Simon Worby wrote:
>Moose wrote:
>
>> hope this will make it easier to see. If it doesn't, maybe
>>there is something wrong with your monitor, its settings or
>>driver, your browser or ??? The diferences are pretty obvious here.
>>
>>
>Yes, I can see now.
>
>You have indeed managed to restore some of the colour, depth, and dynamic
>range, but the most striking aspect is that you've brought back at least part
>of the clarity and crispness of the original slides.
>
>0523-30 Le Lac Vert
>The changes are subtle but you've introduced clarity to see into the water
>better (mainly by darkening the image to get rid of the lightness on the water
>surface?). I can see there's extra sharpening, too.
>
>
The main effect is LCE, which is a use of unsharp mask, but different
from conventional sharpening. What I'm told it does is to enhance
contrast at edges between different brightnesses. Technically, I don't
really know. What I do know is that on many images, scanned or digital,
it is like having a veil lifted, so that the, as you put it, clarity and
crispness of the subject appears. Most of what you see in this one is
from LCE. Because of the way LCE effects some images, pushing high
values to pure white, I sometimes lower brightness a little to leave
some empty space at the top of the histogram before applying LCE.
In this case, LCE was pushing the rocks, etc. along the shore into
rather undifferentiated white at the level needed to clarify the
underwater detail and reflections. So I selected those parts by colour,
deselected with the lasoo the parts of the rest of the image that had
been picked up by colour, and copied the selected area into a new layer.
I then applied LCE and a little curves to the original layer and did
some curves adjustment to the shore. I think you can see where there is
now more detail/differentation in the face of the big rock which is
rather blank in the original. I would guess total time of about three
minutes, certainly no more than five.
>0524-19 View from Säntis
>The changes in this are most striking, I think. The blue sky is obvious, but
>the major contribution you have made is to introduce clarity again to draw
>one's eye to the horizon, where you can see much better just how far into the
>distance you can see.
>
Again, most of what you see is from LCE. I darkened the whole image,
then applied LCE and some Shadow/Highlight adjustment, and maybe a bit
of curves.
>The foreground has been darkened and sharpened, too, but I'm not convinced by
>that, I have to say.
>
>
Again, not sharpened in the conventional sense. LCE and S/H have
enahnced already existing contrast at the detail level, making a rather
undifferentiated area a bit over contrasty. I believe I mentioned that
in my first post. As with Ls Lac Vert, I could have selected much of the
brighter foreground for a separate layer, to be adjusted on its own for
a subtler effect. I just didn't feel like putting in the time. Working
with a full size and uncompressed image, it would be worth it. Time,
less than three minutes, probably less than two.
>0525-04 Freiburg
>You've restored the deep red on the trade building very nicely, and again got
>rid of the haze. The cobblestones have also been brought to life and crispened
>up very nicely.
>
>
Both mostly LCE. I think I lowered brightness before LCE. S/H helped
bring up some shadow detail and bring detail into the sky and
cobblestomes. Again maybe 2-3 minutes.
>0525-33 Titisee
>This is the one with fewest changes, as you say. The changes are subtle, and I
>haven't convinced myself they make a huge difference one way or the other, to
>be honest.
>
>
I'm not convinced they are much either, a little more color and clarity
in the reds, blues and whites of boats and a subtle strengthening of the
reflections. I mostly included it both to show that not all images need
anything such and that similar treatment can give an overall impression
of a slightly darker image, as in the first three, or a lighter image,
as in this one.
>Now we come to the crux of the problem: I have no idea how to do the same on
>any new scans. As people here will no, I'm not a fan of digital manipulation,
>but equally I can't see any harm in trying to put back what the scanner has
>taken away. But at this point, I'm not in possession of the knowledge (or even
>possibly the software -- not sure on that one!) about how to do it.
>
>
The basic techniques are pretty simple. I sometimes go to great lengths
on an image of my own here and there, but purposely kept it simple on
yours. I have an action saved in PS to create a duplicate layer and
apply LCE (Unsharp mask, Amount 20%, Radius 50, Threshold 0, very
occasionally modified) to the new layer. I can then adjust the opacity
of the new layer with a slider if it is too much. Very occasionally,
with very flat images, a second dose of LCE is applied, almost always
partially.
I also have saved actions for the Brightness/Contrast and
Shadow/Highlight tools with middle of the road defaults that I adjust by
eye as the action plays.
I use Photoshop, version 8/CS at the moment. Most of the things I
regularly do are available in other image editors. I think
Shadow/Highlight may be less common and it does absolute wonders on a
few images. I suppose should be able to get the same effect with Curves,
but it's much quicker and easier in S/H.
I won't pretend it didn't take me some time to learn what worked for me
and how to apply it well for the results I want, but most images are now
pretty quick.
>Could you tell me how long it took you, please? At least that will give me an
>idea of whether I *want* to learn...
>
>
I'm pretty sure it took no more than say 10 minutes, 15 at the outside,
to do all four images. I just redid Le Lac Vert in under a minute, but I
knew what I had done before.
Digital can be frustrating, because it's a whole new set of concepts and
application. I have found it very rewarding, because it has finally
allowed me to do many things I always wanted to do that were too
expensive, time and space intensive, etc. to realize prints and web
images that reflect what I saw when I took the shot. I've been amazed
and very happy to find the wonderful images hidden in automated prints,
some from decades ago. Slides are usually fine as they are, but getting
good prints was either impossible or too expensive for me, I'm not sure
how much of each. And even some slides can be improved on, at least
mine. :-)
Moose
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