Canon 20D help please - Photos are dark

[billbunton]

Originally Posted by Cally P

the first one , my focal length was 55.0mm and the second was 50.omm.

It looks like you were also holding the camera just a little lower, and thus pointing it up a little more, in the second one. The more I look at it, the more it looks like there's enough extra sky in the second to explain the exposure difference.

I agree with Patti that the second one is, overall, the better exposure. It has some highlight detail that's totally blown in the first. I'd think about brightening up the child a bit, maybe 1/2 to 2/3 of a stop (i.e. not quite as light as she is in the first).

[Duffy Pratt]

I took the liberty of editing the second picture a bit. Nothing drastic. I just adjusted the levels to bring in the endpoints some. Then on a new layer a substituted the Green channel for the RGB channel and reduced opacity to about 85%. Converted to LAB, applied that A and B channels to themselves in Overlay mode on a copied layer and lowered the opacity to about 33%. Then sharpened the L channel at like 55, 24, 12 (using the High Radius, Low Amount technique that works for faces so often.)

I haven't tried anything with the first picture, but the second one looks pretty good to me. Cute girl too.

The edits may sound complicated, but they take only about 2 mintes to do.

Duffy

[DigitalScape]

You lost me at "nothing drastic" . I hate to see your "normal" or "exceptional" work flow.

John

[Duffy Pratt]

OK, when I first started looking at Photoshop, what I said above seemed like a foreign language. There were four types of steps I took:

1) Adjusted the endpoints. Almost every image needs this, and its typically done either with levels or curves. I used levels here, because it was faster, and because there isn't any obvious neutral highlight in this picture. All that I did was move the ends of the levels curve in to where the histogram starts showing some information.

2) Faces almost always carry the best detail in the Green channel. That was the case here too. To check this, just click on each of the channels and see what you think. The red is almost always a bit too bright and lacking in detail, and the blue channel tends to be dark and noisy. To bring out the detail that exists in the green channel I copied the background layer. Then I set the blend mode to luminosity, which will allow changes in contrast to come through without changing any of the color. Then I picked Image-Apply Image, selected the G channel and set the blend mode to normal. This makes all of the contrast in the image come entirely from the Green channel. I then dialed this back a bit by reducing the opacity.

3) The LAB color space allows you to work separately on color and contrast. The L channel is often the best place to do sharpening or shadows/highlights adjustments. The A and B channels carry all the color information. Here I followed a simple formula to bring out color contrast in the face. What you do is create a new layer, then select the A channel. Do Image - Apply Image and the A channel will be applied to itself. Change the mode to Overlay. Do the same thing for the B channel. Then just lower the opacity to your taste (usually somewhere between 25-40% looks good). This formula comes from Dan Margulis, and it works extremely well on all sorts of portraits.

4) Finally Sharpening. I use the Unsharp Mask filter. Typically, I will sharpen in the L channel, again because it deals only with contrast and doesn't leave any annoying color artifacts. I either try to do a high amount of sharpening with a low radius, where I want to bring out lots of detail. But most people don't like alot of detail in facial skin (glamming up pictures typically tries to blur skin to get rid of skin detail). So for portraits, I will often use a high radius and a low amount, with a fairly high tolerance. This tends to do little to no sharpening on the face, but helps with the eyes and hair and other large features. (By the way, in an elaborate scheme, I might try converting a portrait to CMYK and sharpening just the K channel, especially on a dark haired model, but thats another discussion.)

Hope this clarifies things some.

Duffy

[DigitalScape]

Duffy, Thank for the detailed explanation. I learned something about working in the LAB color space through your explanantion. Obviously there is a lot more PS learning I have in my future.

John

[Cally P]

Thanks so much again all for your replies, and Duffy for the photo editing.

I seriously think the problem is on MY end, with my screen (it is about 6 years old). As even the photo Duffy fixed looks way to dark for me, her face is really dark looking.

So thanks again for your help and input, I will look at probably getting a new screen and going from there :)

[Duffy Pratt]

Cally:

Try going to Kinko's or to a Library, or to a friend's house, and log into this site. That way, you can look at the pictures here on another monitor and you will be able to compare for yourself.

Duffy

[Cally P]

Thanks Duffy, good Idea, now why didnt i think of that lol

[Patti Edens]

Here's a quick way to check your monitor calibration and make an easy adjustment.
It's not meant to replace using a tool and software designed to truly calibrate your monitor, but it might help in the meantime.

http://www.bytephoto.com/photo-editi...alibration.php

Patti

[Michelle Allmon]

FYI, If yout camera is new....
Something I noticed with my MkII. When I first got my camera I had the same issue with my pics. Believe it or not, after about a thousand or so pictures things seemed to change a bit...kind of like it took a 'break-in' period of sorts. My exposures at first seemed to always be to the 'left' so to speak, so I set up compensation to the right about 2/3 stop. Later on the exposures seemed to suddenly be to the right too much, so I had to set the compensation back to 0. Even using the flash, it was the same.
You might play around with the different exposure settings, or just compensate the exposure and wait and see...???

Yeah, me too with my 300D. Also my friend got a Nikon D70 and had the same problem. Check your histogram often and when you see a good one copy your settings into manual mode, if you are staying in the same spot. That'll help you get a feel for things. Also play in the AV and TV mode so you can understand them a little better. Read your manual often, if you don't understand something one day, you might a week later after you'd played a little.

[Michelle Allmon]

ps - I really like the first one.