PHOTOGRAPHIC THREADS: camera queries, any photo tech stuff!

[TC]

It could be that the "capture" of the picture is using a saturated program and needs post capture adjustment using a photo program.  Before using the camera, it gives you the choice of setting sharpness, contrast, colour reproduction, saturation and hue.  It could be that the picture taking mode has been set up incorrectly.  Only by reading the instruction book and looking at how the camera is set up and trying different combinations will you be able to see if it is a camera fault. Another way is to reset the camera controls to default level.
Digital cameras have a huge of picture recording possibilities that was not possible with film.  With slide film it was a case of what you saw was what you got.
With Digital, it is only the starting point.  I would be most surprised if the D3000 would regularly produce sub standard pictures.  It is more likely due to the set-up.

[Ed Alverson]

Speaking from experience (!) I would say that the first thing to learn about when you get your first digital SLR is white balance.  The auto white balance setting does not always produce the desired result - I find with my Canon, landscape photos that include a lot of green foliage typically are too blue when it is cloudy, and a bit too red when it is sunny.  Using the custom white balance function is pretty easy (all you really need in terms of extra equipment is an old-fashioned gray card), or if you shoot all of your photos as RAW files it is really easy to adjust white balance in the post-processing phase.  If you just shoot jpg files is is a bit more difficult to get the color right but not impossible.

When I first got my digital SLR, I somehow accidentally set the white balance from auto to manual/fluorescent.  Not realizing what I had done, I wondered why all my outdoor photos seemed more than a bit on the bluish side.  It was several months before I figured out what I had done!

Ed

[Peter Maguire]

John,

You don't say whether your colour problems occur when you are viewing the pictures on a monitor, or when you are printing them. There's several places where things can go wrong: in-camera settings, computer/monitor communication or computer/printer communication
Firstly if the problem stems from the camera, it has probably been moved away from the basic settings. You say that the camera belongs to a friend, so I would check this first, and ask to borrow the instruction book so that you can reset to the factory settings if desired/you are allowed. It's always a counsel of perfection to fully read the manual, but I've never got past page 60 (out of over 380  ) of the manual for my D300, but have now taken over 13,000 photos with it.
If your reds appear wrong on the monitor, is it just photos taken with this camera (assuming that the camera settings are correct), or do other photos or pictures from the web look wrong also? In this case you would need to recalibrate your monitor. There's a basic system for doing this in Photoshop, which you seem to have - let me know if you need any help with this.
If it's the printing at fault, then if you are printing yourself, are you using Photoshop to talk to the printer and set the colour whilst at the same time using the printer's colour management to do the same thing? This can cause some awful conflicts and false colours (been there, done that.... ). Also with printing, I've given up using third-party inks as I've never been happy with the results (my problem was yellows); yes, manufacturer's own inks are probably more expensive by weight than gold (maybe not after the recent price increases), but you do get what you pay for. If you are having them printed commercially, then try a different lab, sometimes their printers will cause a colour problem for you.
As for cameras, you probably won't want to go up to the D300 I use, but as you seem to have Nikon fit lenses, I can say that my son-in-law uses a D90 and gets excellent results with it.

[Paddy Tobin]

While photography questions are topical, perhaps I could ask another: resizing photographs to put them up on the web is a job I find tedious. Can anybody suggest a quick way to deal with resizing a large number of shots? Is there any way to deal with a batch of photographs and treat them all in the same way - select a group of photographs and resize them all in the same manner and then save to a different folder. I use Adobe Photoshop CS2.

Paddy

[JohnLonsdale]

Paddy,

Indeed there is a very simple way.  You need to create an 'action' then record the steps you want to follow - such as 'file open, resize, sharpen, file save, file close' then save the action.  Then do File, automate, batch and select your saved action.  Choose the parameters you want then hit OK.  The action will run on all the files in the input directory you selected and save the output to the destination directory.  Assuming the two are different you will keep your originals unmodified.

Let me know if you have any questions - best to just try it out - PS isn't especially intuitive but if you keep fiddling you usually get the desired result.

Best,

John

[ranunculus]

Paddy,

Indeed there is a very simple way.  You need to create an 'action' then record the steps you want to follow - such as 'file open, resize, sharpen, file save, file close' then save the action.  Then do File, automate, batch and select your saved action.  Choose the parameters you want then hit OK.  The action will run on all the files in the input directory you selected and save the output to the destination directory.  Assuming the two are different you will keep your originals unmodified.

Let me know if you have any questions - best to just try it out - PS isn't especially intuitive but if you keep fiddling you usually get the desired result.

Best,

John

Wonderful news, John ... would you happen to know the procedure for Macs?   

[JohnLonsdale]

If Photoshop runs on a Mac then it is the same, I would imagine.  If not then......sorry......no.  I've used PS for ever and never needed anything other than PS, and Irfan View for quick looks at image attachments etc.

Best,

J.

[Peter Maguire]

Cliff,

You will need to open the 'Actions' palate (Window>Actions in Photoshop CS2) - I keep it docked with the Histroy palate on the side of the screen. There is a keyboard shortcut on a PC (Alt+F9), but I don't know what the Mac equivalent of Alt is.
I just used Photoshop help once the actions palate was open to create actions for simple resizing/sharpening for posting on the website. I keep the long side of the image to 900 pixels, so that I needed a vertical and a horizontal format action. Mind you I've been applying the actions individually, but now that John has shown us how to batch process a group of images, I'll be revising that......

[Ed Alverson]

I've used PS for ever and never needed anything other than PS, and Irfan View for quick looks at image attachments etc.

IrfanView, which is available as a free download, has batch processing functions - re-sizing, re-naming, etc. The functions may not be as good as Photoshop, but it is free...

Ed

[Gerry Webster]

Wonderful news, John ... would you happen to know the procedure for Macs?   

Cliff - it is possible to automate repetitive tasks on a Mac although it is many years since I did it, & not with images. Look up 'automate' on Mac Help. It now seems quite complicated.

[ranunculus]

Many thanks John, Peter and Gerry.

[Maggi Young]

"bulborum" - Roland de Boer, has this note in his signature  : To make easy and fast small pictures   http://www.efpage.de/eTinypic.html   and has written before about the ease of this system .... not sure about its use on a Mac though.

[Paddy Tobin]

Many thanks, John. I'll give that a try. Paddy

[Carlo]

Paddy, et al,

Before going through the exercise of creating actions, see if the "save for web" function will do what you need. You should be able to choose resolution, sizing options, etc. and apply them to batches of photographs.

[John85]

Thank you all.May be I stick to my very good 44years old SLR as long as film is available.But Fred as nearly convinced me to try the not so expensive Fuji S1730 for a start.Or is it not a good idea?
Your comments please.