Brads Choice Pics 1 - From A Roman Window

Being a teacher I gravitate towards creating posts that instruct, espouse, illuminate and hopefully elevate. The whole point of photography however is to create images, in my case I'm lucky that people pay me to take them but of course I also create a considerable array of images for a wide range of personal reasons.  Sometimes I am setting out to create art, sometimes to record events and places for future reference, often to tell a story and often just because I enjoy the challenge and processes involved.

My storage systems are bursting with images, both film and electronic, images that in the great majority of cases have never been seen by anyone else, unshared and unloved, tis a bit sad really.  I don't post many pics to Facebook, (basically I don't really trust Facebook, read the terms and conditions), I don't have a Flikr account, 500PX or at present even an Instagram account, so most of my non-commercial pics that see the light of day only do so in classrooms or in workshops.

I often I'm asked by my students, what pictures do you like, what do you prefer to shoot, what are your favourite photos and other related questions. Fair enough too, I often ask students the same questions in order to both guide my teaching provision and help them explore more deeply their relationship with photography.

Well I tell you what, it's about time I opened up and shared my favourite pics, laid it all bare and put them out there.  So this my friends is the first post of what will become a regular  series of articles, "Brads' Choice Pics". The articles will include pics taken on iPhones (such as todays'), film cameras, DSLRs, compacts, Mirrorless and even some that were actually resurrections of ancient family snaps.  Some will be out of left field, others traditional, there will be landscapes, abstracts and more....basically expect the eclectic!

But being a teacher who is unable to help but teach,  I'll include some words of insight to go with the images, these words may include some info on technique where it matters, underpinning visual concepts and ideas, challenges encountered or perhaps just insight into how the image makes me feel.

And now without further dithering lets discuss the image of this post.


From A Roman Window

Up front I'm going to tell you, I don't care how anyone else feels about this image, I love it and it image transports me back to a very happy moment where it reignites powerful memories whilst handily encapsulating several aspects of a single days adventure abroad.

It was created just a few weeks back when on holidays in Italy and Spain, which of course included Rome.  The window we are gazing through is on the top level of the "Castel Sant'Angelo" the original Papal residence before the Vatican became the Popes' abode. This was not the Popes' bedroom window, however the bedroom is immediately behind my shoulders and no doubt the Pope of the day would have gazed through this window towards St Peters, which is seen sitting in central frame.

The Castel Sant'Angelo is a truly amazing building and you could spend many hours there but without doubt it's the top levels where the Pope residence sits that literally are the crowning glory of the ancient structure.

The image was captured with an iPhone 6S plus using ProCamera in HDR mode and then processed on the spot in Snapseed.  I added a little extra fine tuning to it in Photoshop, but nothing major, mainly colour tuning the shadows and highlights. 

A single frame exposure would have been hopeless, the difference in exposure between the inside and outside elements is enormous, (especially for an iPhone) and even with HDR processes I had to take several few test frames using exposure compensation to find an ideal base exposure.

The framing was also a bit challenging, twas a fiddle to find the perfect point where all the elements lined up and the visual layers fell into place.  I can tell you however that it was a definitive  "Gotcha" moment, you know one of those when you just know as soon as you have pressed the shutter it's going to work...no questions, no doubts.....you got it!

I reckon the image has a painterly quality which echoes the art typical of buildings period, which is great because that was kinda of my intention. Oft times however a good colour image works well in the monochrome format, it has to do with the way colours map to tones and separate themselves out plus a whole myriad of other pesky little issues. Fact is, often what you think will work as a mono image doesn't and you can easily overlook some of the better candidates, I certainly didn't previsualise this image as a monochrome one. 

So below is a mono version of the image, it has been converted to monochrome using a gradient map in Photoshop and then tritone tinted.  To my eyes it's quite lovely, though I won't use the mono format option because it's not in keeping with the painterly interpretation I was seeking.

This image will not be seeing out its days unloved in my catalogue it's going "straight to wall" as a large scale canvas, in colour of course, but that mono version really is tempting me.

Surprising Results or Something Else?

If you have an open mind about photographic equipment and enough curiosity there is the potential to be surprised by all manner of tools and methods.  Lets see if we can surprise you just as little, from a technical point of view.

The pic at the top is a test pic, but not the whole pic, just a small 1000 by 1000 pixel section, the full pic below shows the complete frame, we'll get to that soon enough. 

Before moving forward let me just explain a couple of things about my testing methods and philosophies, just so, you know, we don’t feed the trolls with misinformation and cause anyone undue confusion.  See I have some "testing" rules, strict rules and I adhere to them almost religiously.

1) When I test a lens (or camera) I never ever pay any attention to out of camera jpegs, they just don’t figure in my world, unless of course I am shooting on my iPhone.  I know you will read all sorts of guff about jpegs being great and easy and all you ever need, spare me…they are rubbish if you are really interested in knowing the worth of a lens or sensor.  I know most punters don’t see the difference “on line”, well let's be frank here, when was the last time you saw a raw file actually displayed "on line" in a raw convertor application.  Never, all you have seen "on line" are compressed jpeg versions of the extracted RAW files, trust me it is not the same thing.

2)   All my RAW test files are converted and processed in just one RAW convertor, Iridient Developer.  There are significant differences between the detail and renderings that come out of different RAW programs, Iridient (a Mac only application) in my experience is the one that extracts the most information out of the any raw file.

3) Lenses are only tested at the lowest native ISO setting on the camera, trust me on this, you can only extract the maximum possible detail that the lens can project onto the sensor if the noise levels are kept at their absolute minimum.

4) I don’t turn on the distortion correction option in the RAW convertor, most folk probably don’t realise this but the corrections can seriously erode the edge and corner definition of an image and in most cases the correction is not needed.  I would rather apply it on a "case by case" basis.  Turning it off also quickly alerts me to any major distortion problems the lens may have in its native state.

5) I always custom fix the Chromatic Aberration, often the pre-potted settings work fine but the fact is they are rarely perfect, there are actually sample variations from lens to lens even of the same model and in any case I can often dial up a better setting set myself.

6) I leave the vignetting correction off, that way I get a better idea of any vignetting issues, but I also try the file with it on to see if the degree of correction required is going to mess with the tonal rendering.

7) I take lens test shots at pretty much the same location under the same light (bright sunlight), that way I am comparing apples with apples so to speak.

8) I never take test shots of brick wall or close up charts, (unless I am testing a macro lens or for macro capability) all shots are 3D subjects in the near, mid and infinity distance ranges.  God knows why people run tests of brick walls, maybe there is some odd sect of photographers out there whose lifelong work revolves around recording the masonry arts, beats me!

Ok, so all clear then, good, now I ask that you please remember these above aspects when you look at future posts on lenses and camera tests.

So back to our test pic…..

Now the original frame (below) the section was lifted from is a file a tad over 33 megapixels, bet that has the keen amongst you guessing, what camera shoots 33 megapixels?   Ah actually none, but I will come back to that.

So allowing for the odd resizing and damaging compressing images for a blog site does, in essence what we are looking at in the 1000 by 1000 px crop at about a 100% view.  Let's put that into a little more perspective, if you printed the image at 300 psi (pixels per inch) you would end up with a print about 22 by 17 inches, pretty big but of course you would not generally be looking at such a print with your nose just a few inches from the papers surface.  Anyhow this file would easily print tack sharp to 36 by 27 inches and much bigger again if your viewing distance relaxed a bit.

After looking at the full frame above something might be tinkling around in the back of your photographers brain…..it is not a 3:2 ratio image, ……actually it looks kinda like…..well, 4:3.  Something fishy going on here eh?

Ok we’ll come back to that, but lets go back to the 1000 px section, now even allowing for the rubbish the net inflicts on images I bet you can see that is pretty detailed, I mean you can actually make out the barbs on the barbed wire just above the chain link fence, (at least I can on my screen before the web does its business), you can almost see the cross frames in the windows on the long white building in the background, which I might add is a good kilometre from the camera (in fact in the original in Photoshop you can see them at a 200% view.  Heck even the blades of the dead grass inside the compound are pretty easy to see.

So this is a very sharp test pic.  OK you want more, everyone wants more.  The section is actually from the outer edge of the frame well away from the centre where lenses usually resolve at their best, and I can vouch that right on the frames perimeter it's actually no worse.  So this must be an expensive and rather good lens?

Well actually it is not an expensive lens, but yes its rather good and maybe a bit better than it might first appear.  You see this is a kit lens, just a lowly kit lens and it is being used just beyond the middle of its focal range where its performance actually starts to tail off a little. Intriguing no?

More intrigue, the lens is being shot wide open! Yes one could not consider f5.3 a particularly wide aperture but nonetheless that's as wide as this puppy goes at 28mm.  Oops that rather lets the cat out of the bag, the 28mm focal length being beyond the mid range of a kit lens, well yes it is if the cameras sensor format is M4/3.  

That’s right folks this is a kit lens on a Micro 4/3 camera, in this case a Panasonic series 2 14-42 mm jobbie.  As kit lenses go it really is rather excellent despite the basic specs and utilitarian intents.

The camera in question, an Olympus EM 5 Mk2.  Did I just hear someone go ah ha, I'ved heard about that camera, I know what you did Braddles, you shot it using that new fangled hi res mode where the camera takes 8 frames and blends them together for 40 plus megs and then you cropped it…didn’t ya, didn’t ya, fess up?

Ah, um, so sorry but you are completely wrong, this is actually a single frame, hand held and shot at just 16 megapixels, the file is 33 megapixels because the image is so detailed it can be uprezzed easily in the raw conversion stage.

So fact is that this lens is really very very good, the second fact is that M4/3 is capable in conjunction with the right convertor of producing some technically amazing results.

But there is something else happening here and I am not going to let the cat out of the bag too much, as it is actually a bit of a trade (my trade) secret, but allow me to tease you a little for the time being.

Look at the full frame and ponder this for a moment. This shot is taken in bright and fairly contrasty sunlight, agreed.  Ok now look at the highlights, the white building on the left, the white on the platform, the almost specular highlights on the light at the top of the pole.  There is no tonal clip off, everything is rendered and detailed.  Look at the tonality of the sky, absolutely natural.  

Now take a look at the shadows, you can see details in the deep shadows under the carriages. Take a peek in the trees in the background, you can see into the deep shadows inside the trees and make out the details.

This "out of the RAW convertor image" has a very long tonal range, very film like, the colour is muted but it could be easily boosted in saturation.  However, where the saturation should be high, like on those orange/red safety flags, it is just right! This is a file could be now edited with impunity and still hold together perfectly, add contrast, boost saturation, stretch the highlights...no worries.

Is it a HDR image, stacked image….nope, like I said it is a single frame.

Take another look at the crop, can you see any noise at all, nothing.  Think about that for a minute, this file has been optimally sharpened to bring out every little fine detail and then uprezzed to 33 megapixel, by any normal accounts there should be some obvious noise showing, both chrominance and luminosity…but nothing, nada, not a spot.

So now if you have had some experience in the dark digital arts you would be wondering, how is this possible? How is it that a lowly, cheap kit lens on a 16 megapixel M4/3 camera can end up with image quality as good or better than say a Nikon D810 or Sony A7Rmk 2  (Bear in mid folks that if this image was a frame taken by those cameras cropped to the 4/3 aspect ratio it would have been almost the same number of pixels as our test pic, so its a fair comparison.

Well like I said, I am not giving the game away, but I can tell you this, I have been doing this very thing for years and it is part of a full system, and I have run workshops on it.  It is aimed at serious photographers who want an edge and it has a name, “True Light Capture” 

Stay tuned cause pretty soon I will be announcing the next round of TLC workshops and I will tell you a little about it.