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Latest Nikon mirrorless teaser gives a closer look at body and lens mount

02 Aug

Nikon has published a new 30 second teaser video about its upcoming mirrorless system, which will be announced on August 23rd. As with most teasers there aren’t many details here (though there’s a nice tour of classic Nikon bodies), but at the end we get a good look at the DSLR-style design of the camera (complete with what looks like a very D850-style handgrip) and its new mount.

Of some possible significance is the fact that the D/SLR bodies featured in this latest teaser video are all professional models…

Given all of the ‘coming soon’ placeholders on Nikon’s website, it’s safe to assume that more videos are forthcoming. What do you make of the latest teaser? Let us know in the comments.

Read DPReview reader’s wish list for Nikon’s new mirrorless

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Look. Think. Click. Don’t Rush Into Taking Those Action Photos

27 Jul

How can you improve your action photography? Everything moves so fast that it is a real challenge to make decent action photos.

The best way to improve your high-speed action photography is to slow down. Don’t be mistaken that because your subject is moving rapidly that you must do the same.

Expert action photographers achieve their outstanding results by carefully anticipating and planning. Then they pick up their cameras to begin making photographs.

Hmong New Year kart racing - Action Photos

My best action photo. Sometimes it’s more than just good planning. My timing was lucky!

Here are three basic steps to improving not only your action photos but all of your photography. You can apply these principles each time you shoot, no matter your chosen subject.

Look First

Before you bring your camera to your eye, even before you turn it on, look carefully at what you have chosen to photograph. Look at:

Your subject
The background behind your subject
Foreground in front of the subject
Lighting
Weather
Obstacles – people, traffic, cows, etc. (Anything that might hinder you from taking pictures.)

Being observant is one of the key things photographers need to be experts at. You need to know what is around you and how it will help or hinder your photograph making process.

Hmong New Year top spinning - Action Photos

Then Think

Once you have chosen your subject and had a sufficient look at your surroundings, it’s time to piece together the picture you want to make.

Think about your shooting spot

One of the most important things to consider is where you will take your photos from. You need to think about how your subject will look from different angles and which one you will choose. You may need to take photos at a few different locations before finding one you are happy with.

For any action photography your subject will be moving, so your background may not remain the same. Ask yourself if you will get better photos if you are moving with your subject or if you are stationery.

Moving with your subject will be more difficult. There will be a greater risk of not getting any usable photos. It might pay to stay in one spot until you are confident you have some good pictures and then move with your subject.

Hmong New Year kart racing - Action Photos

Be conscious of others

If you are at a sports event you will need to be conscious of other people. Photographing your kid’s football game, there will be other parents on the sidelines that you will need to consider. They may not consider you and step in front of your camera ruining that shot where your kid scores.

So choose a location where you will not be hindered. Sometimes this will mean getting in front of others or getting further back.

Think about the light

Is it bright enough to achieve a fast enough shutter speed? If not you will need to raise your ISO to a higher setting.

Where is the light coming from? Will your subject be lit from the front or back? Maybe from the side? Maybe from multiple angles as they move around.

Looking at how the light is falling on your subject will help you choose a location at which to position yourself. Look and see at what angle the light is best for the type of photo you want.

Hmong New Year kart racing - Action Photos

Think about the weather

Photographing outdoors you may also have to give some thought to the weather. On clear sunny days or cloudy dull days when weather conditions are unlikely to change there’s not much to think about. When there’s a good wind blowing that might cause dust or sand to hinder you photo session you will need to be careful.

Clouds are the thing that you need to think about the most. On a day when clouds are moving across the sky and the sun is being obscured some of the time, you will need to pay attention. As the light changes your exposure will need to be altered and this may affect your shutter speed, depending on the settings you are using.

Think about your composition

Composition requires careful thought. So often people will try and take a quick snap of the action. They may be successful at capturing the decisive moment, but the composition is often terrible.

That is because it was unplanned. Choosing a good location and anticipating the action will also help you plan your composition.

Hmong New Year kart racing - Action Photos

Lastly, Click

Now that you have thought everything through you can start taking photos. The thinking stage does not always have to take long. It can happen very quickly at times. This depends on how familiar you are with your subject and the location you are shooting.

The more familiar you are with both, the easier and quicker it will be for you.

Camera settings

Setting your camera well for action photos is important. Your shutter speed and focusing mode are especially critical.

To stop the action you will need to chose a fast enough shutter speed. The faster the action the faster shutter speed you will need to freeze your subject.

Hmong New Year kart racing - Action Photos

To blur your subject the opposite applies. Choose a shutter speed sufficiently slow enough to let your subject appear blurred by their motion, but not so slow that you cannot recognize it anymore.

With really fast action I typically set my camera and lens to manual focus. I will pick a spot to focus on and only make photographs when my subject is within my focus zone. I do not practice a lot of action photography these days so I find this method suits me well. Of course, this technique will depend on the type of action you are photographing.

Most importantly with action photography, make sure to squeeze your shutter button and take your photos at the decisive moment when the action is at its peak.

Hmong New Year - Action Photos

Conclusion

If you just grab a few frames without first looking and then planning before you shoot, your results will often be lacking. Being ready when the action happens will more often lead to better action photos.

The more familiar you are with your subject and surroundings the easier is will be. So, if you are just starting out and trying some action photography, picking a subject you know well might mean you have early success.

The photographs I have used in this article are all from a Hmong New Year celebration I photographed a few years back. The day features various sports activities that individuals and village teams compete in. There’s always loads of action and tons of fun.

Please check out this video for some more tips on looking, thinking, and clicking your way to improved photography.

The post Look. Think. Click. Don’t Rush Into Taking Those Action Photos appeared first on Digital Photography School.

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An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

22 Jul

Lightroom is an ever-changing ever-morphing evolution of the cutting edge of digital image processing. Quite literally, it seems like Adobe releases new features and updates for their upper tier consumer photo editing software extremely frequently. Now, some of these updates and new features are loved by the photographic community and others…well, not so much.

One of these brand new features, called the “Range Mask”, came along with the v7.2 release of Lightroom Classic CC back in February (2018) and it caused quite a stir. It allows you to incorporate masking with the local adjustment tools right inside of Lightroom V7.2 and later.

An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC - Death Valley

As with most fresh features in Lightroom, some photographers were a little bit skeptical about its actual usefulness in their editing workflow. It’s an interesting tool to be sure and after this, you’ll know everything there is to know about the brand new range mask feature in Lightroom Classic CC.

What is the Range Mask?

Before we get too far into the conversation let’s take a moment and briefly talk about masks as they pertain to editing photographs. A mask is simply a way for you to control what areas of a photo receive the edits you want to apply. There is a huge range of mask types and they vary quite infinitely in their applications.

Usually, masks are routinely used in Photoshop. The old adage “black conceals and white reveals” was born directly from the usage of layer masking inside Photoshop. For the purposes of understanding the range mask in Lightroom, just know that masks allow selective control over edits within a photo.

The new range masking feature provides you with two different methods for applying masks: luminance and color.

Luminance Range Masking

If you’re a Photoshop user, think of luminance masking as a boiled down version of luminosity masks. Don’t sweat it if you’ve never used luminosity masking in Photoshop. Just know that the luminance mask applies local adjustments based on the brightness range you select.

luminance slider - An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

This means that you can apply any edit from a local adjustment tool to only the shadows, highlights, or mid-tone luminance ranges that you choose. The luminance masking function also features a “smoothing” slider. This controls the intensity of the masking effect from hard to soft.

Color Range Masking

Conceptually, the color range mask works just as the luminance range mask except instead of basing its masking on brightness it relies on the color ranges you select with the dropper tool.

color range mask - An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

The dropper tool lets you select a large color palette by clicking and dragging the eye-dropper over an area of your photo.

Using the eye-dropper tool to select the color range.

Alternatively, you can also select up to four (five without the large area selected) highly specific color areas by shift+clicking each desired point.

Using the dropper to select up to 5 target colors for the mask range.

It’s important to note that you can not use both the luminance and color range masks within the same local adjustment tool at the same time. However, you can create a new local adjustment (or duplicate one) and “layer” the masks as many times as you see fit.

How to use the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

Alright, let’s get down to business and look at an example of how the luminance and color range masks work. It’s extremely easy and can yield some impressive results once you get the hang of things.

Using the Luminance Range Mask

Here’s an image from an awesome night I spent in Death Valley a couple months ago.

death valley no-edit An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

Let’s say I want to use the Gradient Filter tool to brighten up that foreground and bring out a little more detail around the two people crouched by the fire.

An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

That looks okay, but it definitely caused the highlight portions of the sky to be a little too bright for my taste. To solve this, I’ll apply a luminance range mask.

Simply select “Luminance” from the mask selection drop-down. Next, adjust the slider so that most of the highlights are excluded from the gradient filter adjustments and voila! The sky is no longer overexposed yet the foreground is now much more visible.

And since you can use the range mask with any edit in the local adjustment tool kit I went ahead and added in a little clarity and highlight boost to really make the foreground pop.

To truly demonstrate the effect of the luminance range mask I’ll tick the “show selected mask overlay” box at the bottom of the view window (the keyboard shortcut to show the overlay is O). The areas in red are the portions of the image where the gradient filter has applied its edits.

Gradient Filter applied without a mask. See how it is affecting parts of the sky as well.

Next, let’s have a look at the effect of the luminance range mask.

Gradient Filter with the Luminance Mask applied. Notice how the sky is now less affected in the bright areas.

Notice how the red masking recedes from the highlights in the skyline? It’s not overly obvious in this example but it will be incredibly apparent when we take a look at the effects of the color range mask.

Using the Color Range Mask

We’ll stick with the same photo from earlier for this example. But this time I’m going to use a Radial Filter to brighten up the fire and add some saturation to make the orange glow of the flames stand out more from that gorgeous purple of the desert night.

First, let’s see how a normal Radial Filter looks when applied to the area in question.

Radial Filter applied in Lightroom Classic CC.

Sure, it definitely brightens and adds saturation to the fire but it also added the adjustments to the entire filter area.

To remedy this, I’ll use the color range mask. I begin by using the‘shift+click and drag method to select the majority of the fire area color. Next, I set the Amount slider for the color range mask virtually to zero so that the mask really targets just those oranges and reds. This is the result:

An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

And remember how I said you could immediately discern the effects of the color range mask? Well, look at the mask overly before the color masking was applied….

Radial Filter without masking.

…and now check out the incredible selectivity of the color mask.

Radial Filter with color range mask applied.

Final Thoughts on the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC

The new range mask feature borrows the power of Photoshop layer masks and brings it home to the warm safety and comfort of Lightroom. While the range mask is admittedly nowhere near as versatile and customizable as say a luminosity mask in Photoshop, it does have its own excellent merits when it comes to taking more control of your local edits.

With the luminance range mask, you can fine-tune where your edits are applied based on the brightness levels within the photo. This is hugely beneficial when working with highly contrasted scenes and works great for black and white images.

The color range mask harnesses the power of color to let you creatively select exactly which tones will receive your adjustments. As you saw in the examples above, the color range mask is an excellent way to really bring out the contrast when working with complementary colors.

If you haven’t updated to the Lightroom Classic CC v7.2 or later then I urge you to do so now. Take the new range mask feature for a spin and let us know what you think in the comments below.

The post An In-Depth Look at the Range Mask in Lightroom Classic CC appeared first on Digital Photography School.

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How to Create a Luminous Look for Your Photographs

19 Jul

Today let’s talk about one of the final processes of creating an artful image. Let’s talk about THE LOOK. This refers to the overall feeling your images projects to a viewer. This look is often created during post-production here in the digital age, or it can be created in camera. Either way, the final look and feel of your image are just as important as all the technical requirements that went into the initial exposure.

Create a Luminous Look - tide on the beach

In this case, a soft focus was added in post-processing to help lighten the image.

There are lots of different looks that you can create with your images, everything from a bleached look to something with super rich colors. There’s also the hyper-realistic style where you process your work to create a gritty look. Today though we’re going to focus on the luminous look.

Defining the Luminous Look

To fully understand the luminous look lets start with a full understanding of the characteristics of a photograph that looks and feels luminous. Dictionary.com defines the word luminous in the following way:

Adjective

Radiating or reflecting light; shining; bright.
Lighted up or illuminated; well-lighted: the luminous ballroom.
Brilliant intellectually; enlightened or enlightening, as a writer or a writer’s works: a luminous concept; luminous prose.

This means one of the main focuses when creating a luminous photograph is to consider the feeling the light will create in the image.

Luminous could mean the image glows. This means it feels like the light seeps from the image out towards the viewer. The best way to achieve this look is to shoot towards the light source. The goal is to make the light central to the look and feel of the image.

You will notice that there are still dark areas that contrast with all of the light. This is important. The goal is not to wash out the image but to create that feeling of all-around soft bright light.

Glowing

Let’s study the following images to understand how one creates a glowing, luminous look and feel within a photograph. Below is the initial photograph, unprocessed. The RAW image was shot in a local forest. I was attracted to the soft light coming through the forest that illuminated this tiny spring flower.

This was shot at 1/80th, f/5.6, ISO 1000.

In post-processing, several elements were slightly adjusted. In the image below the highlights were enhanced and the exposure was raised a little. The tones were also warmed. All adjustments were completed in Lightroom. The goal was to make it feel as if the light permeated the scene with warmth.

Create a Luminous Look - spring flower with warmer tones

After processing – notice how much lighter and airier the image is now.

The second image was edited using the Nik Efex software from Google. I love their analog looks. I chose a preset then made some adjustments to the image, controlling the brightness and the amount of vignette in the image. A matte feel was also added to this second version.

Processing using Nik Efex.

The essential concept when creating an image that has a luminous glowing feeling is to ensure that the light softly reaches all corners of the image.

Using Fog and Mist

Another way to create a luminous look is to take advantage of fog and mist. Photographs shot in their natural conditions won’t glow in the same way but the luminous look can be achieved when shooting in foggy conditions. The fog softens the view and can make the viewer feel as if the scene is still filled with light.

In the case of the image below, the fog and the mist completely obscured our view of the countryside. The entire top of the mountain, however, glowed with a diffused light. The 2km hike straight up the side of the mountain was still worth it for the ghostly quiet we experienced while standing on one of the highest peaks in Wales.

Create a Luminous Look - mountain top in the fog

Pen-y-Fan is one of the highest mountains in Wales and the view from the top is supposed to be spectacular. Our grueling hike to the top did not reveal expansive views but rather this eerily silence. It was still worth the effort.

The Miky Look

A third way to create a luminous look is to process an image so that it feels milky in nature. These means that post-processing produces a softer feeling image that doesn’t necessarily contain brightness or dark contrasts but rather one that feels soft and light but muted.

Here’s the original unedited image. The soft muted colors and the fog are elements that will help to achieve the milky look. Strong contrasts and bright bold colors do not lend themselves to creating this style.

The deserted beaches around Borth, Wales were a perfect spot for shooting images with soft gentle tones.

To process the image and complete the milky look I used warmer tones, adjusted the vignette, and lightened the corners of the image. I used a faded film preset and gave the whole image a light greenish tone. Then, I adjusted the haze slider in Lightroom. I wanted the whole image to feel very light but also very soft.

Processed for a milky, almost retro look.

Using Lens Flare

One final technique to consider is the use of lens flare to help create images that look and feel luminous. Lens flare is one of my favorite techniques to use in experiments. I love the effect of so much light permeating the image and also the unique shapes created as the light refracts in your camera.

The following images are all floral in nature but the light is refracted in each image in different ways. In some cases, it’s the shape of the bokeh in other cases it’s lens flare.

Perhaps this image is more about the bokeh in the background. Beautiful circular spots of light softly illuminate the flower.

There wasn’t much editing that went into the photograph of the tulip above. A touch of vibrancy was added to heighten the colors and the exposure was adjusted slightly. The focus is also a little soft which helps lend itself to the soft bright feel of this image.

You might be able to classify this image as having a glowing look but the sunlight is obscured by the flowers and the majority of the image is not in sharp focus. The light and the shallow depth of field bring this flower image into the realm of luminous abstract.

Here is an example of the classic lens flare. This image, while the same subject matter as above, was processed with more blue tones and a different depth of field. The goal was to include that star-shaped flare of light.

The Look is About Creative Interpretation

Creating a look and feel for your images is an important part of the creative process. These days the majority of our efforts are focused on creating a look in post-processing. That doesn’t have to be the case, it is possible to create a look in camera as well.

The luminous look is just one of many different creative styles you can utilize in your work. Choosing a look is about deciding how you want the image to be presented to the viewer. It’s also about the message you wish to communicate. Finally, creating a look is about your artistic interpretation of a scene. Wanting to take something like a dreary rainy day and make it feel bright and airy is just as valid as capture the reality you see before you.

So it’s time to experiment with different looks. Give the luminous look a try and show off your best work in the comments below.

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Look inside the factory where Kodak Ektachrome is (re)born

17 Jun

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Kodak has restarted production of one of its most famous film emulsions – Ektachrome. Popular Science editor Stan Horaczek recently go to take a look inside.

Launched in 1946 and discontinued in 2012, Ektachrome owes its rebirth to a relatively recent resurgence of interest in film. Easier to develop than its more famous cousin Kodachrome, Ektachrome should be back in the hands of today’s film photographers before the end of this year.

You can scroll through the images above to take a brief look into Kodak’s factory in Rochester New York, and for more information, we recommend reading the full article, linked below.

‘Inside the facility where Kodak brings film back to life’ (popsci.com)

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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DPReview TV: A look back at APS film

10 Jun

Every photographer knows about APS-C sensors, but what about APS film? This week, Chris and Jordan take a stroll down memory lane and try out the original APS format, short for ‘Advanced Photo System’, a technology that promised to streamline the film workflow, but which ultimately lost out to digital technology. Tune in to see what made APS so interesting, and whether 15-year-old expired film is still up to the task.

Make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week.

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Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning

20 Apr

The holy grail of travel photography is a stunning photo looking into the vast distance taken at sunrise or sunset. It seems to just work as a blend of color, composition, and light to create something that often makes the viewer utter that famous word that any photographer wants to hear, “Wow!”.

But why is it then that so often when you look at your own sunrise or sunset photos they don’t look so stunning? Here are 5 reasons why your sunrise or sunset photos don’t live up to your expectations.

5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning - sunset on the coast

#1 – What’s the point?

I remember a picture editor once told me, “This might sound controversial, but a sunrise or sunset is actually pretty boring.” What he was referring to was the lack of compelling subject matter in a photo of a sunrise or sunset like for example an empty beach with just the setting sun.

While sitting on a beach and seeing a sunset can seem like a wonderful experience, unfortunately, the camera cannot replicate that. Most successful photos of sunrises or sunsets have a point of interest in them, in that there is a subject that is the main story and the sunrise or sunset is providing the light and the atmosphere.

That story doesn’t necessarily have to be a person or an object in the frame. The story could be the beautiful scenery or the crashing waves against the coast. But the key point is that there is something that gets the viewers’ attention. So, don’t just rely on the sunrise or sunset, try to build your composition using it as an addition rather than the story.

boring sunset photo - 5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning

This photo just isn’t very interesting. There’s a lack of interesting clouds or even water movement.

In this image, the big rock in the foreground, footsteps in the sand and the people all add interest and context to the photo.

#2 – Clouds or no clouds?

For example, one element that can dramatically improve your sunrise or sunset photos is some clouds. Take your generic empty beach scenario from above, but this time add some dramatic clouds that the light can bounce off and suddenly you’ll go from something mundane to something that looks fantastic.

The clouds here add drama to the scene.

Of course, you can’t control the elements and no clouds in the sky means, there’s nothing you can do. In that scenario, you just have to work harder to frame your shot and give the viewer a point of interest.

While you generally want some clouds in the sky, too much cloud cover and you will often find the light seems flat and dull and the whole photo looks uninteresting (unless the sun can set below the clouds and light them up from underneath). So, in conclusion, while you ideally want some clouds, it’s important not to have a completely overcast day. You can, of course, plan your shoots around times when you will have the best conditions.

5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning

#3 – Are your highlights and shadows correct?

One of the big challenges in photographing sunrise or sunsets is the vast contrast you get between highlights and shadows. Your highlights are the light areas of your photo (such as the sky for example) and your shadows are the dark areas in the photo (for example your foreground).

If either is pushed too far you will get completely white areas for highlights and completely black areas for shadows. This means that these areas contain no pixel details and is something you want to avoid.

The problem you face when photographing sunsets or sunrises is that your sky will be bright, and your foreground will be dark (a high dynamic range). The way that you can ensure that your highlights and shadows are exposed correctly in this scenario is to use a graduated neutral density filter to balance out the difference in the highlights and shadows.

There are also other techniques such as exposure bracketing as well that can help you achieve this in post-production and actually just brightening or darkening these areas in a software like Adobe Photoshop or Lightroom. But whatever you decide, just make sure that your highlights and shadows are exposed correctly and fine-tune them if you need to in post-production.

5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning - clipped shadow areas

The blue areas on this photo indicate where the shadows are being clipped (black with no detail).

Here the same image has been adjusted in post-processing to hold more detail in the shadow areas.

#4 – The image isn’t framed correctly

One of the key elements in ensuring the final photo looks great is to frame your composition correctly.

The easiest way to do this and a good starting point for any photographer is the famous Rule of Thirds where you try to place key points of interest on the intersection of the lines. But the Rule of Thirds is also worth remembering for your horizon line. Usually, you will find that placing the horizon either on the top third or the bottom third will look better than slap bang in the middle.

Horizon centrally framed.

Using the rule of thirds, the horizon here is on the lower third – off-center.

But try to consider the whole picture when framing your shot. Think if there are any areas that are just wasted space where you can crop in tighter. Or if your camera angle is slightly off and you can benefit by just moving a little to either side.

The beauty of photography these days is that you can usually take as many photos as it takes to get your shot framed right. So, play around with your composition and capture a few alternatives that you can then review later in post-production.

5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning

Your camera may have the option to display the Rule of Thirds grid when you’re shooting or in image playback mode.

#5 – You haven’t fixed mistakes

Usually, the first bit of feedback that I often give newbie photographers when I look at their sunrise or sunset photos is on elements that could easily be fixed in post-production. Whether you are an advocate of post-production or not there are certain things that you simply should not forego on any photo.

The two biggest of these are:

Ensuring that your photos are straight, that means the horizon line needs to be dead straight.
Making sure you have the correct white balance for the photo (if you haven’t already done so when taking the photo). Think about the scene that you are showing, is it a warm and golden scenario or is it a cool and crisp setting? Either way, tweak your white balance until it is correct.

If you do nothing else in post-production, just making sure these two settings are correct will immediately improve your photos.

5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning - crooked horizon line

This image is clearly not straight as can be seen from the horizon line.

Here the image tilt has been corrected.

Conclusion

Sunsets and sunrises are wonderful times in the day to photograph things. The soft golden light can transform an ordinary scene into an extraordinary one. When done well, they are often the photos that will be the “show stoppers” in any portfolio.

But always remember that a sunset and sunrise needs to work in combination with your composition and subject matter to create a wonderful photo. Follow these tips and you’ll be on your way to capturing great photos of sunrise and sunsets.

Now it’s your turn to get involved. Share your great sunrise and sunset photos below.

The post 5 Reasons Why Your Sunrise or Sunset Photos Don’t Look So Stunning appeared first on Digital Photography School.

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Video: A closer look at NiSi’s new F3 cinema prime lenses

12 Apr

One of the most surprising announcements from NAB this year came from filter maker NiSi, who decided to release a set of cinema prime lenses. No, that’s not a typo. And Cinema 5D’s Nino Leitner was at NAB to see the lenses in person and ask the NiSi rep some questions about the lineup.

The NiSi F3 Cinema Prime lenses cover focal lengths from 25 to 100mm—25mm T2.1, 35mm T2.0, 50mm T2.0, 75mm T2.0, and 100mm T2.0—and give video shooters yet another set of relatively affordable options in a market that is quickly becoming crowded. So the main question Leitner asked was: what makes these special?

The answer is two fold. First, Nisi boasts of the artistic properties of the lenses, which produce flaring with “a lot of character” while maintaining great center resolution. And second, the lenses feature an interchangeable mount; users can swap between Sony E, Canon EF, and PL mounts using a set of standard Allen keys that can be ordered alongside the lenses.

To learn more about these lenses, watch the full video above or check out our launch coverage here.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Quick look: Canon’s new compressed Raw format

03 Apr

Canon’s new entry-level EOS M50 is also the first Canon camera to come with the new Digic 8 processor, allowing it to capture smaller C-Raw files in the new CR3 format.

The EOS M50 may be aimed at beginning photographers, but its all-new Digic 8 processor makes it Canon’s first camera to use the CR3 Raw file format. Older Canons that used the CR2 file format could capture either losslessly compressed Raw files or ‘medium’ and ‘small’ equivalents, both saving you disk space, the latter at the expense of reducing resolution.

However, if you enable the compact ‘C-Raw’ option on the M50, the files will be 30-40% smaller than their losslessly compressed equivalents without any reduction in resolution. But are there any other image quality penalties to pay? Let’s take a look.

Click here to download the original Raw files for all of the below comparisons.

Base ISO


Uncompressed Raw	Compressed Raw

Click through for full size
ISO 100 | 1/40 sec | F5.6 | Canon EF 50mm F1.4

The above images were shot and processed using our standard studio testing procedure. Do you see any differences? We couldn’t find any – but we decided to see if boosting the ISO value and using our low-light scene would turn anything else up, particularly in terms of shadow noise.

High ISO


Uncompressed Raw	Compressed Raw

Click through for full size
ISO 12800 | 1/40 sec | F5.6 | Canon EF 50mm F1.4

Now that we’ve switched to our low light setup and boosted the ISO by seven stops, the images still appear all but identical, even in terms of noise levels. So far, it looks like it’s best for you to go ahead and switch into C-Raw and save yourself some disk space.

But when we put the EOS M50 through our standard exposure latitude test, we did find some evidence of what sort of processing is happening in Canon’s C-Raw files.

Pushed shadows


Uncompressed Raw	Compressed Raw

Image pushed four stops in Adobe Camera Raw

Our exposure latitude test involves exposing our studio scene with increasingly lower exposures, and then pushing them back to the correct brightness in Adobe Camera Raw. With many older sensors, you would see an abundance of noise being added by the camera, but today’s sensors output files that are much more tolerant to this sort of manipulation.

Basically, after pushing the files, we look into the shadow regions to assess the exposure latitude (essentially the dynamic range) of the Raw files. And it’s after underexposing the EOS M50 by four stops and then re-brightening, we start to see some clearer differences between the regular Raw files and their C-Raw equivalents.

The resulting pattern can be more difficult to remove or reduce than normal noise patterns, and is reminiscent of artifacts left behind from noise reduction algorithms that we’ve seen in the past.

At this time, we’re optimistic that users of Canon’s new Raw format can shoot in C-Raw without a noticeable impact on image quality.

But after all, this is a four-stop push. Depending on your shooting, this may indicate a slight dynamic range disadvantage to using C-Raw, but it’s likely to remain an edge case for most users. And so we’ve decided to finish off with a more informal test in a more common situation. We wanted to see if processing out the two different Raw files would turn up different results for the gradient in a blue sky.

Blue skies and takeaways


Uncompressed Raw	Compressed Raw

Click through for full size
ISO 100 | 1/640 sec | F8 | Canon EF-M 15-45mm F3.5-5.6

Smooth gradients can often trip up compression algorithms, particularly in many cameras’ JPEG engines, so we wanted to see if there was any noticeable difference when the EOS M50 compresses its Raw files. As with our un-pushed studio images, it’s again impossible to tell which is the normal Raw file, and which is the C-Raw file. So what does this all mean?

Of course, we still have plenty of tests to run on the EOS M50, but at this time we’re optimistic that users of Canon’s new Raw format can safely shoot in C-Raw and save themselves valuable memory card and disk space without noticeable impact on image quality.

Note that all of the above images of our studio scene were processed in an identical manner to images in our studio scene widget, meaning there was no sharpening nor noise reduction added. Adjustments for the blue sky scene were limited to highlights, shadows, whites and blacks in Adobe Camera Raw, and sharpening and noise reduction were left to default levels.

Click here to download the original Raw files for all of the below comparisons, and to see how the EOS M50’s uncompressed Raw files compare to its peers, check it out in our studio test scene.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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How to Make Your Digital Photo Look Like a Polaroid Using Photoshop

06 Mar

Nostalgic for the printed photos? Polaroids are coming back as trend as are many vintage things. Do you want to achieve this effect while still maintaining the advantages of the shooting digital? In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to make your digital photo look like a Polaroid and even like a stack of Polaroids in a very easy way using Photoshop.

From digital to Polaroid effect intro

Make a new document in Photoshop

The size of the image in an original Polaroid (just the image without the white frame) is 3.1 inches by 3.1 inches. Therefore, you need to open a new document in Photoshop with those measurements. If you are going to keep the result digital then you can leave it at 72 dpi (dots per inch). If you want to print it then set it to 300 dpi. Make sure the background color is black and then click OK.

Polaroid effect tutorial size document

Double-Click on this background so that you make it a layer, that is by default called Layer 0. Then make a new empty layer by going to Menu > Layers > New Layer.

Add the white frame

Now you need to do the outer frame which is the white border of the Polaroid. In order to make sure it’s centered, you can do it in two steps. First, go to Menu > Image > Canvas Size and this will open a pop-up window. The original Polaroid has a width of 3.5 inches, regardless you put it as both width and height. Make sure the point in the grid below is on the center square.

Polaroid effect tutorial canvas size white frame

Now you just need to make the bottom part of the frame larger. For that, go again to the Canvas Size but this time the point should be in the top square. Now fill this layer with white color by going to the paint bucket tool, make sure white is the foreground color and then click on the layer.

Polaroid effect tutorial canvas size white frame2

Add the background and a drop shadow

Create a new layer that will be your background. It can be white for now, but you can also add a texture like wood, for example, if you want to make it look like a table top, and so on. Go to Canvas Size and make it bigger once again. You can choose the size that’s best for you, here I’m doing 5.5×6.5 inches.

Select the layer that contains the frame (the white rectangle) and click the Add a Layer Style button at the bottom of the palette (fx). Select Drop Shadow and in the window that will pop-up, you can choose your settings. I’m using a 45-degree angle, with a distance of 30, a size 10, and setting the opacity to 29. You can set all these however you want, just move them around until you like how it looks. Make sure the preview option is ticked so that you see what you’re doing.

Polaroid effect tutorial drop shadow

Put your image inside the frame

Up until now, you have prepared your Polaroid and you can use this process for any photo or save it as a template.

To put your photo inside the frame you need to open your raw image and make the adjustments you want until you are satisfied, as you would do normally.

Now open the image as a Smart Object by holding Shift to make the Open Image button turn into Open Object and click on that. Another way to do it is to click the link at the bottom of the image window and in the pop-up window tick the option “Open in Photoshop as Smart Object”.

For more information about Smart Objects you can see my previous article on that topic here: How to Create with a Good Workflow Using Smart Objects in Photoshop.

Polaroid effect tutorial open as smart object

Now drag the thumbnail of that image into the layers palette of the Polaroids document you’ve been working on and it will be added as a Smart Object there as well. Now you can choose the image and keep working on the Polaroids.

Make sure the Smart Object (your image layer) is on top of all the other layers (with your black square directly underneath). Right-click on the image layer and select Create a Clipping Mask from the menu. Then use the Move tool to position the image to best compose it within the square.

Oops, notice my layers are in the incorrect order here. Make sure your image is on TOP of the black square.

Try out some backgrounds to make it more interesting!

How to make a stack of Polaroids

If you want to make a stack of Polaroids follow these directions.

Select all the layers except the background and put them into a group by going to Menu > Layers > Group Layers. Now make as many copies of it as you’d to have like in your stack. You can do this just by dragging the group into the New Layers button at the bottom.

Finally just give a little twist to each one (use Edit > Transform > Rotate). There you go!

Digital to Polaroid Stack Effect tutorial

Digital to Polaroid Effect tutorial

Or you can play around with the composition. Remember you can also change the image that appears in each frame.

Digital to Polaroid Stack wide Effect tutorial

Extra effects

If you like to give your digital photo a printed quality but you don’t want to do a Polaroid, try curling the corner as if it was a page turning in only three steps.

1. Draw a square selection in the corner and draw a Gradient inside it with the Gradient tool set to go from black to white.

Tutorial Curl Turn Page effect 1