This image from the recent photo-session with Amy and Nick in Manhattan received a number of comments and questions about the technique. The basic camera settings for several sequences of images here, were 1/20th (at f8) and 1/10th @ f11. The image above was one of a sequence at 1/20th. But there’s more to it …
Amy and Nick are one of my couples whose wedding I am photographing later this year. They met up with me in Bryant Park in Manhattan this past weekend, and course we had to get photographs of them going for a ride on the carousel.
Every time they went by me on the carousel, I would fire off a series of images. The carousel presented a lighting problem in that towards the outside, it was brightly lit by clouded sun .. and towards the inside, it would be much more shaded. Usually I will try to control the contrast of a scene by using fill-flash of some kind. But in this situation with the carousel, and given the the scope of this kind of shoot, getting a perfect photo in-camera would be impossible.
Simple on-camera fill-flash would not help here because there are parts of the carousel in the way. Also, as they swung by me, Nick would be much closer to me and the fill-flash would be of no help whatsoever in getting more light onto Amy.
Therefore, because of the wide range in exposure from the outside of the carousel to the interior, the images I took here needed some additional work in Photoshop to achieve the final result I envisioned for my couple.
Doug Fairbairn asked me about this image from a recent post on my wedding photography blog, where I showed some images from a Las Vegas destination wedding:
Great photos. I’m wondering about the lighting for the second photo - B&G and wedding party walking to camera with sun in background. How did you get so much light on their faces? Was it just reflected from the walkway or what? Too far away to use flash it would seem.
Doug .. thank you for the compliments!
About the look of that image and the way their faces are lit - this has less to do with the use of flash than it has with starting off with an image that is correctly exposed, and then tweaking it in post-production.
One of the original pages on this website a few years back, was on the subject of my choice of Nikon’s custom curves.
Since I went over to a raw-only workflow about 5 years ago, I haven’t had any need for custom curves. The reason for this is that there are an infinite number of scenarios under which we take photographs, and hence there won’t be any single custom curve which would suit all situations. Lighting scenarios change. The contrast will change, and brightness and other settings will also change. A raw workflow is the most flexible way to adapt to this.
The quest for the perfect custom curve is a dead-end street, and the best advice I can give to anyone who is curious about custom curves - for whatever reason that may be - is to forget about custom curves, and go to a raw workflow. You’ll avoid many headaches this way.
However, I still get emails asking for info and my opinion on custom curves. So for those who are curious about the original page on custom curves, I am reposting the article here as it orginally appeared.
(For anyone else, this page will be trivial and of marginal interest.)
I had someone email me regarding this image, which is one of the images I posted of a recent wedding :
Hi Neil.
I’ve just had a look through this weeks wedding favorites and noticed your image of the bride stood in the window. Would you mind letting me know how you produced this shot as I just love it and was wondering if you have used HDR on it as it looks like it has a massive dynamic range.
Many thanks, Charles.
Hi there Charles,
The key here is correct exposure - and then trying to capture as much of the range of tones as I can, by controlling the contrast during the image capture. Lots of words there .. but what it means is that I used (on-camera) flash to control the contrast. So I was able to get that image pretty much as you see it there, directly out of camera without having to resort to HDR (High Dynamic Range) in post-processing.
What did help here is that the tree outside, wasn’t lit by direct sun. Of the four windows looking outside in this room, I chose the one where the entire frame would be filled with the tree, and not have bald sky appear
My specific settings are also important to note: 1/250th @ f5.6 @ 400 ISO,
- and specifically, the 1/250th shutter speed.
In using the maximum flash sync on my camera, I was able to
1.) better control the available light outside, since below the max flash sync speed, shutter speed has no effect on the flash exposure.
2.) and indirectly, get better range on my strobe (which translates to getting more power out of my strobe for a specific scenario
Point 2 needs some careful consideration. If the outside area is well exposed at 1/250th @ f5.6 @ 100 iso, then it means that it would’ve been well exposed at other shutter speed / aperture combinations, such as 1/60th @ f11. BUT, that small strobe on my camera has a better chance of pushing out enough light for f5.6 than it would for f11 … especially since I was bouncing my flash there.
OK, so the 1/25oth shutter speed is dictated to me by the high-contrast situation. I have the best chance of my strobe pushing out enough light, at my max sync speed. The reason for this is the most efficient setting for my strobe, would be max flash sync speed, since this is the widest aperture I can use with flash and thereby getting maximum output from my strobe.
(That last paragraph might need some mulling over to let the implications of it sink in. 
)
I then bounced flash into the room, upwards and to the left of me, to throw enough light on the bride’s dress. The dress is partly lit by available light from outside, and partly lit by my strobe pumping out a lot of light. In this case I had my flash exposure compensation dialled up high, to force the strobe to throw as much light as it could. I could also have used manual flash output, but sometimes it is easier just to ride my flash exposure compensation to the max. Either option would’ve worked here.
Here are two images:
left: The image on the left is from the raw file, directly converted to a JPG through Canon’s DPP software. This is what the JPG would’ve looked like directly out of the camera. As you can see, there is a some highlights on the dress that are slightly blown out.
right: The image on the right is as I edited it slightly in Adobe Camera Raw (using Bridge CS3). I corrected the white balance a bit, and pushed the Fill-Light fader a touch in ACR.
The image on the right is the one I then edited further in Photoshop to add a soft glow and a vignette - producing the final image I posted at the top.
So, no HDR techniques where used (or needed). This was partially just luck in having a scene where the dynamic range wasn’t excessive, but this is also partially due to me using (on-camera) flash to bring the scene’s dynamic range within what would still look great directly out of camera.
Neil.
I frequently get asked how I deal with high-ISO noise, since many of the photos are taken at ISO settings over 400. The answer might be surprising … I usually don’t. Even though I own both Neat Image, and Noise Ninja, (both excellent pieces of noise reduction software), I rarely use them.
How noise appears depend a lot on what camera you use, whether you’ll notice noise at 800 ISO or 1600 ISO … and then more importantly you have to consider what size you’re going to print to. Also, the crucial thing is not to under-expose. That will definitely show up as a noisy image.
I have made 8×12 prints that I show potential clients, which include images shot at 1600 ISO without noise reduction software being used … and NO ONE has commented about the noise. If you looked at the prints, you would see the noise, but it isn’t intrusive. At larger sizes, it might be noticable, but not really at that size. (These photos were taken with the Canon 1D mk2N.)
The problem is only really a “problem” if you look at 100% on your computer .. but that isn’t what is going to appear in print. I suspect too many photographers get hung up on the noise issue, without considering what the use of the images will be. But the best way to check for yourself is to make a few prints.
Formal photos / portraits I seldom take higher than 400 ISO … but reception photos I easily go 800 ISO and higher, since they will rarely be printed larger than 4×6.
With film based cameras, you would’ve had to change film and filters in an attempt to correct for colour casts during the moment of taking the photograph.
But with digital cameras, life is so much easier with built-in white balance settings. Yet, deciding on the correct white balance to use with a digital camera, seems to strike fear in the hearts of many new photographers …
In short, this is how I handle White Balance settings on my cameras …
1) My cameras are set to the closest appropriate WB setting, whether Daylight, Cloudy, etc.
2) I shoot in RAW.
3) With a RAW workflow, it is no effort afterwards to change the WB setting on multiple images.
4) A calibrated monitor gives me a neutral reference point.
There - it is as simple as that.
I try to get it as close as possible, but without stressing it.
Then I finesse it in post-processing.
Now the details …