Sunday, November 18, 2007

Getting in on the act

It's taken me a long time to start using the RAW format for my photography, but as soon as I did, I've noticed the huge difference it can make. I really hadn't realised how much was lost when the camera applies its algorithms to determine what settings should be used on the raw data in terms of white balance, color saturation, contrast, and sharpness before compressing to jpeg.

I spent all of yesterday working through a series of papers, relevant to the work I'm about to start, plus writing out flash cards to speed up my intake of Spanish words - up to around 500 in passive use, not much in active use yet. With a good day's work under my belt I headed back, and took a detour to a sculpture that I'd previously spotted and thought would make an interesting subject.

This is the sculpture, though the obvious angle wasn't the one I was particularly interested in:

Santiago reflections_181107_01.JPG
I often get strange looks as I'm taking photographs, as I often find myself in strange angles, under objects to get what I think will be an interesting shot. These were a few that I managed from the above sculpture:
Santiago reflections_181107_14.JPG
Santiago reflections_181107_12.JPG
Santiago reflections_181107_07.JPG
Santiago reflections_181107_03.JPG
This set of buildings also caught my eye, and it's the much higher dynamic range that I seem to get with RAW that has me so excited for the prospects. Perhaps it may not look like much, but I can see a big difference. Click on the photo to see more detail in the larger versions:
Santiago building_181107_01.JPG
and finally, one, before I started with the new format, of the Cathedral, as seen through Santiago's winding alleys:
Santiago cathedral through street_281007_09.jpg

4 comments:

James said...

I like shooting RAW, too. Means I can use CA correction and other features in DPP. Mind you, you kiss your disk space goodbye pretty quickly! Like the sculpture pictures, especially how the sky blends with their reflective surfaces.

Unknown said...

Having just bought a half a terrabyte backup drive, this is now less of an issue.

I'm playing around with photoshop a bit at the moment, but really getting to know it is a time investment that I can't really afford right now!

James said...

Heh, RAW photography forced me to get a 500 GB monster as well: the library didn't leave much room for music or, indeed, software on my notebook! Now I'm trying to figure out the best way to make backup copies. There must be a better way than burning 6 DVDs...

Anonymous said...

If you load the image up in MS Paint, you can go to edit, then resize and shrink the picture down so the file size is much less!!!

Glad to be of service