The post Weekly Photo Challenge – Eyes appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Sime.
They say eyes are the window to your soul, I say “I almost always want my eyes to be in sharp focus!” but each to their own! This week we really want to see your interpretation of ‘Eyes’ – #dPSEyes
A man on a wall in a photograph of a painting…
Now, I guess the first thing we think of when we think of eyes are the things we see with, right? But there are many more options when it comes to photography! It doesn’t just have to be your eye, up close, lookin’ all crazy! Let’s make a list…
Your eyes
Someone else’s eyes
The eye of a needle
The eye of the storm
Your pet’s eyes!
Something that looks like an eye?
You should see the other guy…
Missed a Challenge? Don’t sweat it, find all of our previous challenges here!
So many options when it comes to eyes, but the main goal of these challenges is to be creative in your photos, to make you think about different ways to photograph your subject – if you want to set your camera up on a tripod (or the bench) and photograph your eye, you need to think about lighting and angles to best capture all the crazy details in your eye (Yes, I’ve done this, with a macro and lots of light – it’s crazy!)
Looking outward…
As ever, post your photographs here, in the comments (there are instructions at the bottom of this post) or visit us on the socials and post and tag your photographs there! Whenever, wherever, we look forward to seeing what you photograph!
A night on the Thames – London Eye…
Share on Instagram or Twitter and use the hashtag #dPSEyes so we can see them!
How do I upload my photo to the comments?
Simply upload your shot into the comments field (look for the little camera icon in the Disqus comments section) and they’ll get embedded for us all to see. Or, if you’d prefer, upload them to your favorite photo-sharing site and leave the link to them.
Eye!
If you get stuck, leave a comment below or drop us a note on the dPS help desk! support@digital-photography-school.com
The post Weekly Photo Challenge – Eyes appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Sime.
The post 3 Simple Ways to Create Stunning Eyes in Your Portrait Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Gina Milicia.
Image model credits, clockwise from top left: Chris Milligan/Fremantle Media, Rachael Lever, Danny Spannerz/East Brunswick Tattoos, Tiffany Diaz
“Here’s looking at you, kid.”
Reclusive Hollywood legend Marlon Brando would always close his eyes when paparazzi tried to take his photo. He knew that without his eyes open the image wasn’t worth publishing.
The eyes are the single most important feature of any portrait. Beautiful eyes can make even the dullest portrait mesmerizing. Poorly lit, out of focus eyes, or eyes that lack connection, will weaken the impact of a portrait.
Here are my three favorite techniques to make eyes really stand out in your portrait photography.
1. Light
“Light makes photography. Embrace light. Admire it. Love it. But above all, know light. Know it for all you are worth, and you will know the key to photography.” – George Eastman
Eyes look best when they are lit well, with beautiful catch lights. Catch lights are the reflection of a light source in the eyes. The size, shape, and brightness of your catch lights depend on the light source you use.
Two large, frosted windows from my studio create beautiful catch lights. Model: Bryana Karanikos
Diffused on-camera flash creates a slightly softer, rectangular catch light.
A medium softbox, off-camera and positioned at 2 o’clock, gives a soft, natural catch light.
Poorly-lit eyes without catch lights look cold and a bit creepy.
2. Expression
“You are what you think. All that you are arises from your thoughts. With your thoughts, you make your world.” – Anon.
Model: Tiffany Dias
In the image on the left (above), Tiffany’s eyes are cold, and she looks nervous. After I gave Tiffany a visualization exercise, her eyes became warm, confident, and connected (see the right image above).
How you communicate, connect with, and direct your model is key to capturing a great expression in the eyes. If your model’s smile isn’t genuine, his or her eyes will appear cold and dull-looking. If your model is nervous or distracted, this too will be reflected in his or her eyes.
One technique I use to create a great expression is visualization. I ask my model:
If you could be anywhere right now, doing anything, where would that be? Tell me about that moment. Who is there? What does it feel like?
Once your model is in the moment of their visualization, their body language and expression changes.
3. Post-production
“Be willing to give that extra effort that separates the winner from the one in second place.” — H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
Post-production can lift your portrait photography from good to great – when it’s done well. The key to great post-production is to avoid overdoing it. It’s easy to get excited with all the tricks and enhancements that post-production software offers. It’s addictive, and much like opening a jar of Nutella, it’s very difficult to control yourself once you’ve begun.
I try and use the overnight rule when it comes to retouching. Once I’ve worked on an image, I won’t look at it again for at least a day. I find that my eyes constantly adjust to the modifications I’m making, so it’s more difficult to see when I’ve gone too far (which is also what happened when I dressed in the ’80s).
Here’s a step-by-step technique to enhance eyes using Adobe Lightroom:
Before and after: I’ve used Lightroom to make the eyes sharper and brighter and to enhance their color.
Step 1: Import your image into Lightroom and use the Basic panel in the Develop module to edit your shot. In this case, I’ve used one of my own beauty presets.
Here are the basic adjustments I’ve used for this image.
Step 2: Zoom in on the eyes (“B” in the image below) and select the Adjustment Brush tool (“A” in the image below). You can also select the Adjustment Brush using the keyboard shortcut “K.”
Step 3: Next, you should adjust the eye color with the Adjustment Brush:
Increase the Temperature slider (A) to make the eyes appear warmer in tone.
Increase the Exposure slider (B) to brighten the iris.
Increase the Shadow slider (C) to bring more detail into the shadow area.
Increase the Sharpness slider (D) to make the eyes appear more detailed.
Adjust only the colored part (the iris) of your subject’s eye (highlighted in red in the image above) and set the brush to have a slight feather and a low flow so you can build up your adjustments slowly.
Step 4: Next, select a new Adjustment Brush (A, below), increase the Sharpness slider (B, below) by +22, and paint over the colored part of the eyes, eyelashes, and eyebrows. This will really make the eyes stand out.
Step 5: Finally, select a new Adjustment Brush. Set the Exposure slider to -29, and increase the Clarity to +10. Paint around the edge of the iris. This will darken the area slightly and give the eye more definition.
Here, the final portrait was imported into Adobe Photoshop, where I did a basic skin retouching to remove a few small blemishes.
And that’s it!
I’d love to hear about your techniques for enhancing eyes in portrait photography, and it’d be great to see some examples. So share them in the comments!
Gina is the author of several dPS eBooks, including Portraits: Making the Shot.
The post 3 Simple Ways to Create Stunning Eyes in Your Portrait Photography appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Gina Milicia.
A study recently published in Nature Communications details the creation of an ultra-fast 3D camera capable of recording at 100 billion frames per second. The development comes from Lihong Wang and his team at Caltech, where the researchers developed this new camera using the same foundational technology found in Wang’s previous 70 trillion frames per second project.
The newly detailed camera produces what the researchers call ‘single-shot stereo-polarimetric compressed ultrafast photography’ (SP-CUP), a technology that records video at insanely fast speeds in three dimensions. This is made possible, in part, by creating the camera to perceive the world in a way similar to how a human sees — with two eyes, or in the case of the camera, with a halved lens that simulates looking at the world with two eyes.
The result is a camera that records video at insanely fast speeds in three dimensions. The technology is able to capture ‘non-repeatable 5D … evolving phenomena at picosecond temporal resolution,’ according to the study, referring to space, time of arrival, and angle of linear polarization. The study goes on to explain:
Disruptively advancing existing CUP techniques in imaging capability, SP-CUP enables simultaneous and efficient ultrafast recording of polarization in three-dimensional space. Compared with available single-shot ultrafast imaging techniques, SP-CUP has prominent advantages in light throughput, sequence depth, as well as spatiotemporal resolution and scalability in high-dimensional imaging.
Wang and his lab first detailed the 70 trillion frames per second camera back in May, explaining that such speeds were capable of capturing the fluorescent decay from molecules and waves of light as they traveled.
That particular camera technology was called compressed ultrafast spectral photography (CUSP), and it followed Wang’s past work on similar technologies, including the phase-sensitive compressed ultrafast photography (pCUP) device, Caltech had explained in a release.
With the newly detailed SP-CUP technology, the camera captures stereo imagery — 10 billion images in the blink of an eye — using a single lens that has been halved in order to capture two different slightly offset channels of the subject. This is similar to how the human eye works, enabling humans to perceive depth. The image data can be processed to create 3D content, which itself exceeds the capabilities of the human eye by including data on the polarization of light.
The sum total of this new photography technology opens the door for various scientific applications, including research in the field of physics. In particular, Wang sees the potential use of this camera in exploring the mystery of sonoluminescence, a phenomenon in which sound waves produce small bubbles in liquids that, when they collapse, produce tiny bursts of light.
Wang explained:
Some people consider this one of the greatest mysteries in physics. When a bubble collapses, its interior reaches such a high temperature that it generates light. The process that makes this happen is very mysterious because it all happens so fast, and we’re wondering if our camera can help us figure it out.
The study titled ‘Single-shot stereo-polarimetric compressed ultrafast photography for light-speed observation of high-dimensional optical transients with picosecond resolution’ is available in Nature Communications.
Think you know what the world looks like? Think again! DPReview TV host and mad scientist Don Komarechka shows us what the world looks like when seen through ultraviolet light.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week
SmugMug Films has released Streets in Mind, its latest film that follows London-based street photographer Alan Schaller around the busy streets of New York City.
The film comes in at five-and-a-half minutes and takes a wonderful look into the life and work of Schaller. As narrator, Schaller explains how he came to be a street photographer after a career in music.
In the words of SmugMug Films, Schaller’s ‘surrealist, geometric eye reveals the hauntingly intimate beauty which exists in the hustle of every day life in the Big Apple.’
You can find more of Schaller’s work on his Flickr photo stream and purchase a print through his online shop.
HTC has launched a new variant of its U11 smartphone called the HTC U11 Eyes, and it’s built specifically for selfie takers (cue eye roll). The name “Eyes” refers to the handset’s chief feature: dual front-facing cameras, which resemble a pair of eyes and bring features like live bokeh and post-focusing to selfies.
HTC packs some other premium features into the model, including an 18:9 ratio Full HD+ 6″ Super LCD 3 screen and a “flagship camera” on the rear, but other than the front-facing camera, the handset is more-or-less the same as the regular HTC U11.
The front-facing camera is comprised of dual 5MP BSI sensors behind F2.2 aperture lenses, which support Full HD 1080p video capture in addition to stills. The selfie cameras produce “studio-quality portraits,” claims HTC, with Bokeh Mode being the most notable feature. In that mode, selfie backgrounds are blurred in real time, though users also have the option of adjusting it manually after the fact.
The model’s front camera also supports Screen Flash, HDR Boost, Voice Selfie, Auto “Beautification,” Auto Selfie, and Selfie Panorama. The rear camera, meanwhile, features a 12MP HTC UltraPixel 3 with 1.4?m pixel, BSI sensor, OIS, F1.7 aperture, an LED flash, and UltraSpeed Autofocus. HTC has included a “Pro Mode” with manual control for its rear camera, including 32-second long exposures, Raw support, and manual control.
Cameras aside, the HTC U11 Eyes has a high-capacity 3930mAh battery that supports up to 28.8 hours of talk time (depending on the network) as well as Qualcomm Snapdragon 652 processor, IP67 water- and dust-resistance, Edge Sense squeezing support, HTC USonic audio tech, active noise cancellation, and Face Unlock.
Availability outside of China and pricing isn’t clear. Engadget reports that its “local sources” put the price potentially at HK$ 3,200, which is equivalent to about $ 410 USD and 334 EUR.
A before and after of Photoshop Elements’ new Open Closed Eyes featured at work.
While the professional photography market waits with bated breath to see what Adobe has in store for us at AdobeMAX, the company behind Lightroom and Photoshop unveiled something that appeals to a bit broader of an audience today: Photoshop Elements 2018 and Premiere Elements 2018.
The new, user-friendly versions of Adobe’s photo and video editors come with some really creative and easy-to-use features that the company says are aimed at “memory keepers.” The idea was to create two programs that make finding, enhancing and sharing the precious memories hidden away inside random memory cards, hard drives and (most likely) smartphones almost totally automatic.
Photoshop Elements 2018
Photoshop Elements 2018 tackles the same problem that everyone—Google’s Photos App, Apple Photos, etc.—is trying to tackle: how do you help the typical shutterbug find their best images out of the thousands they take every week on their smartphone, and enhance those images so they look ‘professional’ and worth sharing on social media?
As with everybody else, Adobe is leaning heavily on machine learning and computer vision (different types of ‘AI’) for this trick.
It starts with an easy-to-use Organizer view and something called Auto Curation, which uses computer vision and some nifty algorithms to guess (because it can’t REALLY know, can it?) which of your images are the best. So if you have a group of 200 images, you can ask Photoshop Elements to cull those down automatically to just 15.
Once you’ve selected your shots, you can use the program’s new Guided Edits and a new feature called Automatic Selection to do things like drop in a new background, create a double exposure effect using two of your images, or add ‘artistic’ overlays.
The coolest feature, though, has to be Open Closed Eyes, which allows you to select two frames, and replace the closed eyes in one with the open eyes from another. The results are incredibly lifelike given that whole thing can be done in a matter of seconds.
Premiere Elements 2018
Like Photoshop Elements, Premiere Elements 2018 also leans heavily on AI-powered features to make video editing as automatic and pain-free as possible.
Smart Trim does for videos what Auto Curate does for photos, namely: it asks you what ‘style’ of video you want to create, tries to intelligently find the best clips that match this style, and tosses out the rest to create a coherent clip.
Another interesting addition is a feature called Candid Moments, which tries to find the best candid ‘photo’ hidden within a video clip and pull it out for you. With new smartphones like the iPhone 8 Plus shooting gorgeous 4K 60p, we could see this feature being a huge hit with those ‘memory keepers’ Adobe is all trying to target.
Admittedly, neither Photoshop Elements 2018 nor Premiere Elements 2018 are really targetted at more professional photographers out there (read: many of the people who enjoy reading DPReview). But as these beginner-focused programs get more and more powerful, amateur photographers who are allergic to the subscription model and don’t like to do much post-processing anyhow might actually enjoy using Photoshop and Premiere Elements 2018.
Of course, that’s not to say we won’t be keeping a very close eye on AdobeMAX this year.
To learn more about Photoshop Elements 2018 and Premiere Elements 2018, head over to the Adobe blog by clicking here, or visit their dedicated landing pages by clicking on the program names above. Both programs are available now for $ 100 new or $ 80 as an upgrade. You can also buy them together for $ 150 new or upgrade both programs at once for $ 120.
[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Street Art & Graffiti. ]
As public art interventions go, googly-eye additions to urban objects and surfaces are pretty simple to implement, effectively animating their surroundings without too much work (or risk of being caught).
Humans are naturally wired to read faces into ordinary things, but an extra cue or too by someone like Vanyu Krastev solidifies the effect, often with hilarious results.
Cracked bollards become crooked Pac Man-esque creatures and gaping water pipes seem to scream while doors and garbage cans gain strange sentience. The emotive range of these inanimate objects is quite impressive, considering it’s entirely in the eye of the viewer (and the two eyes placed on a given thing).
Eyebombing is nothing new (at least as old as the internet and probably as old as ‘googly eyes’ themselves), but always a fun way to lighten someone’s day as they pass by on the street. It’s also a form of expression anyone can engage in — very little skill or cash required.
It is “different from traditional types of street art like tagging, sticking, stencils” according to Eyebombing.com because “the above forms are largely driven by egocentric behaviour, like getting seen, respect and maybe a hope to get famous, often using vandalism as modus operandi.”
Eyebombing: 21 Street Artworks Utilize 42+ Googly Eyes
Unlike graffiti tags or other stylized and personalized approaches to urban art, eyebombing is an equalizer. Like a crowd behind Guy Fawkes masks, the work of any of the following 21 example …
Creative Crosswalks: Artist Adds Color to Brighten Crossings for Students
Part art project and part urban safety experiment, this series of Funnycross installations in Madrid have been positioned outside a cross section of city schools.
Sprouting up alongside the streets of New York City, garbage cans packed with colorful flowers are turning repelled waste receptacles into attractive centers of attention for garbage-weary …
[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Street Art & Graffiti. ]
Teardowns are a handy way to satisfy the urge to see what’s inside expensive and prized electronics, while remaining a safe distance away and keeping warranties intact.
Behold, a teardown of the Sony 24-70mm F2.8 GM, a lens that sells for $ 2200. Sony’s own SGNL YouTube channel does the dirty work of prying it apart for us, giving us a close-up look at the inner workings of the fast full-frame zoom.
Aspen Tree Fall Color in the Eastern Sierras of California
This is the 2nd of a 3 part series on my experience jumping back into film photography after a 10 year hiatus focusing purely on digital photography. You can start here at Revisiting Film Photography After 10 Years: The Readjustment if you missed it.
Mental Math & Visualization
As I’ve been shooting with the Fuji GX617 I’ve had to make a bit of a mind-shift in my approach. On one hand I have to account for slightly different mental calculations regarding how medium format focal distance, depth of field and vignetting might impact my composition. This is rooted with the fact that medium and 35mm formats follow the same mathematics, but the calculations for similar units (focal length, aperture, etc.) result in different visual aesthetics. 90mm focal distance on the GX617 equates to 20mm on a 35mm camera and a 300mm lens on the GX617 equates to ~70mm on a 35mm camera. f/8 on the GX617 is shallow for closer subjects while not so for most images on a 35mm camera. It’s an interesting adjustment, but frustrating if you forget or don’t fully make the right mental calculations as you’re taking photos. After all mistakes on film have a financial cost.
Volume versus Quality
Back in October when I took out the Fuji GX617 and the Canon 5DS R on a trip I found it notable how different my approach to shooting was with each camera. Unsurprisingly I shot less with the film camera and was much more generous in my shooting with my DSLR. I spent a lot more time on my film shots to focus on correct exposure and composition. With 4 exposures to a roll I took greater care to work a scene by walking around, looking for different angles, check focus, check settings, double check settings and account for various lighting conditions before triggering the shutter. The net result was feeling more connected to the scene I was photographing.
My efforts with the DSLR were much quicker and as a result I took more photos. Shooting RAW affords you to work fast and loose. It was eye opening to see how fast and loose normal shooting has become for me. Jumping back to film made that all too clear. The digital format affords you the ability to:
Salvage an image with +/- 2 stop latitude (potentially more if you use a newer digital camera)
Have virtually no exposure (image count) limitation creating an “insurance” mentality where you take additional photos to account for lighting or weather variations or just to cover lazy technic
Change ISO or lenses during a single composition on a DSLR in the event you realize your initial approach isn’t working
In the end the ratio of digital versus film photos taken on my trip was 1:20. For every film photo taken I took 20 digital photos, but that said I utilized my DSLR to experiment and photograph a much broader array of subjects. As for the photos I considered keepers and worth sharing the ratios broke down as follows:
1 out of every 9 film photos taken was sharp enough and composed well enough to share and/or print.
1 out of every 7 digital photos taken was sharp enough and composed well enough to share and/or print.
Seeing photos that didn’t work out on film were much more painful. Psychologically I felt more angst either because of lost opportunities or the cost associated with a blown roll of film. I’m not sure if my history of shooting film makes me more or less prone to take extra digital photos for insurance than the average photographer, but it certainly has an impact on my emotional state.
Emotive Photographs Beyond concerns about technical proficiency and productivity I was most concerned about being able to capture images that deeply resonated with me. It’s one thing to say that I got 5 or 100 publishable photos and it’s another to state that they’re photos I think will resonate with others let alone me. Sharp photos, well composed photos, etc. don’t always equate to a great photo. Images that resonate more deeply are not just about sharpness and composition, but atmosphere, artistic presentation and often “je ne sais quoi”. I’ve yet to compile stats for this as I’m still evaluating images from this trip, but if history is a guide the volume is always low.
The jump back into film has been interesting, fun and even anxiety provoking at times. Most of all it’s been eye opening in how I work, compose and think about photography in general.
Continue to Part 3 in this series – Revisiting Film Photography After 10 Years: Development & Post
The post Revisiting Film Photography After 10 Years: Composing Through New Eyes appeared first on JMG-Galleries – Landscape, Nature & Travel Photography.
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