Title: "Emma's Elevator Portrait"
Shot data: 1/60s f/4.0 at 23.0mm iso1250
Camera / Lens: Canon 40D / Canon 17.55mm f/2.8 zoom with built-in flash
Post-processing: Photoshop CS3 > Topaz Adjust plugin
6637 - Sankt Veit II
1 day ago
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Emma's Elevator Portrait
While in San Antonio last weekend I grabbed this impromptu portrait of my daughter Emma in the Hyatt's elevator. I used my Canon D40's built-in flash and expected the image to be extremely over-exposed (after all I was a maximum of three feet away from my subject). I was pleasantly surprised when I had time to look at the image on my PC. Not only was the image not over-exposed, it was near perfect (at least to my eye). Anyway...my lesson learned was to not be afraid of using my camera's built-in flash when the situation dictates the need for flash and I don't have my accessory flash handy. It's better to risk a bad exposure (which turns out to maybe not to be that great of risk) than to pass up the shot entirely!
Title: "Emma's Elevator Portrait"
Shot data: 1/60s f/4.0 at 23.0mm iso1250
Camera / Lens: Canon 40D / Canon 17.55mm f/2.8 zoom with built-in flash
Post-processing: Photoshop CS3 > Topaz Adjust plugin
Title: "Emma's Elevator Portrait"
Shot data: 1/60s f/4.0 at 23.0mm iso1250
Camera / Lens: Canon 40D / Canon 17.55mm f/2.8 zoom with built-in flash
Post-processing: Photoshop CS3 > Topaz Adjust plugin
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5 comments:
This looks like one of those "Dad enough already" shots. Don't know if you are aware that you can dial back the output of your on camera flash, if needed, in your menu of custom functions.
Nice job, but I would get rid of the flash in the background window over the top of her head. It's a little distracting.
DHaass
I really like both portraits of Emma you've had on your blog recently. One question: did the Topaz Adjust plug-in create the bleach bypass look of her skin? I think it works really well with her dark features.
Thanks Doug and Steve!
Doug - Somehow I managed not to even notice the flash reflection until I already had it up on the blog! You're right; that reflection needs to go! I guess I need to improve the quality controls in my workflow! :-)
Steve - For both shots I applied two different Topaz Adjust presets; first one called Photo Pop that does some subtle contrast and exposure adjustments and then one call Portrait Smooth that does the smoothing. I use a black layer mask on the layer that has the Portrait Smooth application and paint in the desired amount of smoothing on the skin areas with a low opacity white brush. On the elevator shot I also ran Topaz Adjust's DeNoise to reduce noise. I hope this process makes sense; I'm just making it up as I go along! :-)
Cheers!
Barry
Like it a lot. I agree with DHaass the reflection is somewhat bothersome so would probably remove it. I cannot believe that you used the on-camera flash. As I told you before, I am often surprised by the results you can get using the TTL and the on-camera flash.
Really nice job.
Thanks Patrick!
I'm not ready to go to full time built-in camera flash but I won't be so reluctant to use it in a pinch in the future! :-)
Cheers!
Barry
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