General Photography Chat

[M II A II R II K]

Instead of photoshop I just try to adjust the settings of the camera depending on what the weather's like and what's being taken of.

Reducing the brightness does make for some clearer pictures when the excessive light is filtered out.

[Doady]

I think you should always increase saturation in Photoshop and never in-camera. Because if the saturation is too high it will cause clipping of highlights and shadows, and what exactly is "too high" will vary from scene to scene. When you increase saturation in Photoshop, you can watch the histogram as you increase saturation so you can avoid clipping. Same goes for gradation and contrast as well.

Sharpening is another parametre that should not be set too high in-camera, though for different reasons.

[Aleks]

Has anyone played around with the Nikon 10-24? After I get my 70-300mm I want to order a wide lens but I'm not sure if I want the Tokina 11-16 or the 10-24.

The Tokina is $300 cheaper
f/2.8 instead of 3.5
Harder/longer to get
Limited zoom range

The Nikon 10-24 has a good zoom range
It's, well, Nikon
f/3.5
900 freaking bucks!

For now I'm leaning towards the Tokina. Plus I'm getting a good deal for what I'd be paying. I just don't like the zoom range too much, which means I'd have to carry my 18-105 everywhere I go.

OR! Should I not get the 70-300 and instead save my money for the Tokina [which means I can get it sooner]. The thing is that the lady who's selling me her 70-300 is giving it to me for $350 which is wayy lower than a $550 new one. Plus I'm not sure if I'd be using it a lot since most of my photography is landscapes and urban. Then again, it's 350, a really good offer, almost too good to pass. And I'd have the option on using a tele whenever I want closeups of far away objects. Plus I hear really good reviews of both lenses and my greediness is telling me to get both. Too bad I can't get both at once. Shees, I just can't make up my mind.

As for saturation, I keep my D90 on Vivid mode and adjust the sat depending on where I am and what I'm shooting. If I'm shooting randomly I keep the saturation at normal level, still on Vivid mode though. Then again, I like my pictures saturated and most of them end up changing in Photoshop anyways.

[toyota74]

fair enough but what about white balance settings people..

[1ajs]

i shoot in raw and ajust em afterwards

[Aleks]

I keep white balance on auto although I do some fine tuning at night to get bluer shots and on gray days to get warmer shots.

Yeah, RAW works pretty great too. Although I feel like sometimes I can get better images when I adjust the colors in the camera. Plus you need Photoshop to actually edit RAW. You can use other programs like Picasa but it's not the same and you'll get way better results with Photoshop.

[toyota74]

Suppose I will have to but photoshop someday ....more euros

[flar]

Or you could use GIMP for free. It does everything I need, and with the UFRaw plugin it works great for editing raw files.

[Aleks]

You don't have to get Photoshop CS, that's in the hundreds of dollars! Get Photoshop Elements, it's only 70 US dollars, it's easy, organized a has everything you need. I haven't tried out GIMP but flar uses it, and his pictures are amazing!

[HomeInMyShoes]

@Aleks: I've got a Tokina 12-24mm that I like a lot. The Nikon was just too much money, especially when I was living in the US. While the 10mm would have been nice, it just wasn't going to happen. I paid around half the cost of the Nikon for the Tokina. There was a website with some good review information that ended my indecision.

A couple of samples of what is coming out of it (click to go find bigger versions):





For white balance, I sometimes use the sampling method and sometimes auto, unless I'm finding it off in which case I'll change to cloudy as it does a bit better job in some seemingly sunny conditions.

[Aleks]

Sweet shots! That first one is amazing.

But yeah, the Nikkor 10-24 was never an option. It's too expensive, I was just wondering. The Tokina 12-24 takes nice shots [as you've demonstrated]. I never thought of it as an option since I was focused on the 11-16 but I think I'll check it out and see which one I like more. Plus I wonder if the extra 1 mm makes that much of a difference and the 12-24 is cheaper.

I also don't want to focus on 2 lenses. So far these are the lenses I'm considering from the ones I was most to the one I want the least [the ? means tied/can't decide]
-Tokina 11-16 ? for around 650 f/2.8 limited range wider
-Tokina 12-24 ? for around 500 bucks f/4 usable range
-Sigma 10-20
-Tamron 11-18

[Doady]

The RAW converter in Photoshop Elements has less controls compared to the one in regular Photoshop, but the results are similar, better than the really basic RAW converters packaged with cameras, so it might be worth it if you shoot RAW. And I think it good to have RAW converter integrated with photo editing software instead of separate, and really only PS and PSE offer that.

But still I only use RAW if I need high dynamic range. Otherwise, it is not worth the extra time to edit. I never shoot RAW just to change white balance, because WB is so easy to get right in-camera, at least during the daytime.

GIMP is great but I don't use it because it lacks adjustment layers. But if don't need adjustment layers or RAW conversion then really there is no point in spending money on Photoshop or Photoshop Elements. But I think adjustment layers alone are worth the extra money.

[toyota74]

So will raw overwrite any camera setting like saturation etc..

[HomeInMyShoes]

Originally Posted by Aleks

Sweet shots! That first one is amazing.

But yeah, the Nikkor 10-24 was never an option. It's too expensive, I was just wondering. The Tokina 12-24 takes nice shots [as you've demonstrated]. I never thought of it as an option since I was focused on the 11-16 but I think I'll check it out and see which one I like more. Plus I wonder if the extra 1 mm makes that much of a difference and the 12-24 is cheaper.

I also don't want to focus on 2 lenses. So far these are the lenses I'm considering from the ones I was most to the one I want the least [the ? means tied/can't decide]
-Tokina 11-16 ? for around 650 f/2.8 limited range wider
-Tokina 12-24 ? for around 500 bucks f/4 usable range
-Sigma 10-20
-Tamron 11-18

11 might be nice. I do like that with the 1.5 conversion (since I'm not using a fullframe camera body), the 12-24 actually gets me into the 35mm range so I can still get a pretty regular what the eye sees without having to switch lenses. Makes it a bit more useful and a reasonable option for carrying around to do city stuff without having to carry an extra lens. I would give serious consideration to the f/2.8 of the 11-16 and, for me, that would be the deciding option and not the 1mm difference. A bit wider range versus a little easier to skimp on carrying the tripod and a bit narrower depth of field when you want it.

[M II A II R II K]

All of these intricate variables to accommodate every single type of photo one wants to take.

My camera doesn't have most of those settings so I just improvise through trial and error.

[Doady]

Originally Posted by toyota74

So will raw overwrite any camera setting like saturation etc..

Yes, but, technically, RAW doesn't overwrite any camera settings, it just doesn't apply such settings. The only settings that are applied are those of the RAW converter.

[toyota74]

i see.
Ialso see that some people recommend f22 for
landscapes while others say f11 is enough..so
is there any factors that would make you choose
one or the other ie. light,lense etc..

I understand about getting everything focus
which can be got with both fstops or any in
between...

[Doady]

I have no experience with dSLR, but I would say that you probably should not go beyond F11, assuming that you are using non-full frame lens. Beyond that the photo will become progressively more unsharp due to diffraction. F22 will have extremely high diffraction and lack sharpness, and so should only be used if you really, really need it.

At wide angle, F11 is probably the sweet spot for sharpness and depth of field for a landscape photo. Again, I don't use this type of camera so I don't know the exact numbers, but I assume others recommended F11 for a good reason. Maybe it is not the exact diffraction limit, but it should be close. And keep it mind the limit differs between lenses of different formats.

[ue]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

All of these intricate variables to accommodate every single type of photo one wants to take.

My camera doesn't have most of those settings so I just improvise through trial and error.

what kind of camera do you have?

[M II A II R II K]

Cyber-Shot - Sony

7.2 MP

Basic settings

No shutter, aperture. or all that good stuff.