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Fun with MF images - ARCHIVED - FOR VIEWING ONLY

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Ben Rubinstein

Active member
The tonality of the work is incredible Jack, managers office, hmmm, wanna do another print swap? A small but well printed copy of that would be incredible...
 

zonevt

New member
Jack, very nice B+W series......the sepia split tone is perfect for these...I like the visual geometry of the "Pipes'n Palms" .....Tom.
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Sergei,

Here are two mixed lighting examples that I think best illustrate the issues with shooting color there. (Both of these were shot 4 years ago with a Canon, but they made better examples of the color mixes than anything I took this past weekend with the Phase --- and this time I specifically searched for compositions destined for monochrome output.)

This first one is "interesting" as a discussion image, it does not make for very good print work IMHO. I set the WB to basic daylight. What you have here is daylight coming through a door from distant camera left. You have a large Mercury vapor light directly to camera right. Finally you have a large Sodium vapor lamp providing overhead key lighting on background elements. To put this into perspective, that is raw, un-cooked clay pipe in front of me, basically a gray-tan color, almost the same color as wet concrete. Once fired, it turns brick-red. If you look to the left, you can see tips of them lit by the outdoor light and their "normal" color:


Next we have an image that I think works better for print, though honestly it would still be better as a split-sepia. I did choose what I felt was the most attractive WB, which was a bit cooler than BDL. This one has daylight from holes in the roof overhead, a Mercury vapor light in the distance tinging the background, bright orange from a few of the kiln's gas jets, and there is a weak fluorescent overhead right as well:

 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
To the rest of the comments, again thank you for the kind words. While the natural light at GMB is wonderful, adding the split sepia treatment does improve "depth" in the images. If you have not tried the new C1's advanced B&W split-tone tool, I suggest you DL the trial and give it a whirl!

PS: Based on the positive comments, I have decided to offer up a limited run of 12 sets containing six of the above images. Details here: http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?p=281631#post281631
 

baxter

New member
A truly wonderful series Jack. You really got the feel of this piece of history.

The B&W conversion is very sensitive and conveys the mood well. I've not investigated it's possibilities yet. Is it possible to give some ball-park figures and indication of which are the key controls please?

Many thanks

Baxter
 

MaxKißler

New member
Yesterday I learned that even the oddest of circumstances may result in interesting images. For instance this one. I received and installed an acetat overlay with crop lines for my zd back. So I wanted to check whether those crop lines are accurate and did a few tethered shots of my father while he was looking at the screen.

Mamiya AF 80mm - 1/60s - f 2,8 - ISO 400




Max
 

Sarnia

New member
Max,

Where did you get the acetate overlay that you mentioned? The Mamiya checker pattern with ZD guidelines is crazily expensive.

Thanks.

Mark
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
A truly wonderful series Jack. You really got the feel of this piece of history.

The B&W conversion is very sensitive and conveys the mood well. I've not investigated it's possibilities yet. Is it possible to give some ball-park figures and indication of which are the key controls please?

Many thanks

Baxter
Each camera will have it's own response personality, so the initial WB and camera profile, exposure and saturation settings will affect the conversion result to some degree. With that said to the B&W tool itself:

It has two basic control areas. The first is the color response sliders, which translates to filtration in traditional B&W film parlance. Here you'll need to experiment and find a set of values that works for your camera AND the type of image you are working, but I chose a basic yellow filter, by pumping up yellow, red and green somewhat less, and then dialing down cyan and blue (minus blue) to taste. The second tool is the split-tone tool itself. Fortunately, this is easier. Here you simply choose a tone and saturation for the for the highlights and shadows and experiment. I went with a sepia in the 32 to 38 range, and then varied densities for the highlights and shadows until I found a balance I liked. Try 5 or 6 for highlights and 10 or 12 for shadows. Once you have one you like, save it. I have tweaked my original one dozens of times getting it dialed in and ended up saving two iterations that I liked best.
 

baxter

New member
Brilliant Jack I'll give it a go tomorrow with some pictures I'm wanting to convert.

I'm primarily using a P45+, so expect it will be similar to your figures.

Could be timely as Nik have just touted for more cash with SEP2 which doesn't seem to offer too many new things (borders looks interesting and it might not keep quitting as it does at present with P45+ files with control points) for what I think is a hefty upgrade price.

Thanks again

Baxter
 

MaxKißler

New member
Max,

Where did you get the acetate overlay that you mentioned? The Mamiya checker pattern with ZD guidelines is crazily expensive.

Thanks.

Mark
I got it from dtek systems which is an official P1 dealer located in the UK. If you aren't from Europe you might just ask your local dealer.
BTW it's not an official ZD Back overlay. It's actually for the P25+/P45+ but this app. one millimeter difference in sensor size doesn't really matter. Nevertheless it's pretty helpful.

Max
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Max, I like both your "dark" portrait and the evening(?) shot of the train and motorway! Great lines in motorway, and the bit of graffiti provides a perfect point of interest.

My only comment on the dark portrait would be maybe decrease contrast a bit for web -- unfortunately one problem with converting from a larger working space to sRGB jpeg for web, is you can loose shadows and highlights if they're at the bleeding edge to begin with -- and it appears both happened slightly in this shot. Otherwise, :thumbs:
 

Sarnia

New member
I got it from dtek systems which is an official P1 dealer located in the UK. If you aren't from Europe you might just ask your local dealer.
BTW it's not an official ZD Back overlay. It's actually for the P25+/P45+ but this app. one millimeter difference in sensor size doesn't really matter. Nevertheless it's pretty helpful.

Max
Thanks, Max. I'll get in touch with them.

I must congratulate you on making the humble ZD back look like a Phase One/Leaf Aptus. :thumbup:
 
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