BIRD IMAGE: PLAIN PRINIA

It has been a while since I have gone looking for birds. I was out last weekend birding in the shrubs and this is what I found. I shot this Plain Prinia sometime around mid-afternoon, the most incorrect time of the day for shooting birds. But it was just after a short spell of showers and the sky was still overcast. So there was no harsh lighting and it was just what I could ask for.



Exif: Canon EOS 350D, 100-400L at 400mm, f/5.6, 1/100sec, ISO 100

IMAGE: LAKE IN THE EVENING

I am beginning to realize that being technically correct with an image adds a lot to the aesthetics part of the image too. I had made a very similar composition at this place two months ago, but without a tripod and with some exposure errors. The earlier image was more colorful with orange colors of the sunset and the place looked more beautiful than the day I made this image. But this image was made with a sturdy tripod, cable release, and two 2-stop GND filters mounted on the lens to balance the exposure. Even though the actual scenery was much better when I had made the earlier image, this image below turned out to be far better.



Exif: Canon EOS 350D, 17-40L at 27mm, f/4, 1/13sec, ISO 100

IMAGE: TERRACE FARM

This is an image from my photo-trip last weekend. Shot near the town of Chikmagalur in Karnataka, India. I was surprised to see terrace farms in this area where it is not commonly practiced. The small hut in the bottom was definitely an eye-catcher!



Exif: Canon EOS 350D, 100-400L at 100mm, 1/100sec, f/8, ISO 100

KODAK AD ON TV

These days I am seeing some ads of a Kodak product that is making me wonder what Kodak is up to. It is not the ad contents but the product - they are advertising their films!

Like everywhere else in the world, even here in India, we are quickly moving to digital and we are seeing less and less film cameras in parties, functions and outdoors. Canon and Nikon have nearly forgotten film and are busy publicizing their digital cameras. I am not sure if Kodak has still not learnt its lessons, or if they are just trying to clean up their inventories. In the later case it is not a bad idea to advertise film, but what is odd is that we see almost no publicity for Kodak's digital cameras.

I will not be surprised if Kodak winds up its India operations in a few months!

ADDING EQUIPMENT - MANFROTTO 055DB AND 488RC0

After holding on for almost a year without buying any photography gear, I am back to doing some shopping again. I bought a new tripod which I had been planning for a long time, and a ballhead to go with it.



The tripod, Manfrotto 055DB and the head, 488RC0 will hopefully help me get some sharper and crispier images. I took some trial shots at home and saw a definite improvement in the sharpness of images, compared to what I used to make. I shall be heading out with the camera this weekend and it will be a good time to see if I can put the new tripod to good use.

With this, here is my latest set of camera gear.

- Canon EOS 350D with 2+1GB Sandisk compact flash cards.
- Canon 17-40L
- Canon 100-400L IS USM
- ballhead - Manfrotto 488RC0, mounted on Manfortto tripod 055DB
- A bunch of accessories - a circular polarizer, 2 GND filters, cable release, etc.

FLOWERS ON THE FOREST FLOOR

Image from Arunachal Pradesh, India. I had a tough time making this composition. It was a day of long walk. We had walked for nearly 20kms in the day and I was tired, and my hands were shaking. The flowers had spread wider and I kept composing and recomposing without becoming satisfied. Finally, this is the only image that I managed to shoot.



Exif: Canon EOS 350D, 100-400L at 400mm, f/11, 1/125sec, ISO 100

JPG MAGAZINE

I happened to go through the website of jpg magazine, which has something of interest for budding photographers who would love to have some of their pictures published, and also make a bit of money in the process.

Photographers can submit images, which will be rated by other registered members. The editorial committee will review top rated photographs and some of them could be published in the print version of jpg magazine. The photographer gets $100 if it is published.

There is a catch though. On submitting the photograph, you give them rights to use it in a gallery show or include in a book, besides giving them right to publish the image in their magazine. Participate only if you don't mind these terms!

ADJUSTING LEVELS TO IMPROVE CONTRAST

Prerequisites: Understanding histograms will make it easy to use the levels tool.

Levels is a simple tool available in most photo-editing software for improving contrast of the image. Using levels can increase the contrast to make the image look rich with saturated colors. In Photoshop, levels tool can be invoked by Image >> Adjustments >> Levels.

The levels tool shows the histogram with three sliders at the bottom of it, as you can see below.



Above is the levels display for the image shown below.



ADJUSTING BLACK POINT

The black slider to the left of the histogram(marked '1') determines the black point of the image, where all RGB values are zero. By shifting the black point to the right, all pixels to the left of the slider will be made completely black(RGB values zero). The histogram will be re-adjusted to reflect the new black value, resulting in reduction of overall brightness of the image. Note that this is not same as reducing the brightness using Brightness/Contrast tool. While Brightness /Contrast tool uniformly reduces the brightness of the image, black point slider of the levels tool affects darker portion of the image more than brighter portions. It also does not result in any shift in the white point. That is, all pixels that are completely bright(RGB values 255) remain unaffected. You can see the effect of moving the black point slider on the image below.



See that the image turns darker. Also see the input levels on the top, which indicates that the pixels with brightness 19 and below will become zero.

ADJUSTING WHITE POINT

The white slider to the bottom right of the histogram(marked '3') adjusts the white point of the image. Moving the white slider to the left results in all pixels to the right of the slider to become full white(RGB levels 255). Similar to moving the black slider, histogram will be re-adjusted to reflect the new position as white value(255), resulting in the overall brightness of the image. Again, this adjustment affects brighter parts of the image more than darker parts, and leaves the black point unaffected. See the effect of adjusting the white point below.



ADJUSTING MID-TONES

The middle slider(marked ‘2’) is used for adjusting mid tones(brightness level 128). For example, if you move the slider to the right, mid tones get shifted to the new position to the right, rendering the pixels to the left of the slider to go below the mid-tone value and hence reducing the brightness of the mid-tones. Moving the slider to the left results in pixels to the right of the slider go above mid-tone value, resulting in increase in brightness of the midtone. This results in change in the brightness of the mid tones without affecting black point and white point.



Here, I have moved the midtone slider to the right, resulting in reduction in midtone brightness. The ratio of new mid-tone value to the old-value is often called as 'gamma'. The middle text box above shows the value of gamma as you move the slider. In this case, it indicates that the new mid-tone has a brightness level that is 0.83 times the initial brightness.

INCREASE IN CONTRAST

Note that the changes made in the levels has improved the contrast of the image. See the comparison of the image before and after applying levels.



When adjusting levels, it is recommended to shift the black slider to the right to a point until the graph starts rising, and white slider to the left to a point until the graph starts rising. This gives the best contract without loosing any color information. After doing this, adjust the gamma to either side until the image looks at its best. This is exactly what I have tried to do above.

PREVENT CLIPPING OF COLORS

To ensure that no color information is lost because of clipping when moving black or white sliders, hold the Alt key when moving the sliders. On holding Alt key, the entire image look white. And as you move the slider, any clipped colors will start appearing on the screen. To ensure that no color information is lost, stop the slider at a point before you start seeing any colors on the screen.

ADJUSTING INDIVIDUAL COLORS AND BRIGHTNESS

The above adjustments were made on the overall image brightness. Level adjustments can also be made on single color channel by choosing the drop-down box on the top. However, adjusting levels of individual colors is a job for experts and is best not done, as it may result in color shift in the image.

The levels tool can also be used to for color correction of the image by using the eye-dropper tools seen in the bottom right of the tool. But this deserves a special attention, and can be a separate chapter by itself.