clique

This is part one of a two part series on working with grain.

When I say grain, I mean digital noise. It makes more sense to me creatively to relate the two concepts of ‘film grain’ and ‘digital noise’. Digital noise is nothing more than more-orderly film grain, and I’m not sure why it has the bad reputation that it does. So, moving on.

First, let’s talk about what grain is, so we can better understand how to get rid of it. Know Thine Enemy!

Here’s an extremely detailed article on digital noise. Read up, and then come back. We’ll talk about what we can do with and about grain. I think of grain as the camera’s guesswork. The higher the ISO, the more guesswork the camera is doing on the detail it is being asked to record accurately. More grain existing in an image represents the camera’s estimations being further and further from ‘accurate’. It makes guesses based on color and luminance (which is like brightness). So, inconsistencies of both brightness and color can exist. In this post, you’ll learn how to get rid of, de-emphasize and mitigate graininess in your image.

Most of my grainy images come from shooting concerts, so we’ll start with one of those.

This is a shot of Malevolent Creation, a metal band I shot at the Masquerade in Atlanta. I shot this with my Canon 30d at 3200iso, 1/60th of a second, at f/1.8, with my 50mm f/1.8 lens, without a flash. I pushed the exposure up. This image is extremely grainy, as you can see in the 100% zoom below.

Notice in this next image how, even the sharpest areas of the image are suffering from the noise’s ‘averaging’ effect. Yikes! Let’s get started.

Before we start attacking the detail of the image, let’s start with some global adjustments. There is a lot of noise in the darkest areas of this image. Let’s push all those noisy shadows even darker so they get knocked out and less noticeable. I used a curves layer, like so:

Next, we’re going to attack the noise more directly by looking at the image’s individual color channels. If you’re using photoshop’s default window setup, it’s right here:

Let’s take a look at the individual channels, looking for noise. Here’s Red, Green and Blue, respectively:

As a rule, the blue channel is a complete dick about noise. The red channel is bad in this case, but not always. The green channel is fine, as it usually is (this, I believe, is because there are twice as many ‘green’ sensors in your camera’s sensor as either other channel). The blue channel is almost always the noisiest.

I’ll knock out some color noise by reducing the saturation on the image a little bit. I’ll use hue/saturation for this.This is a good idea because it not only reduces color noise, it also helps control the extra-saturatedness of high ISO images. Check out the shadow area on this dude’s arm while he throws up the devil horns.

and after:

Much better!

So now that we know where we need to reduce noise, Photoshop has a reduce noise filter that we’re going to use next (there are other 3rd party tools, like the highly-lauded Noise Ninja, which are considered by some to be better). So, I’ve created a new merged layer (I keep all my previous layers underneath, so I can preserve the ability to edit and redo my work later).The reduce noise filter has ‘advanced options’, which let you work on noise on a per-channel basis. So, I’m going to make my decisions here based on my observations earlier, preserving more detail in the green channel, and really obliterating the blue channel.

‘Preserve detail’ is a threshold control, just like in Unsharp Mask. It’s Photoshop’s way of figuring what is noise, which should be destroyed, and detail, which should be retained. Strength controls how much smoothing (or whatever it does, exactly) it will apply to the areas that are ‘noise’ and not ‘detail’. I prefer to set it higher overall than I think I should, and then paint in the noise reduction with a layer mask. Noise reduction can be hell on the actual detail you want to retain, because the threshold control is not perfect.

At this point, I’m done working on noise, and I can put some saturation back in, since I’ve gotten rid of the noise that would have caused a problem. At this point, I’ll make my creative decisions about the image: toning, contrast, saturation or what-have-you.

Lastly, I’m going to create a new merged layer again, and run Unsharp Mask. It’s important to get rid of noise before sharpening your images. Photoshop can’t always tell the difference between noise and detail, so Unsharp Mask can end up intensifying grain. I am going to use a higher-than-usual radius setting, because the noise in the image ’scattered’ the detail. A higher radius will allow me to ‘corral’ it back into defined edges.

Here’s the before and after:

Much better. Great! Next time, we’ll talk about getting convincing film grain in our images. See you then!

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. I won’t make excuses, so let’s get in to it:

Props go to my wife for this one. The woman is a junkie for the dollar store. Anything that costs a dollar is a good deal as far as she’s concerned. Mostly it’s crap, but sometimes she gets something actually worth a dollar. And then sometimes she gets something that worth more than a dollar.

I immediately knew it was one of those special times when she showed me this:

It’s a little mini tripod! She saw it and knew that I would find something far more useful than it’s intended purpose. And she was right! I immediately ran and got one of my cold shoe cajiggers that come with those strobist umbrella adapters and screwed it on:

And, hey! We’ve got a little light stand!

This thing makes for a perfect kick light. A kick light is basically a low backlight. David Hobby once suggested using a tennis shoe for this purpose, but that’s a little more ghetto than I would like to be. It’s only a dollar, it’s totally stable, and it looks like real equipment!

How’s it look when you use it?

Like that! Here is my dog Annie, lit by daylight with the $1 kick light back and behind. Notice the dramatic rim light. ooo, ahh. So, keep your eyes peeled, and when you see one of these crappy little tripods, pick one up. Because this little stand doesn’t just kick light, it also kicks ass.

Hey Blogosphere!

I wrote a few weeks back about the new Eye Fi memory card. We talked about some implications it could have for the photo industry. While it definitely seems marketed towards the more casual photographer, who is looking to avoid the hassle of downloading pictures, I am interested in the benefits for professional photographers: shaving off time getting an image to print, instantaneous auto-backups, and art direction. So, that’s what I’m going to be looking into today.

What you get

Here are some shitty pictures I took of the packaging with my wife’s camera.

I am a sucker for good packaging, so I really liked this box, and the way that both sides slide out when you pull on the tab. This reveals the eye-fi card and card reader, and the instructions. The card reader is just a fancy looking vanilla SD card reader. Feel free to lose it if you have a multi-card reader like I have.

Setup

This thing is stupid simple to set up. You plug the thing in, install the software in a pretty ordinary way (drag to applications on mac, and install wizard on pc), and open up the software. You need to be connected to the internet to register yourself, set up, or make changes to the way your Eye Fi card functions. This is pretty irritating, and (in my opinion) functionally superfluous. I’d be interested to hear why they do it this way. Anyway, you’re online. The setup screens are simple and clean. Setting the card up to talk on a network and upload your pictures to a variety of sources (including smugmug, my website host!) is a breeze.

Once you’ve got everything done, you can remove/eject the card. I shoot with a Canon 30D, which takes CFII cards. I bought this to make it work.

“Premiertek SD/MMC Card to Compact Flash Type II CF Adapter” (Premiertek)

Its ratings are not the best, but so far, so good. I haven’t had any problems. Everything plugs together thusly. Photographer see, photographer do.

Make sure the SD card gets tightly seated!

Once you’ve got everything put together, you can start shooting.

What it’s like

Once it’s setup, the thing just works. It only transfers jpg files (see below). If you drift out of wi-fi range, the card will wait until it sees the network again to resume transfers, even mid-file. You get a nice popup in the upper right corner of the screen on your host computer showing you uploads, too.

As you can see, I am uploading a picture of the glass(es) of wine I’ve been drinking while writing this post.

What you can do with it

The applications for professional photographers using this product are endless. If you’ve got a laptop, a wi-fi router, and an internet connection, you can get your pictures anywhere in the world, as soon as you shoot them. That’s powerful stuff. I’ve started promoting this service to my wedding clients, as a way for distant relatives to enjoy your wedding, live on my website.

I’ve also started using it for product and fashion shoots. Instead of shooting tethered, I shoot RAW+L (which creates a high quality JPEG alongside the raw), the jpeg gets transfered, the RAW stays put. Clients can review images as I shoot, and direct and make changes as necessary. That’s a big value-add for them, and it’s gone over very well so far.

This could be big for newsies, too. With a laptop, wi-fi router, and your internet-enabled cell phone, you can become a roving live photo correspondent almost anywhere in the world.

If you upload somewhere that generates an RSS feed (like flickr or smugmug), you could be slick and get upload confirmations on your cell phone by text message.

Let’s not forget the backup ramifications as well! Maybe you’re a war correspondent, u

Hey, Eye-Fi! Here’s how to make it even more awesome

Don’t require users to go online to setup and use the card. What if we don’t have an internet connection, but still want to transfer pictures over a wi-fi network to our computer? I am also uneasy about eye fi’s website keeping tabs on everything I do with their card.

RAW Transfer. My best guess is that they were worried about large images transferring slowly and queueing up. Pros will still want RAW transfer.

More configurability. In regard to the upload services, I would really like to have some more options made available. If you upload to flickr, it does not allow you to specify any tags or groups, yet it adds an eye-fi tag. So, they have the capability. They are just denying users access to it. Nice, thanks. Specifically, I want to be able to upload to a pre-existing gallery. That way, I can send it to my customers beforehand. They can load up the gallery and watch the images appear when I start shooting.

Get the software running on a smart phone. It’d be nice to eliminate the laptop middleman, even if you do still need a wi-fi router somewhere. My dream would be to link up my camera and my internet phone,

Just hack the damn thing, guys. I can only hope that some saintly genius somewhere is going to write some open source software to run this device that will give us all the functionality we desire.

How about a pro version? Instead of bogging down your amateur consumers, how about you offer a juiced up version for pros? Faster write-speeds, faster transfer-speeds, upload configurability! Etcetera, glorious etcetera!

Q & A

So, now, I’d like to open the floor to you. Feel free to ask my anything you like about the card, and I’ll do my best to demonstrate something or get you an answer.

What happens to RAW files?

They just sit on the card as usual. As of now, only JPG files can be transfered. No CR2, no NEF, no DNG.

How fast does it transfer?

I don’t know. I will ask the company.

How fast does the card write data?

I don’t know. I will ask the company.

Does it drain the battery?

The website says: advanced power management optimizes use of camera power. I haven’t noticed a difference in battery drainage rate. I imagine that it has to be drawing more juice than a regular card would, but it doesn’t seem to be enough to affect your usage.

Do files ever get dropped?

Unless there’s a bug that shows up in a circumstance that I haven’t observed yet, no. Transfers resume mid-file, so it will pick up right where you left off.

My company, joie de vie photography has a unique technological edge that you can use to bring your long-distance loved ones into your wedding. As I shoot, images are uploaded straight from my camera to my website, live and wirelessly! Anyone can watch it from anywhere in the world, as it happens, in the most beautiful, expressive way possible: the still photograph.

I’m launching this service with a give-away If you’re getting married soon, and someone special and close to you can’t make it, I want to hear your story. The first three couples to respond will get FREE wedding coverage, including an engagement session. On the wedding day, I will upload images live online, so your loved ones can see you on your big day, from anywhere. Finally, all joie de vie photography bridal clients get free portraits for five years, so this is included as well.

Check out my portfolio here and feel free to drop me an email!

Hey folks,

I just wanted to say that now is the time to subscribe. Here’s what’s coming up:

Depth of Field: A series of interviews with top-level pros. We’ll learn how they got to the top, and what new photographers should do to get there, too. I’ve got some really cool shooters lined up for this!

My Beauty Book: I am entering the fashion and beauty photography business, and I’m going to show you how I do it. I will show you where I find models and what to look for. I will show you how to put together a large-scale shooting project, scheduling models, makeup artists, hair stylists and wardrobe stylists. I will post about the shoots themselves, and dissect the post-processing. Lastly, I will assemble the images into my final beauty portfolio and begin marketing it in the summer. At the end, you’ll have a step-by-step guide to assembling your own fashion portfolio!

Historical Portraits Book: This is my personal project. I am assembling a series of “Time Magazine” portraits of famous historical figures, using actors, models and historical enthusiasts. The idea is to take a ‘modern’ look at significant people through history. I’m going to get authors and historians to write essays about the characters, and put the whole package together into a book! In the meantime, the images are interesting portraits that will provide fodder for my marketing campaign.

So stay tuned. This blog is going to get pretty awesome. I am going to show you that new photographers like you and me can make it. With creativity, a good business plan, legal smarts, and a little bit of what the French call les boules, we can become successful without going broke.