Swampfrog's Oregon Photography Tour

[swampfrog]

Some wide angle, and slightly more vivid processing on some of these.

[Katy Lied]

the chipmunk is precious. and the birdies on the deadwood branch

[wuapinmon]

The lark sparrow shot (the first of the new batch) is my favorite. I felt like some of the light was a little too golden for my liking in the later ones. Like I prefer this one:


to this one:

[swampfrog]

Yeah, I added a bit of yellow/orange to some of them. Which is consistent with what I remember from that evening, it was getting towards sunset when we got up to the location we wanted. I added it globally, it might be a bit better just added to the highlights (like the clouds) and leave the shadow areas alone. The dirt ended up a little on the "orange-y" side.

Are you normally this sensitive to tones? Many people would not catch the relatively subtle shifts, especially on uncalibrated screens.

[swampfrog]

Played with even more processing choices on this batch.

[wuapinmon]

I think I am sensitive to tones. I tend to favor natural-looking work in photography. Which is odd because my favorite art period are the Fauvists, the exact opposite of what I was criticizing in your photos. Some of your choices remind me of Maurice de Vlaminck's work.

[mtnbiker]

I have to admit that my first thought was to suggest you lower your chroma settings on your monitor.

[swampfrog]

I think I am sensitive to tones. I tend to favor natural-looking work in photography. Which is odd because my favorite art period are the Fauvists, the exact opposite of what I was criticizing in your photos. Some of your choices remind me of Maurice de Vlaminck's work.

Interesting. Most people will prefer the warmer version of most photos. I'll typically go slightly on the warm side for most subjects. You've nailed the adjustments spot on so far.

[wuapinmon]

Interesting. Most people will prefer the warmer version of most photos. I'll typically go slightly on the warm side for most subjects. You've nailed the adjustments spot on so far.

Well, don't let me change your artistic vision; I'm but a single voice. However, I do spend a LOT of time in nature, far more than the average person, so maybe I get sensitivity from that. My mother and daughter are artists, so that kind of thing runs in the family, though I've never possessed any creative skill with physical objects. The height of my powers are brightly-colored Day of the Dead altars for the my dead loved ones. My photography skills are not good, and I tend to edit things so much that they look like Mimi from The Drew Carey Show after a shift at Sherwyn-Williams and her latest tanning session.

[tooblue]

Interesting. Most people will prefer the warmer version of most photos. I'll typically go slightly on the warm side for most subjects. You've nailed the adjustments spot on so far.

I like your edits. I often push mine too far towards the cool side, and do a little too much sharpening. Of course all of my images once posted on this site have now vanished; I did not like the changes made to flickr and deleted my account. I should find another method of posting images ... maybe this week.

[swampfrog]

Well, don't let me change your artistic vision; I'm but a single voice. However, I do spend a LOT of time in nature, far more than the average person, so maybe I get sensitivity from that. My mother and daughter are artists, so that kind of thing runs in the family, though I've never possessed any creative skill with physical objects. The height of my powers are brightly-colored Day of the Dead altars for the my dead loved ones. My photography skills are not good, and I tend to edit things so much that they look like Mimi from The Drew Carey Show after a shift at Sherwyn-Williams and her latest tanning session.

Don't worry, I was already ignoring it (well mostly). I find it interesting only because it's opposite of what I have typically found/read. Generally, you can often rely on a bump towards warm, a bump in sharpness, and a bump (sometimes large) in contrast to improve audience reception for "pleasing" in a landscape photo. Pleasing isn't always what I'm after. And there are exceptions. I generally try to not make it noticeable, but since you *did* notice it I have to at least go back and look to see if I think I overdid it. Sometimes it needs an adjustment, sometimes it's having exactly the effect I wanted (as in the coldish/bluish feeling from the creek photos earlier).

There's the age old question of whether photography counts as "art". Or should just be relegated to capturing what was there.

I lean more towards neutral with human and wildlife, skin tone especially suffers from uncanny valley effects, either get it right or go way off for artistic purposes. Wildlife will often get a very slight touch towards warm from what auto settings provides as it brings out more color in feathers and fur. I'll even occasionally brush in a little warm just on the animal to focus attention there.

[swampfrog]

I like your edits. I often push mine too far towards the cool side, and do a little too much sharpening. Of course all of my images once posted on this site have now vanished; I did not like the changes made to flickr and deleted my account. I should find another method of posting images ... maybe this week.

Such a personal preference issue for warmth, most people just accept whatever the camera chose, which is often wrong. Sharpening is trickier. RAW conversion sharpening, local sharpening, and output sharpening. I typically use LR defaults for importing RAW files and then use PS Smart Sharpen with a 1.1 radius and 175% for my full resolution 7DII files. Even then the delivery medium often dictates different techniques. At some point close enough works most of the time.

I gave up on the free ones and finally succumbed to paying annually. I use SmugMug now. Integrates tightly with Lightroom and allows sharing to forums via generated BBcode which is what I use here. Makes all of the pictures automatically linkable, sometimes to a larger version (which I also have control of).

[wuapinmon]

Don't worry, I was already ignoring it (well mostly). I find it interesting only because it's opposite of what I have typically found/read. Generally, you can often rely on a bump towards warm, a bump in sharpness, and a bump (sometimes large) in contrast to improve audience reception for "pleasing" in a landscape photo. Pleasing isn't always what I'm after. And there are exceptions. I generally try to not make it noticeable, but since you *did* notice it I have to at least go back and look to see if I think I overdid it. Sometimes it needs an adjustment, sometimes it's having exactly the effect I wanted (as in the coldish/bluish feeling from the creek photos earlier).

There's the age old question of whether photography counts as "art". Or should just be relegated to capturing what was there.

I lean more towards neutral with human and wildlife, skin tone especially suffers from uncanny valley effects, either get it right or go way off for artistic purposes. Wildlife will often get a very slight touch towards warm from what auto settings provides as it brings out more color in feathers and fur. I'll even occasionally brush in a little warm just on the animal to focus attention there.

Well, given that you don't shy away from cerebral reading, you might enjoy Walter Benjamin's take on photography of artwork itself. I think you might like it. If you read it, and don't, I'll buy you dinner next time I'm in Oregon. The line he used, "The camera introduces us to unconscious optics" has always made me feel reverence for his early realization of the power of the lens to introduce us to what we might ignore. https://www.marxists.org/reference/s...e/benjamin.htm

[swampfrog]

Well, given that you don't shy away from cerebral reading, you might enjoy Walter Benjamin's take on photography of artwork itself. I think you might like it. If you read it, and don't, I'll buy you dinner next time I'm in Oregon. The line he used, "The camera introduces us to unconscious optics" has always made me feel reverence for his early realization of the power of the lens to introduce us to what we might ignore. https://www.marxists.org/reference/s...e/benjamin.htm

For example, in photography, process reproduction can bring out those aspects of the original that are unattainable to the naked eye yet accessible to the lens, which is adjustable and chooses its angle at will. And photographic reproduction, with the aid of certain processes, such as enlargement or slow motion, can capture images which escape natural vision.

Namely, the desire of contemporary masses to bring things “closer” spatially and humanly, which is just as ardent as their bent toward overcoming the uniqueness of every reality by accepting its reproduction. Every day the urge grows stronger to get hold of an object at very close range by way of its likeness, its reproduction. Unmistakably, reproduction as offered by picture magazines and newsreels differs from the image seen by the unarmed eye. Uniqueness and permanence are as closely linked in the latter as are transitoriness and reproducibility in the former. To pry an object from its shell, to destroy its aura, is the mark of a perception whose “sense of the universal equality of things” has increased to such a degree that it extracts it even from a unique object by means of reproduction. Thus is manifested in the field of perception what in the theoretical sphere is noticeable in the increasing importance of statistics. The adjustment of reality to the masses and of the masses to reality is a process of unlimited scope, as much for thinking as for perception.

An analysis of art in the age of mechanical reproduction must do justice to these relationships, for they lead us to an all-important insight: for the first time in world history, mechanical reproduction emancipates the work of art from its parasitical dependence on ritual. To an ever greater degree the work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed for reproducibility. From a photographic negative, for example, one can make any number of prints; to ask for the “authentic” print makes no sense. But the instant the criterion of authenticity ceases to be applicable to artistic production, the total function of art is reversed. Instead of being based on ritual, it begins to be based on another practice – politics.

For the last time the aura emanates from the early photographs in the fleeting expression of a human face. This is what constitutes their melancholy, incomparable beauty. But as man withdraws from the photographic image, the exhibition value for the first time shows its superiority to the ritual value.

Earlier much futile thought had been devoted to the question of whether photography is an art. The primary question – whether the very invention of photography had not transformed the entire nature of art – was not raised.

Evidently a different nature opens itself to the camera than opens to the naked eye – if only because an unconsciously penetrated space is substituted for a space consciously explored by man. Even if one has a general knowledge of the way people walk, one knows nothing of a person’s posture during the fractional second of a stride. The act of reaching for a lighter or a spoon is familiar routine, yet we hardly know what really goes on between hand and metal, not to mention how this fluctuates with our moods. Here the camera intervenes with the resources of its lowerings and liftings, its interruptions and isolations, it extensions and accelerations, its enlargements and reductions. The camera introduces us to unconscious optics as does psychoanalysis to unconscious impulses.

You don't owe me dinner. Great stuff which will require a closer reading (assuming I ever find such time).

[wuapinmon]

You don't owe me dinner. Great stuff which will require a closer reading (assuming I ever find such time).

This is a great thought: "Earlier much futile thought had been devoted to the question of whether photography is an art. The primary question – whether the very invention of photography had not transformed the entire nature of art – was not raised."