Lighting painting interiors.

Hello,

Today is like to share a process with you on how I like to light my interior images.
If you’ve ever tried to photograph a building interior, you know how tough it can be to properly expose all parts of the scene. You know how many areas tend to fall into darkness.

When this happens, many photographers will just try to recover the shadows with a brighter exposure or some dodging and burning. Unfortunately, that can lead to muddy results which often display a lack of texture and colour.

One technique that I like to use with modern photographic tools is light painting.

One method would be to literally stop down the aperture, wear an all-black outfit, and wave a light around for a 30-60 second exposure to fill in shadows.

Luckily, things are a bit easier these days. You can use a single Speedlight and see the results instantly.

I personally like to use a speed light and a remote to pull it off, (depending on how much power I’ll need.)

The aim here is to add light in spots that appear to have natural light falling on them – either from landscape lighting or interior lighting. Adding flash or hot light will dramatically clean up the quality of the light, by giving it direction and fall off. Whereas the ambient light may create a muddier appearance due to having no directionality, incoherent colour casts or being mixed with the window or interior lighting.

Above is an image of myself adding a pool of light onto a foreground part of the scene.

A couple of points to remember -

• The camera has to be on a tripod or secure point and does not move throughout the process.

• The camera has to be in manual mode to ensure that each frame remains consistent. Focus, exposure, ISO, colour temperature etc.

While using a Speedlight I use pocket wizard triggers, one on the flash, one in the hot shoe on the camera, and another as a trigger in my hand which is able to fire the camera and flash remotely.

Again here are a few more images of me moving around the scene adding more illumination.

(Schoolboy error though, this time I forgot to pack my coloured gels and so had a bit more photoshop work to do after the fact.)

Once all the images are captured, they are imported into photoshop and aligned.

Using a base layer, (without any flash) I add each illuminated frame on top.

Changing the blend mode to “lighten” and adjusting the opacity, I am able to change the intensity and have greater control of what is lit.

Finally using a layer mask, I paint out everything that is not required to help to keep the image clean.

The final example of this technique in use.

Personally, I think the before image would have been a flat, uninteresting image. By adding light to different parts of the scene I feel brings in greater interest and a more polished professional product for my clients.

If you have any questions or would like to know more about this technique,

please drop me a note.

Kind regards,

Lee

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Christmas decorations along the Golden Mile

Hello, I hope that you are well.

18 sleeps until Christmas….

Here is a photo of Blackpool prom getting into the spirit.

I hope that the bow is well secured, as we have been seeing some high winds recently.

Lee

Petrofac Christmas

Congratulations for Petrofacs Industrial services Rope Access team, for doing an amazing job installing the buildings Christmas decorations :)

Through either a work rotation or weather, i have not physically been home for Christmas day since 2014,

and so just call me Mr Christmas as the Ramsden family are going the whole hog this year.

I hope that you all have a great time, either at home with your families, or if you are stuck at work, hope that you make up for it double when you return.

Thanks

Lee

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Photography tool - image stitching.

Good morning, i hope that you are well. 

Today i'd like to share a quick thought on how you can use image stitching to over come problems.

I appreciate that this is nothing new, but with some fore-thought it can become a powerful tool in your arsenal. 

I was commissioned to shoot an office building. The front had no access due to very limited space and parked cars in my way. Even with the lens at 24mm it was simply impossible to fit the building into frame. So stitching is the only way forward. 

The above image was created with around 25 images. 

View fullsize

Here you can see the images used, 

the camera was mounted on a tripod and i systematically panned left to right making sure to over lap alot. The building took 3 passes.

Always best to have more frames than needed, than have pieces missing down the line. 

With each up date of Photoshop CC i have noticed that it is becoming much better at stitching. 

In the past it would have not been able to do this, and for these cases i use Autopano Giga 3.0 stitching software, but photoshop managed ok with this. 

Now by using a tilt shift lens, and/or a parallax tripod head, your job in post will be so much easier, but as i do not own either of these i had to make do. The majority of my time was spent straightening the stitched image. 

As with all panos, shoot in manual, turn white balance off auto so all the images remain consistent. 

I hope that this helps, and when you are trying to shoot a subject larger than your frame, that you remember this technique. 

Thanks

Lee

Photoshop short cuts - Free download.

Hi all,

I hope that you are well. 

As you know there are hundreds of photoshop short cuts, and when you know them how much easier life can be. 

Like most i downloaded a list, and it just sat in my downloads folder.

Here is an idea I've been trying out and it works a treat. 

I incorporated the list in to some images, i now use them as desk top images and screen savers. This way the information is easily accessible while i am working, and even when not editing by viewing this information it helps sink into the grey matter. 

If you would like to try this out, please click HERE 

and you can down load these images in Hi-rez and use them as your desk top image. 

If you like this, then please feel free to share on your social media, 

giving credit to Lee Ramsden @ www.leeramsden.com

Thanks

Lee

Helvellyn composite images.

Hi, i thought id share the images that i used to create the image bellow.

The top left image was me putting my idea down as a drawing.

The Helvellyn page was created in photoshop with taking some information from Wiki.

Also i used a wood effect background which was warped and pulled about to make it fit into the scene.

Helvellyn Composite.

View fullsize

Morning, I thought id share a composite image that i created recently for a bit of fun.

I am still yet to climb Striding edge, but will complete this in the summer.

As i have mentioned in previous posts, i do these type of images as i really enjoy thinking of a concept and then trying to execute the idea, and if nothing else it certainly hones my photoshop skills making me quicker and understand all the tools more in depth.

Thanks

Lee

Composite with a snow machine in the garden.

   Nikon D800 f10 1/125th ISO 100

Good morning, hope that you had a good weekend.

The above is an image that i wanted to play with for a little while now, i have been commissioned to take a portrait of someone advertising a snow jacket.

Where possible i like to do a run of the shoot before the client, to iron out anything the comes up, plus gives their design department a good idea of the finished product and we can tweak it to their taste and needs.

  Nikon D800 f10 1/125th ISO100

This was the set up, pretty straight forward really. Two light sources, both camera left. The elinchrom ranger in a large octa positioned in front of myself, so the light was feathered and soft.

with a bare elinchrom quadra behind back lighting the snow.

With a snow machine you can see on the left of the image.

The image was shot with grey paper background intentionally to aid in the photoshop work afterwards.

Image set up and execution around 45 mins, and all photoshop work an hour and half.

Some times these images can take a lot more, but having the final goal in your mind and through experience you can achieve that goal much quicker and have a nicer final product.

  Nikon D800 f10 1/125th ISO 100

Happy Christmas for us.

A big happy Christmas from all of us. Hope that you have a great time.

The "ryan brenizer" Method.

Thought id explain a little into a new technique that i have tried out.

This was my first attempt and so go easy on me.

For you out there that have not yet came across the "Ryan Brenizer method" here is a

link to his work

This image was made up of 50 images.

To create the DOF, you need to be to fairly close to your subject, using a focal length of around 85mm+ and with  the highest aperture you can go,

this was shot at f1.4.

Take the shot of your subject, keeping your feet still, pan around overlapping the shots by around 50%

Below you can see the images used. click on the image to see them larger. 

To create the f1.4 i used a neutral density filter and as you can see used an Elinchrom Quadra to light the subject.

I have found Autopano Giga much more accurate at stitching then photoshop.

Here is the final stitched image in Photoshop. 

You can see the light stand and parts missing to the image, 

this was my mistake, i did not overlap the images enough when shooting them, and so the software struggled to identify the gaps. 

A little re-touching, deleted the light stand, added some warmth i arrived at the final image. 

*Few tips -

that i have learnt and will be putting in place next time. 

Ill be shooting in jpeg rather then RAW, 

using the D800 the raw file sizes are immense, and kept filling up the buffer, really slowing down the process. If i shoot correctly colour balanced jpegs the post processing will be much quick too. 

Overlap much more each image to give the software a fighting chance.

Oh and not use a moving subject like balloons, boy that didn't half make the Photoshop work a head ache... worth it in the end though. 

Well thats enough of my ramblings on, hope that you enjoy the rest of your weekend. 

As always any questions or comments feel free to contact, 

either on here or through the contact page on my

website

Thanks 

Lee

A subtle technique, but goes a long way..

Hello, here is a little tip which i have recently picked up and thought id share as it makes such a lovely difference.

When working on images of buildings here is how i now add contrast.

Rather then use contrast adjustment layer, i created two levels layers, one darker and one lighter - both with black layer masks.

Now take your time, and paint in, where the face of a building is lighter, make it lighter and the dark side darker. It takes a little time, but certainly gives your image much more depth and a 3D feel to them.

 This image has the effect turned off. 

The extra layer you can see is a contrast adjustment layer to the lighter layer.

Here is the final image with the contrast technique added. 

Subtle but certainly makes a lot of difference to the image.

The view from the Shard London HDR image break down.

Hi, hope your keeping well and have had a good weekend. 

Here are some images from the previous London landscape image that i have posted. 

I wanted to show the images used to create the final image. 

I clamped the camera down to the handrail using the Manfrotto Magic arm and using a cable release i rattled a few bracketed frames. 

I have included the metadata on each image, but other then converting to jpg, they are straight from the camera and in the order the camera took them and i added to Nik softwares HDR efex pro 2.

Here is the first base image. In face i quite like this exposure but i personally prefer having the extra range to play with. 

And finally this is the out put from the software. As you can see it has little punch, no halos. or even much contrast going on. But the key is to get a nice base to start with, and then bring this into photoshop and make it your own.

I have tried many different HDR software on the market and not one will you be able to click process- done.

But i do think that this is a good thing, no 2 images will ever be processed the same and so this way it makes you take your time and make something unique and more realistic.

Here is the final image. 

Thanks.

Lee

Carcassonne Castle edit.

Happy Sunday... 

Here i wanted to show how i got to this final image of Carcassonne. 

This is made up of 3 different exposure images. 

It is technically a HDR image, but it has not been tone mapped, i used the exposures as different layers and masked them in. 

Here is the base image as it was out of the camera, 

This image was taken for the exposure of the bridge and Castle.

I used a layer mask to only reveal the parts of the image i wanted to be brighter.

Here is the 3rd image taken, for a darker exposure.

I used the 3rd darker exposure to paint into the sky to darken it and add some drama.

Here the image was cleaned up, from the lights in the windows, and other highlights that i found distracting.

There was a blown out building, which is grey in this image,

I used a part from the darkest exposure and masked it in,

as you can see, it doesnt share the same colouring as its surroundings, and so i used various adjustment layers to make it fit in.

 Contrast and Photo filter were used to get the temperature right.

Here i found the tree  - bush thing very distracting and so i clone stamped it out, on the bottom right of the screen.

Now for some punch and texture,

I use Nik softwares colour effects pro. I apply this to all of the image but then mask back in the effect to where i want it.

To give it a little more punchier contrast, i like to use Nik softwares Silver Efects pro,

by making a black and white punchy layer,

This black and white layer now has a blend mode of Luminosity.

 I found that the sky was to cool, for buildings. And so with adding an adjustment layer of Photo filter

I warmed up the scene.

Finally, the more i looked at the image, i found the water to be extremely distracting and anoying,

and so i created a new layer and painted it with black. I lowered the Opacity to regain some of the texture.

Once again if you have any questions or comments id love to hear from you.

Thanks

Lee

Adding Leaves to an image...

Happy New Year!

I wanted to show a subtle part of the above image.

I felt when looking at this scene, the background just behind Myself and the Mrs, was to similar to our clothing and wanted to break it up abit.

With large piles of fallen leaves on the ground,  it would be good fun to add some of these.

Here is the in camera image,

Lots of distractions, sign posts and rubbish on the ground.

Where our dark tops are, they blend in with the background around us.

With the camera set on a trip pod, i got the Mrs to throw some leaves in the air.

Another shot of some leaves.

As the camera is on a tripod, it makes editing much easier.

As im now using the Nikon D800 camera, the file sizes are crazy large, and so instead of importing every image as layers into the one file, I simply made selections of just the leaves that i wanted and moved them onto the final image.

As always, if you have any comments or questions, id love to hear from you.

Thanks

Lee

The Edit of the Tash image.

Following this image, i thought i would post on how i got to this final image from the out of camera shot below. I have included many screen grabs to try and explain how i got to the finished image. 

Here is the original image, taken in my front room. You can see the TV on the left, but knowing that i wanted to do a cut out, i placed a piece of white card behind me to make life easier later on in photoshop. 

To make the cut out, i make a rough selection with the quick selection tool.

Then click onto the refine edge button.

Here photoshop opens up new dialogue box, I use the brush tool to paint around the edge, and photoshop does an amazing job of making a tighter selection. It works on contrast, and hence why i added the white card at the start so my hair and skin would stand out better.

Once you are happy with your selection i output to a new layer with a layer mask.

I added a blank layer, using the gradation tool made a spot light effect background.

Here i did some dodge and burning to the clothing and skin.

If you compare this image to the one above, the lighting on the neck is harsh and unpleasing to the eye.

with all these little tweaks they are only very subtle but they add up and make the final image nicer to the eye.

I wanted to add some texture so my hair and shirt. 

Looks good doesnt it..... Nope of course not, but when adding a filter to an image you need to be selective with it. 

Here i added a layer mask and painted back where i wanted the texture to be.

Now to work on the background, I thought the background is flat not working, and so i am adding a texture. I quite like this pattern.

By playing with the Opacity and Blend modes you can create very different looks.

This back ground is the same as the image about but by dropping the Opacity to 40% it is much more subtle.

The blend mode is now set to soft light. I checked them all out, but this one was the nicest.

The background i felt was too smooth and so needed to be roughed up a little.

I added this texture of a stone wall to the image.

Again play with the Opacity and blend modes, to make slight subtle changes.

The colour i felt needed to be spiced up a tad.

I added a saturation adjustment layer. But by clipping this layer to the one below it then only effects the background.

 Here is the finished image.

I appreciate that i move pretty fast from layer to layer.

If you are getting lost or confused by any stage please feel free to comment or contact me and i will explain a stage in greater detail.

Thanks. 

An Edit from Glyn Dewis course.

With having a couple of images, one of Dave above and Steve below taken in a studio, i wanted to play and create something a bit different. The lighting and images of the guys were taken on a Glyn Dewis course, but these edits are made up of my own ideas and my own stock images. 

Attending a photoshop based course, you learn techniques, and tips on how to improve.

I find that it also inspires me to push the creativity and want to make up my own images.

Thanks 

Lee

Glyn Dewis Photoshop Course.

I recently attended a second course ran by

Glyn Dewis

and was thoroughly impressed.

Here are some images that were taken and edited on the day.

Glyn teaches you how to take an image in the studio like the above, and then how to edit to the one below 

I have attended a couple of these courses now and throughly enjoy them, No matter what level of "photoshopper" you are, you will learn heaps from the new Kelbyone Photoshop world tutor.

Glyn's style of teaching is fantastic, he has loads of energy and you can feel the passion of what he teaches he clearly loves. I would strongly reccomend a course of his.

At the end of the course Glyn doesnt just shut the door behind you... The majority of the class heads over to the local curry house which is a great way to chill out and chat with like minded people.

The model above is the UK NAPP founder Dave Clayton, who is a great guy. And as you can see likes to dress up and have a laugh.

Cheers Guys, once again another fantastic course, learnt loads, met some great people and had a good crack in the process which is what its all about.

Blend Modes to add textures.

Hi,

In this post i will try and explain how i added the grassy texture that you see in the foreground of the above image.

Here is the image part finished. I liked the layout of the positioned pieces but i felt that the ground needed some more texture to it.  With there being some patches of grass to the left and right of the concrete ground. I thought that it would be fun to see if a grass texture would look cool, plus give it a distressed look.

I found this grass image on Deviant Art. Selecting the move tool, drag it onto your composite workspace.

There you go job done.....

Nahhhh, now we need to make it fit into our image. I firstly tried various blend modes to see which best made it fit.

The blend mode Overlay looks super cool for this texture. I liked the way sone of the underneath concrete layer was showing through. 

Adding a layer mask filled with black, with using a white brush you can now "paint" in your new texture. 

If you feel that it is a little strong you can also play with Opacity slider until you find it working for you. 

If you have any questions relating to this post or regarding some photoshop techniques, please feel free to message me and i will try and help. 

Thanks.

Blend modes to merge images.

Hi Guys in this post i will try and explain on how you can blend images together using blend modes.

I will use the flock of birds as the example from the image above and bellow images.

Firstly i need to find an image of a flock of birds. This one i think came from Deviant Art.

I am over time taking more and more of my own images that i will be able to use in future projects.

When sourcing images try and find ones where the background is uncluttered. It will make life so much easier in the long run.

I used the Lasso tool to make a rough selection of the birds that i want to use.

By pressing CMD/J (mac users) OPT/J (PC users) it will put your selection on to its own layer.

Select the move tool, and drag this new layer onto your composite work image.

With the birds now in your composite workspace its time to try and make them fit.

I noticed with the birds layer that they were shot of a nice flat grey background. And so i thought i would try and blend them in before making some crazy selections.

TIP

:-  A quick way to go through your blend modes is to make sure you are using the move tool. Then by holding down the shift key and pressing the + or - keys you can toggle through the blend modes quickly and easily viewing which one best suites your layer.

As you can see the current blend mode is set to normal and so nothing is happening.

Here we have changed the layer to SoftLight, its not right but we are getting there...

By using the Blend mode of Pinlight you can see how well the layer blends away the grey leaving just the birds showing. 

I was lucky and this one blended nearly flawlessly, but sometimes you will find a blend mode that is close but just doesn't quite work, in these circumstances i would clip a curves adjustment to the layer being blended, and by adjusting the highlights or blacks it will then fit into your scene more better. 

Thanks.

If you have any questions or would like more information on any of this please feel free to contact me. 

Police Composite image.

Recently I have had a play with a large composite.

I have for some time now wanted to have a play trying to blend multiple images into one image.

Now my attempt is not pixel perfect, by any stretch of the imagination,

but it was certainly a great learning curve. And something very enjoyable.

I have previously posted in my blog, it’s a great way to keep up to date with the tools of Photoshop

and to try and keep your work flow fast.

It is amazing how quickly you can get skill fade, and end up doing things the long way round.

Your selections, dodging, burning will come on leaps and bounds the more practice you do.

I have included some screen grabs to show where I started and what I have

added.

A starting place of a background from iStock photo.

Straightened the lines and cloned in more of a foreground.

Started adding some elements to the image, i didn't like some in the end and so didn't make it to the final image.

Happy with the placements of the elements. Added a texture over the ground. Just need to render the image with shadings, colouring and few little bits which certainly take the most amount of time in the whole process.

I have enlarged some of the small details so you can see.

I must of been in a real dark mood when i designed this image ;0)