows is seen by patrons eating their steak anyway. Of course the reflections in foreground water from cityscape lights might benefit from lifting the shadows and or adding some clarity. That's the kind of mindful edits I'm referring.
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IF the print, in whatever condition it's viewed is too dark, you only have three options I can think of:
1. Lighten the print.
2. Increase the illuminant.
3. A bit of both.
The display has nothing to do with the above.
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For example prints of cityscapes at night aren't going to fair well in a dimly lit restaurant but then most wouldn't care if detail in the shadows is seen by patrons eating their steak anyway.
That scenario seems unlikely to me, restaurants that show art work always seem to light the art work.
Or the artist takes on the responsibility -- "For places where track light wasn’t an option, I got some clip-on light fixtures…" (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=78953.msg641176#msg641176)
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The display has nothing to do with the above.
And there were the days we had to shoot transparency film for reproduction on some kind of ink on paper that was carried all over the place in differing viewing conditions. Somehow, we managed to get that to work.
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I don't need condescending responses that question my thinking.
I was not being condescending, I was trying to be helpful. And if your thinking is beyond questioning, perhaps I can have your autograph? (As an FYI, that is not condescending, it is sarcastic).
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I'm talking about initial editing of the overall image to a minimum brightness/contrast so the overall look of what's depicted in the image can be seen in minimum lighting environments. We're not talking about a major edit here.
For example prints of cityscapes at night aren't going to fair well in a dimly lit restaurant but then most wouldn't care if detail in the shadows is seen by patrons eating their steak anyway. Of course the reflections in foreground water from cityscape lights might benefit from lifting the shadows and or adding some clarity. That's the kind of mindful edits I'm referring.
What you are talking about is a known problem (with work arounds to resolve them). The bottom line is that at dim light levels, your eyes don't perform as well as with brighter levels. You lose contrast and color saturation when viewing an image in dark illumination.
You can compensate by lightening and increasing contrast (in fact, Lightroom has such a function built in called Print Brightness–which Andrew hates, but was Thomas Knoll's solution to "why are my prints too dark") but doesn't address the loss of color saturation at dim levels...
All of this can be tested and adjusted based upon trial and error–if you want to go down that rabbit hole.
But the bottom line is, yes, if a print will be viewed under less than ideal light levels, you can make adjustments to mitigate how a print will be viewed under low lighting levels.
Which is actually a different thingie that what you first posted about..one of the things I see a lot of people struggle with is not crunching the blacks in images. While there is no such thing as a "perfect histogram". I see a lot of people shying away from clipping blacks (while also lightening shadows). A print pretty much always needs a "real black" otherwise the image tends to recede too much. Punching the blacks can actually help show shadows and midtones better...there's usually less issues dealing with highlights when viewing a print under dim light.
I actually wrote about this issue in The Digital Print. The best solution is, of course, to put more light on a print.
I recently went to NYC and went to the Whitney Museum to see a Steiglest show...the museum lighting is always very low level (to protect the prints) and of course, the prints look like shit. All you can do in that situation is to close your eyes and wait till your eyes adapt to darker conditions, then open and look at the dimly lit prints. It sucks...but the print curators, in an attempt to protect the prints from bright lights are very, very conservative. It's a trade off of viewing vs conservation...and I realize how important conservation is, so I've learned how to adapt my viewing to dim conditions. Sucks, but it is, what it is...
For my own work, I always display under bright lights :~)
(cause I'm not concerned about conservation of my prints)
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I recently went to NYC and went to the Whitney Museum to see a Steiglest show...the museum lighting is always very low level (to protect the prints) and of course, the prints look like shit
The Andrew Smith gallery had a huge Ansel Adams show (http://www.andrewsmithgallery.com/arrington_collection.html). This gallery is massive, three stories, very, very old building with rooms with some limited window light to none. The provided lighting was just awful, many of the prints looked like shit.
Update: so does the web images :o
http://www.andrewsmithgallery.com/exhibitions/anseladams/sierra_club/index.html
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What you are talking about is a known problem (with work arounds to resolve them). The bottom line is that at dim light levels, your eyes don't perform as well as with brighter levels. You lose contrast and color saturation when viewing an image in dark illumination.
As long as what's depicted is recognizable will suffice was my point which only requires viewable areas of the image be brightened to a minimum enough to see. For example being able to recognize family members in DIY hobbyist individual and group portraitures comes to mind. These are exceptions of course compared to serious fine art photographers who can and are able to properly light their prints. However there are far more DIY hobbyists than fine art pro's who want their images viewable by those that might not have the proper lighting.
You can compensate by lightening and increasing contrast (in fact, Lightroom has such a function built in called Print Brightness–which Andrew hates, but was Thomas Knoll's solution to "why are my prints too dark") but doesn't address the loss of color saturation at dim levels...
Wasn't aware of that feature. Might have to check that out, but if it's anything as unreliable as Soft Proof's "Simulate Paper/Black Ink" setting I'll most likely side with Andrew. But thanks for mentioning that feature. I'm not really concerned with saturation levels. Just want to be able to see what the print is conveying. I thought my image samples of my framed prints viewed in the dimmest light made that clear. There's more to appreciate about an image than color. B&W street photographers can explain that point better than I.
But the bottom line is, yes, if a print will be viewed under less than ideal light levels, you can make adjustments to mitigate how a print will be viewed under low lighting levels.
I'm more for overriding the adaptive effect from editing on a brightly lit transmissive display to prevent me from making my renderings darker than they should be and so I'm establishing for my own purposes some minimum RGB number for shadows that I know will be viewable in reasonably minimum lighting situations without destroying the aesthetics and dynamics of the image. Sort of like a zone system for minimum print viewing conditions. Just a reality check for certain captured/rendered scenes that I now know are going to be trouble viewed in dim light but also look good in a print matching booth.
...I see a lot of people struggle with not crunching the blacks in images. While there is no such thing as a "perfect histogram". I see a lot of people shying away from clipping blacks (while also lightening shadows). A print pretty much always needs a "real black" otherwise the image tends to recede too much. Punching the blacks can actually help show shadows and midtones better...there's usually less issues dealing with highlights when viewing a print under dim light.
I agree, I like max black, too, but it usually requires, for me at least, a custom shaped point curve to smoothly blend out of black light enough shadow detail to be seen while not making blacks look like posterized blobs in brighter viewing conditions. I can actually see shadow detail in prints pretty good in dim diffused light mainly from adaptation to those light levels but more so if the roll off of shadow detail out of max black isn't too mushy. That's the part I'm working on and trying to improve if I can just stop editing my images too dark. Also the diffused dim light provides its own smoothing effect as it is.
I recently went to NYC and went to the Whitney Museum to see a Steiglest show...the museum lighting is always very low level (to protect the prints)...
For my own work, I always display under bright lights :~)
(cause I'm not concerned about conservation of my prints)
Museums don't display inkjet copies of famous photographer's work? If so, that's a big waste of technology IMO.
Thanks for your feedback, Jeff. Also appreciate everyone's points and thoughts on this subject.
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I'm more for overriding the adaptive effect from editing on a brightly lit transmissive display to prevent me from making my renderings darker than they should be and so I'm establishing for my own purposes some minimum RGB number for shadows that I know will be viewable in reasonably minimum lighting situations without destroying the aesthetics and dynamics of the image. Sort of like a zone system for minimum print viewing conditions.
Sort of wondering if you are too worried about the numbers. I don't think whether your blackest black is 5,5,5 or 2,2,2 or even 0,0,0 will make much difference in the overall tonality of your output. If your prints are too dark I don't think your blackest black has a lot to do with that.
It's been a long time since I worried about the "numbers". It's something everyone use to worry about and work with and I remember a long time ago mapping my black and white points with a levels adjustment, but I haven't done that in years ... I think since ACR was introduced. , With current post processing techniques as well as inks/papers/profiles not sure if there is a real number to worry about. Overall tonality/density yes, because that's the challenge of using a transmissive device to predict what a reflective print will look like, but I don't think that changes the blacks, that's more about overall density.
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Museums don't display inkjet copies of famous photographer's work? If so, that's a big waste of technology IMO.
Museums will display inkjet prints, if that's all they have. I've seen inkjet prints at all the major museums...but if they have vintage silver gelatin prints, (printed by the artist) that's what they prefer–even if a corrected inkjet would look far better. They still look down on inkjet prints when there's an alternative. And yes, I've seen a lot of really good images printed on silver gelatin that looked way too dark in the dim museum lighting...and these are the major museums around the world. Sad really, but it seems like curators and conservationists have dumbed down the display standards to as low as they can get away with. Yes, it might help preserve a print for some additional time. But it also makes looking at what should be really great prints less satisfying to the viewer :~(
But hey, if I had the money, I would buy the prints then blast them with light when I wanted to look at them (and keep it dark when I wasn't' looking :~)
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I recently went to NYC and went to the Whitney Museum to see a Steiglest show...
Bit my tongue several times but I just couldn't resist. Alfred Stieglitz is too much an icon to allow it to stand uncorrected. Forgive me. ;)
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Thanks for the spelling correction...truth be told I get really confused between Stieglitz & Steichen–so, who was it that slept with Georgia O'Keeffe?
Yeah, ok, I had to look it up...it was Stieglitz who slept with Georgia. And I had to look up the friggin' show I saw, it was Steichen (http://whitney.org/Exhibitions/EdwardSteichen)...
But, the prints were really dark in the museum lighting environment. (which was the point i was trying to make!)
:~)
Sorry, grey moment...(but I still can't keep the two of them straight).
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(but I still can't keep the two of them straight).
It's easy: Stieglitz good; Steichen not so good (IMNSHO). ;)
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Sort of wondering if you are too worried about the numbers. I don't think whether your blackest black is 5,5,5 or 2,2,2 or even 0,0,0 will make much difference in the overall tonality of your output. If your prints are too dark I don't think your blackest black has a lot to do with that.
It's been a long time since I worried about the "numbers". It's something everyone use to worry about and work with and I remember a long time ago mapping my black and white points with a levels adjustment, but I haven't done that in years ... I think since ACR was introduced. , With current post processing techniques as well as inks/papers/profiles not sure if there is a real number to worry about. Overall tonality/density yes, because that's the challenge of using a transmissive device to predict what a reflective print will look like, but I don't think that changes the blacks, that's more about overall density.
Not worried at all, Wayne.
It's just one number I now go for in the shadow zone of images whose dynamics affects my perception into editing them too dark. The first sample I posted of the rocks/water I took note of the RGB numbers in ProPhotoRGB of the fine midtone gravel among the darker dead leaves, green algae and greenish flat stones whose darkest shadows were at around 3,5,20 black. The gravel which should've at least read 127RGB in the green channel (2.2 gamma encoding) was at 99. That scene was shot with the sun directly overhead which I'ld forgotten about and was later reminded after reworks by noticing the thin shadows along the big white rocks above the water. I had to question my perception of this image in deciding just how bright to make it while preserving the rich green/blue colors, dynamics and textures.
Surprisingly the brightened version still has a decent black point but it's not in the shadows of the debris in the water, it's in the small sliver of space in the cracks between the white rocks above water. I checked holding down "Option" and dragging the black slider. So now I figured the brighter the actual scene being shot the smaller the area absolute black will reside. But there's still some absolute black in any image, it's just that by the time I get the image on my computer to edit it I can no longer remember the character of light to determine how far to go in setting shadow densities especially if I ETTR or expose to preserve highlights.
It's a bright scene so why should it look darker to the point you can't make out detail in the print in dim light while other prints of scenes shot in dim overcast light look OK under the same dimly lit print viewing conditions such as the deer in my other posted sample. It's nice to be able to edit to taste on the display and not be concerned about numbers but at some point a pragmatic approach to overcome limits in human perception must come into play to prevent making dark prints.
BTW here's a quote from "Set Print Color Management" section LR4 User Guide page 176 on "Print Bright" settings Jeff mentioned before...
3.(Optional) To achieve colors in print that more closely resemble the bright and saturated look of onscreen colors in Lightroom, select Print Adjustment. Then, drag the Brightness and Contrast sliders.
Note: Dragging the Brightness and Contrast sliders produces tone curve adjustments. These adjustments do not preview onscreen. It may take some experimentation to determine what settings work best for your individual photos and your specific printer.
The part in bold makes me wonder if the author is addressing this perception issue I've been dealing with or the limits of screen to print matching.
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IF the print, in whatever condition it's viewed is too dark, you only have three options I can think of:
1. Lighten the print.
2. Increase the illuminant.
3. A bit of both.
The display has nothing to do with the above.
Ditto. And take the Kruithof curve into account.
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Ditto. And take the Kruithof curve into account.
Clearly you and Andrew aren't reading what I keep having to repeat about five times so far from having to read through unhelpful, over simplistic and irrelevant answers to my points which I think are valid.
I'll say it again for the obtuse crowd, I'm not talking about "pleasing" viewing conditions of prints.
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I've been struggling with the same issue as Tim. I've read some articles, don't remember where, that allude to processing for placing a print in ambient living room lighting but most don't go into detail about that processing. The best I could find in my search is to use a contrast mask. I have the PhotoKit plugin, which can produce contrast masks, but I send files to a lab for printing and haven't yet ordered proofs. Want to learn more before I do.
I also found this article titled Softening Contrast, Balancing Light, but haven't yet used the actions.
http://tonykuyper.wordpress.com/2010/04/25/softening-contrast-balancing-light/
I'm wondering what the more experienced members think of the above techniques.
Regards,
Frank
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Clearly you and Andrew aren't reading what I keep having to repeat about five times so far from having to read through unhelpful, over simplistic and irrelevant answers to my points which I think are valid.
Cool, JR and I are dismissed from 'class' and now move on to better use of our time. ;D
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I have to confess I've been trying to follow this thread and try as I might I fail to see the point. Unless you are designing image sensors or image processing software why do the numbers matter? In the field you stand in front of a scene and form an emotional/intellectual impression that you would like to convey to an audience. You make your exposure and return to post to prepare the image. You manipulate it using your preferred software until the resulting image looks like the impression you formed looking at the scene. What counts is when you present that image to an audience in the form you wish to display it (screen, print, whatever) they receive the impression you want - it really doesn't matter if the darkest tone in the image is 0,0,0 or 5,5,5 or 20,20,20, as long as the image says what you want it to say you've done the job. Indeed photography abounds with excellent images that have NO absolute black or absolute white.
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I just got back last week for printing my new book in China. The project was lead by Arturo Chapa, one of the world's top book designers (in my opinion at least, but since his customers include the King of Spain, the President of Mexico and the Guggenheim Museum I'm in some good company).
In any event, while doing one of the first signature checks Arturo asked the press master to lighten the black (K) ink by 7%. The press master (PM) replied that the densitometer reading was as low as he was allowed to go and that he would take no responsibility for printing the K ink any lighter.
Arturo insisted. The PM asked that he sign a waiver, and another test was run.
The images looked much better. The PM said...You were right. The image looks better even though the numbers are wrong.
Arturo's reply was that people look at images, not numbers, and if there's a disagreement, go with how it looks, not how it measures.
Seems about right to me.
Michael
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Arturo's reply was that people look at images, not numbers, and if there's a disagreement, go with how it looks, not how it measures.
Exactly. Colorimetry is about color perception based on color measurements. It is not about color appearance and the differences are significant. The reason why viewing something is more valid than measuring it is because measurement is about comparing solid colors. While color appearance is about evaluating images and color in context which no measurement device can do.
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As RGB 0 is mapped to darker and darker printed blacks, more and more light is needed to illuminate the prints. Most calibration processes will map RGB 0 to the darkest black possible and RGB 255 to paper white. Light intensity shinning on the print doesn't enter the equation. But maybe it should?
Lightness (the L in Lab) is supposed to be perceptually uniform, i.e. equal Delta L being perceived as equal steps. But clearly the model fails when light intensity being reflected from the print is very low, either because of dark ink or low illuminant. And with high D-max baryta paper, for example, the number of photons bouncing back into the viewer's eye from the deepest black can be very low indeed.
Now, the lightness model is not supposed to fail at very Y/Yn (relative luminance) values. It makes prediction about how we perceive differences in light intensity all the way to Y/Yn equal zero.
Am I missing something or are we all just working from a flawed model of how human perceive light? (I know it’s probably the former… just don’t know where I went wrong.)
And Tim, I’m sorry if this has nothing to do with your question ;) (I saw 'Black' in the title and went with it)
Edit: change Y/Y0 to Y/Yn (relative luminance)
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Lightness (the L in Lab) is supposed to be perceptually uniform, i.e. equal Delta L being perceived as equal steps.
Key here is 'supposed to be'.
Am I missing something or are we all just working from a flawed model of how human perceive light?
We're not working with a color appearance model, that's one issue.
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I just got back last week for printing my new book in China. The project was lead by Arturo Chapa, one of the world's top book designers (in my opinion at least, but since his customers include the King of Spain, the President of Mexico and the Guggenheim Museum I'm in some good company).
In any event, while doing one of the first signature checks Arturo asked the press master to lighten the black (K) ink by 7%. The press master (PM) replied that the densitometer reading was as low as he was allowed to go and that he would take no responsibility for printing the K ink any lighter.
Arturo insisted. The PM asked that he sign a waiver, and another test was run.
The images looked much better. The PM said...You were right. The image looks better even though the numbers are wrong.
Arturo's reply was that people look at images, not numbers, and if there's a disagreement, go with how it looks, not how it measures.
Seems about right to me.
Michael
Right on!
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Key here is 'supposed to be'. We're not working with a color appearance model, that's one issue.
Swoosh (sound of the rabbit hole opening under my feet).
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Swooooosh
Hi Tim
Yes understand your problem
For print output (display is another rabbit hole)
The 'problem' is that the current imaging chain is is designed around reproduction of prints to be viewed under D50 illuminant and at a luminance of between 500lux (P2) and 2000lux. and a surround reflectance of 20%
Any deviation from the standard chain can be problematic and needs to be done on a trial and error basis, which then becomes down to experience (as in Shewe's example).
For dim viewing conditions as low level tungsten in living room, one has to use a colour appearance model to adjust the colormetric output to the new (as opposed to standard viewing conditions). The current CIE appearance model is CIECAM02. Worth reading up about.
This would change the mapping of the input values to the output cmyk values to achieve the same appearance under the new viewing conditions.
The colour appearance rendering in profiles at the moment is fixed to the above standard output.
What is need is the ability to insert a colour appearance model into the digital imaging chain. I think an attempt at this has been made in the form of a Photoshop plug in and in the raw rendering program, RAW Therapee.
Do remember that the lower the lighting levels, the more likely the model will fail.
I would refer you to the following links for some background reading,
http://www.color.org/iccprofile.xalter
Book: Mark D. Fairchild, Color Appearance Models, 3rd Ed. Wiley-IS&T, Chichester, UK (2013). ISBN 978-1-119-96703-3
http://www.cis.rit.edu/fairchild/CAM.html
Iain
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I just got back last week for printing my new book in China. The project was lead by Arturo Chapa, one of the world's top book designers (in my opinion at least, but since his customers include the King of Spain, the President of Mexico and the Guggenheim Museum I'm in some good company).
In any event, while doing one of the first signature checks Arturo asked the press master to lighten the black (K) ink by 7%. The press master (PM) replied that the densitometer reading was as low as he was allowed to go and that he would take no responsibility for printing the K ink any lighter.
Arturo insisted. The PM asked that he sign a waiver, and another test was run.
The images looked much better. The PM said...You were right. The image looks better even though the numbers are wrong.
Arturo's reply was that people look at images, not numbers, and if there's a disagreement, go with how it looks, not how it measures.
Seems about right to me.
Michael
I'ld like someone in this thread to explain what makes me edit my images to look too dark? I'm not a rank beginner. I have a trained eye.
I've spent the weekend lightening the white rose image for the third time (even the lightened version I posted here is too dark) as well as this orange flower image (see below) because I'ld like to be able to see them in my living room light. Below are the lab luminance readings between the two edits of an area I chose to use as a target among other areas to lighten because on my transmissive display my eyes have adapted to the darker version's shadow areas to the point I can see everything in the background so I assume it will be seen clearly on the print.
The business card below the 8x10 print is the original dark edit from the framed 8x10 hanging on my wall I posted earlier. Why should I choose the dark version over the lighter one? Is it a matter of aesthetics or practicality?
I have to use the numbers to tell how much my eyes have adapted to working on them for so long. The orange flower can't be just lightened with a simple slider edit or it will over saturate and blow out the detail in the folds of the petals. HSL edits are required including Luminance to the orange channel.
This is why I started this thread on black point mapping to original scene so I have some type of gauge on just how dark the shadows need to be. Now that I know the black point density doesn't really matter I'm going to use luminance numbers to override the adaptive effect on my eyes that get me to edit my images too dark.
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At the risk of being considered overly simplistic, if the image looks right on the screen while you're editing but the resulting prints are too dark, the editing screen's brightness is set too high. Reduce the monitor's brightness control until the screen looks like your pilot print and leave it there. Now when the image looks correct on the screen it will print correctly. You don't have to get more mathematical than that.
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At the risk of being considered overly simplistic, if the image looks right on the screen while you're editing but the resulting prints are too dark, the editing screen's brightness is set too high. Reduce the monitor's brightness control until the screen looks like your pilot print and leave it there. Now when the image looks correct on the screen it will print correctly. You don't have to get more mathematical than that.
I get exact screen to print matches in both luminance and color with the print viewed under lights that make white paper the same brightness of white as 255RGB white on my display.
You're solution comes from not clearly understanding this simple question which I'll repeat again...
...explain what makes me edit my images to look too dark? This means look dark both onscreen and on the print but not noticing how dark the final edit really is on my transmissive display and how it will translate to a print that will be viewed in various lighting situations.
If you've ever worked in a dark room using a stouffer step wedge grayramp to tell you correct exposure and developing time and not rely on the eye as I have and then immediately switch to closely examining under a loupe color slides on a very bright light table, it will help you understand what I'm getting at.
Digital mashes these two optically driven phenomenon into one process where both the desire of the photographer to make the image look good collides with not knowing how far to go for output to a print for viewing under a wide range of lighting situations.
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I get exact screen to print matches in both luminance and color with the print viewed under lights that make white paper the same brightness of white as 255RGB white on my display.
...explain what makes me edit my images to look too dark? This means look dark both onscreen and on the print but not noticing how dark the final edit really is on my transmissive display and how it will translate to a print that will be viewed in various lighting situations.
???
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I get exact screen to print matches in both luminance and color with the print viewed under lights that make white paper the same brightness of white as 255RGB white on my display.
You're solution comes from not clearly understanding this simple question which I'll repeat again...
...explain what makes me edit my images to look too dark? This means look dark both onscreen and on the print but not noticing how dark the final edit really is on my transmissive display and how it will translate to a print that will be viewed in various lighting situations.
If you've ever worked in a dark room using a stouffer step wedge grayramp to tell you correct exposure and developing time and not rely on the eye as I have and then immediately switch to closely examining under a loupe color slides on a very bright light table, it will help you understand what I'm getting at.
Digital mashes these two optically driven phenomenon into one process where both the desire of the photographer to make the image look good collides with not knowing how far to go for output to a print for viewing under a wide range of lighting situations.
So, umm...
I understand your problem, and have no where near the technical expertise of most of the others in the conversation, but isn't this kind of like shooting for Zones? Wouldn't you conceptually, at the time of capture say this should map to Zone V, then using LAB or something else make sure that spot's values fall near a Zone V? At least, with my basic understanding of the Zone system, that would be how I would apply it. Or am I also completely missing the point?
And on the issue of prints and lighting, my understanding of LED based lights for the home is that, even though sold as "warm" to match tungsten, the light given off by these LEDs is different than true tungsten. If that is true, and the visible spectrum is altered (this is coming from analysis of LEDs and suitability for video production, albeit a few years ago), wouldn't this also negatively influence the appearance of your prints? Something that could be very hard to compensate for as we are in a transition phase from tungsten to LED in the US.
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...
You're solution comes from not clearly understanding this simple question which I'll repeat again...
...explain what makes me edit my images to look too dark? This means look dark both onscreen and on the print but not noticing how dark the final edit really is on my transmissive display and how it will translate to a print that will be viewed in various lighting situations.
...
So what you're saying is that the print matches the screen but when you edit on-screen you somehow see it as lighter than it really is and so you call it done when it's really too dark, that your eyes are being fooled and you don't realize it until after pulling a pilot print???? If that is what is happening the answer lies somewhere in your own psychology and the mathematics of RGB values and tone mapping isn't going to help.
How are you defining "too dark?" Is it by some numerical standard of what the print density of certain tones theoretically "ought" to be or is it a more subjective measure of not having a tonal range (and biased toward the dark) that conveys the message you intend to convey?
There really is no way to print so it looks perfect under a wide range of different lighting conditions. You can calibrate every part of the process to a specific illuminant for the final print but it will look different under any other illumination.
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Sorry Tim
I though I understood you but I am afraid you have lost me again.
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So what you're saying is that the print matches the screen but when you edit on-screen you somehow see it as lighter than it really is and so you call it done when it's really too dark, that your eyes are being fooled and you don't realize it until after pulling a pilot print???? If that is what is happening the answer lies somewhere in your own psychology and the mathematics of RGB values and tone mapping isn't going to help.
How are you defining "too dark?" Is it by some numerical standard of what the print density of certain tones theoretically "ought" to be or is it a more subjective measure of not having a tonal range (and biased toward the dark) that conveys the message you intend to convey?
There really is no way to print so it looks perfect under a wide range of different lighting conditions. You can calibrate every part of the process to a specific illuminant for the final print but it will look different under any other illumination.
Steve, the images I've posted throughout this thread will show you what I mean by too dark both visually and by the numbers.
My eyes ARE being fooled from the adaptive effect caused by the transmissive display skewing my judgment of overall brightness and contrast. Specifically when I brighten an image it loses contrast and definition so I increase contrast which makes the shadows even darker and I just keep going back and forth and back and forth and think I've made headway when I haven't because my eyes of adjusted too quickly.
I have to then resort to scene analysis by the numbers according to how much light was in the actual scene and stop emotionally driven edits from skewing my judgement. Things look great when darkening and adding drama like some film noir/Marvel Comics rendering (i.e. Ansel Adams style tone map where daylight scenes of Yosemite look like night). But because my eyes adapt quickly to the darker version I don't think it's dark at all but it sure does look good. The lower dynamics of a print will make it seem even darker in dimmer light than a print matching booth.
But there are so many options available working in Raw to make an image look just as dynamic and dramatic without resorting to making it look dark and I've found a way to do just that.
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So, umm...
I understand your problem, and have no where near the technical expertise of most of the others in the conversation, but isn't this kind of like shooting for Zones? Wouldn't you conceptually, at the time of capture say this should map to Zone V, then using LAB or something else make sure that spot's values fall near a Zone V? At least, with my basic understanding of the Zone system, that would be how I would apply it. Or am I also completely missing the point?
And on the issue of prints and lighting, my understanding of LED based lights for the home is that, even though sold as "warm" to match tungsten, the light given off by these LEDs is different than true tungsten. If that is true, and the visible spectrum is altered (this is coming from analysis of LEDs and suitability for video production, albeit a few years ago), wouldn't this also negatively influence the appearance of your prints? Something that could be very hard to compensate for as we are in a transition phase from tungsten to LED in the US.
Yes, SZRitter, I'm doing a reality check on my edits using a sort of zone system but for shadows which is the bottom end for establishing minimum density in image detail important enough to be seen in dim living room light. Not all images will have dark detail that needs to be seen in this sense.
The LED I'm using doesn't affect color or tone as you've indicated. Not all LEDs are alike. Check out the shot of the row of framed 8x10's hanging on my living room wall I posted earlier in this thread. I'm not talking about maintaining perfect print matching in this type of light but just to have shadow detail viewable so the idea of the subject can be conveyed.
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Found this link from a Photo.net discussion on darkroom print editing notes...
http://petapixel.com/2013/09/12/marked-photographs-show-iconic-prints-edited-darkroom/
It helps explain the motives behind the decisions I'm discussing about editing an image based on an intent other than just taste.
Scroll down to the Audrey Hepburn image showing the lifted shadow detail in the reflection on the black card door. Is that important shadow detail that should be seen in all types of light as in a magazine at the library, airport or poorly lit bus? Or should they have left the reflections as they were? What would your aesthetics and taste dictate and what would you base it on?
I would've left the reflections as they are because they distract from Audrey's face framed by all the black surround. I wouldn't care if anyone could see it in any light. OTOH if thought it was important I'ld want to make it light enough so that it could.
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Steve, the images I've posted throughout this thread will show you what I mean by too dark both visually and by the numbers.
My eyes ARE being fooled from the adaptive effect caused by the transmissive display skewing my judgment of overall brightness and contrast. Specifically when I brighten an image it loses contrast and definition so I increase contrast which makes the shadows even darker and I just keep going back and forth and back and forth and think I've made headway when I haven't because my eyes of adjusted too quickly.
I have to then resort to scene analysis by the numbers according to how much light was in the actual scene and stop emotionally driven edits from skewing my judgement. Things look great when darkening and adding drama like some film noir/Marvel Comics rendering (i.e. Ansel Adams style tone map where daylight scenes of Yosemite look like night). But because my eyes adapt quickly to the darker version I don't think it's dark at all but it sure does look good. The lower dynamics of a print will make it seem even darker in dimmer light than a print matching booth.
But there are so many options available working in Raw to make an image look just as dynamic and dramatic without resorting to making it look dark and I've found a way to do just that.
'Too dark' visually I understand, though I found it impossible to get a meaningful impression of the images you posted, considering they're photographs of photographs and are further being filtered through my own screen settings on the laptop I use for web browsing. I can see one is darker than the other but can't go much beyond that in seeing into the image details. 'Too dark by the numbers' is a concept I can't relate to. No matter what the numbers are, if it looks right it is right and if it looks wrong it is wrong, IMHO. While there's no question that there are some mechanical/technical elements involved, expressive print making is not a numbers driven process where you set the 'right' values for X and Y and everything else falls into place.
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'Too dark' visually I understand, though I found it impossible to get a meaningful impression of the images you posted, considering they're photographs of photographs and are further being filtered through my own screen settings on the laptop I use for web browsing. I can see one is darker than the other but can't go much beyond that in seeing into the image details. 'Too dark by the numbers' is a concept I can't relate to. No matter what the numbers are, if it looks right it is right and if it looks wrong it is wrong, IMHO. While there's no question that there are some mechanical/technical elements involved, expressive print making is not a numbers driven process where you set the 'right' values for X and Y and everything else falls into place.
So why mention you're viewing my posted images on a laptop? Why would that be an issue since if it looks right then it's right, if it looks wrong it's wrong? Is the laptop calibrated and does it match your higher end calibrated workstation? Just so we're comparing apples to apples, right? I edited those images on a calibrated system to match VERY close to what I see in my living room and I'm quite good at making a match by eye this way? Not so good at remembering how dark or light a scene I shot a week ago and now attempting to edit to look good and not realize I've made it too dark.
If you don't see the contradiction in your arguments in what I just indicated then there's no point in helping you understand what I'm conveying. And I never said I go strictly by the numbers but you seem to continue to misinterpret and add words to what I didn't say.
As some photographers use a gray target to establish 128RGB midgray for proper exposures I'm just advocating a minimum shadow number in relation to absolute black=(which constantly changes scene to scene>how it's seen on a transmissive display>to print depending on paper/ink) so that it will be viewable in a print and communicate at least what the image is about under the dimmest light. Nothing complex or technical about it.
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Here's another observation to show how the relationship of a constantly changing black point within the process to final viewing pipeline that requires scaling to overall shadow densities.
Below is a shot of a mural and an inset shot 2 hours later of a section in shadow. It is a depiction of a night scene. The muralist didn't use absolute black paint to draw in the cracks of the rocks because of the extreme viewing light variances that would force the rocks to scale too dark for each extreme lighting conditions and to prevent the darker black cracks from looking posterized as I've shown by drawing in 0,0,0 black dashes.
Not saying you need to make your edits this light in the shadows. This is just a demonstration of an optical phenomenon regarding perception influenced by variances in black densities and how they relate to variances in dynamic range and light levels. Your transmissive display and your digital images of real scenes have a far bigger DR than that mural even when the mural is lit by bright sunlight, but a print has far less than the display but more than the mural due to both the lighting it's subjected to and the density of ink and obsorption=reflectance characteristics provided by the paper.
The black of a transmissive display has an infinite density, a black hole with regard to human perception, where as a print's black density is not, even though you think the black looks the same as the display's. It isn't especially under varying light levels.
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So, are you worried about contrast in shadows for details, or the bottom black point?
For the bottom black point, you could easily take a curve and adjust it so the absolute black point comes up about 5% from true black. Adjust to taste.
For shadow contrast, you could add a luminosity mask into the darker tones and adjust their contrast through curves. My understanding of our ability to view detail is that it is based more upon contrast, either through color or luminosity, than anything else.
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So, are you worried about contrast in shadows for details, or the bottom black point?...
...My understanding of our ability to view detail is that it is based more upon contrast, either through color or luminosity, than anything else.
You have a correct understanding of how we see shadow detail through contrast and definition by distinguishing separation in dark against light densities scaling up out of absolute black. And I'm aware of how to correct for that.
What I'm not aware and I have to remind myself with that shadow number reality check is to know just how light or dark to go in my edits because the appearance of black point density on a print which affects the relationship to lighter shadow detail will vary according to different viewing light levels AND whether the light is diffused or spot. OTOH the black density appearance on a transmissive display appears static editing to make the image look good but with the added problem of adaptation making me see the overall shadow area as looking light enough when it's really too dark to overcome the issues I just described about printed black and varying light.
The black dotted line I included in the shot of the mural remains static whether it's viewed in bright light or in shade but the shadow tones that make up the detail against the static black change not only in density but in contrast and flatness especially to changes in character of light. Note the tone density relationship of the cracks to rocks and plants and their shadows are less defined than the sunlit version meaning the character of light as viewed on a print under various lighting doesn't behave linearly like it does on a transmissive display.
I'm beginning to think a warning label needs to be printed on fine art framed prints displayed under perfectly lit gallery lighting that goes something like this...
"Warning: Gallery halogen light bulb not included with beautiful print. Not responsible for how it will look anywhere else without it".
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I'm beginning to think a warning label needs to be printed on fine art framed prints displayed under perfectly lit gallery lighting that goes something like this...
"Warning: Gallery halogen light bulb not included with beautiful print. Not responsible for how it will look anywhere else without it".
A humorous sentiment firmly grounded in two inescapable realities - A) your final critical evaluation of a print must be done with the hard-copy print itself, not its 'preview' on the screen; and B) the results are only valid for one specific set of viewing conditions. A fine print may go through several iterations of the physical print until it's what the artist intends. The screen might get you 95% there but the last 5% will be through trial and error with pilot prints coming off the printer using the same paper, ink, and size as will be used for the final print. And there are no viewing conditions one could create for that final evaluation process that would compensate for all possible variants in the print's final resting place. Indeed, one fellow photographer I know maintains that profiling and calibrating one's screen and printer is non-essential since over time one can train the brain and the eye to get you as close as you can get with a calibrated system, since the final print adjustments need to be done referencing the physical print anyway.
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A humorous sentiment firmly grounded in two inescapable realities - A) your final critical evaluation of a print must be done with the hard-copy print itself, not its 'preview' on the screen; and B) the results are only valid for one specific set of viewing conditions. A fine print may go through several iterations of the physical print until it's what the artist intends. The screen might get you 95% there but the last 5% will be through trial and error with pilot prints coming off the printer using the same paper, ink, and size as will be used for the final print. And there are no viewing conditions one could create for that final evaluation process that would compensate for all possible variants in the print's final resting place. Indeed, one fellow photographer I know maintains that profiling and calibrating one's screen and printer is non-essential since over time one can train the brain and the eye to get you as close as you can get with a calibrated system, since the final print adjustments need to be done referencing the physical print anyway.
Wish I had the money to make all those pilot print iterations to match some subjective vision of an artist who seems to be working blind and very picky if they can't be satisfied with 95%. Could you or any one be able to distinguish between how much of that 5% is on account of the eye's adaptive nature as opposed to the influences of lighting and ink absorption and reflectance from the light on the print?
I can't tell if your comments are referring to production workflow practices to accommodate another artist's pickiness or you are referring to your own workflow habits both of which I don't share.
I don't seem to have to work that hard at producing a print that is viewable in my dim living room light but I now understand why I was having problems and I fixed them. And what I've shown in what I had to do to insure this required WAY MORE than a 5% change. Going from L*12 to L*24 in luminance in the shadows suggest I doubled the light, but as you can see from that orange flower, if I'ld done that the flower would have to appear as a pastel peachy off white. The reasons I understand why that didn't happen may be what's lacking in production workflows that require several iterations just to correct for 5%.
A static non-changing state of a calibrated system and matching light level viewing environment keeps one from going around in loops trying figure out why 5% difference is or isn't important. I'll admit I only print on 8x10 glossies because that's all I can afford. I printed on matte and was disappointed with the black levels and the overall reduced dynamics for viewing in my dimly lit living room, but I'm not producing prints on thousands of dollars of equipment and supplies for obvious reasons.