1. Camera settings
2. Exposure
3. Jpeg, tiff or RAW
4. Work flows
5. Jpeg work flow
6. RAW flow
7. File details
8. Storage
9. Computer set up and basic work flow
10. Image selection
11. Transferring images between folders
12. RAW processing
13. Sharpening
14. Shadow/highlight tool
15. Correcting under-exposed images
16. Overexposed images
17. Reducing digital noise
18. Correcting sloping horizons
19. Mono conversions
20. Layers
21. False snow
22. Producing a pencil sketch
23. Using a layer to burn and dodge
24. Curves
25. Altering contrast using curves
26. Altering part of the curve
27. Pysadelic curves
28. Curves and monochrome
29. IR conversions
30. HDR (High Dynamic Range) processing
31. Highlight & Shadow in Photomatix
32. Book list
33. Return to home page

COMPUTER SET UP AND BASIC WORKFLOW

Your computer needs to be capable of running PS as the programme is memory hungry. At least 516mb of RAM is needed, preferably 1 gig to cope with the demands PS can make upon your system. Together with the fastest processor you can afford. I'd rather have a lot of RAM and a fast graphics card than the big hard drives that are so popular as I do not use the HD for storage as explained above. A modern operating system such as Windows XP is essential for a PC.

Before you do anything in PS, or any other imaging programme, change the default RGB working space to Adobe RGB (1998).

sRGB IEC61966-2.1 is not the best space for photographs though many cameras use this for jpegs and it will give better reasults for images to be used on the web; see here.

To change this Edit>colour settings and select Adobe RGB (1998) from the working space drop down menu.

Also for a PC ensure the grey gamma is 2.2, for a Mac 1.8

The importance of having your monitor correctly set up cannot be over emphasised, it's your window to the world. A profiled monitor is the most important step in getting good results either for printing or for use on the web and seeing others work in the correct manner. Given a correctly profiled monitor the generic printer profiles will show a distinct improvement and with custom print profiles an even better result.

An essential tool for getting good results is the use of a screen calibration tool such as the Sypder Studio Pro2; this may seem expensive for the individual at about £200. I think it's a piece of kit any camera club worth it's salt would buy and let it's members use. With a reasonable knowledge of how colour works you should be able to profile your printer yourself after your screen has been profiled.

Monitor profilers update 16/01/06

Pantone and Colorvision have ended their co-operation and both now market monitor profilers. I have no details other than press release information on the new Pantone system, the basic unit is about £65 but the one that most photographers would need is the Eye-One Display 2 is priced at £194. Until I've seen this new unit I'd still go for the proven Studio Spyder Pro2

If you cannot justify a calibration tool you can do a visual calibration on a PC using Adobe Gamma, this comes packaged with Photoshop, or on a Mac the Apple Display Calibrator Assistant. As I suspect the majority of members are using PC's I'll concentrate on Adobe Gamma.

1

Open the Control Panel and select ‘Adobe Gamma', if the icon for this is not showing open Program files/Adobe/Calibration.

2

Select the Assistant radio button

3

If you have a profile supplied by your monitor manufacturer, these are found in the ICM Color Profiles folder, select the appropriate one and click ‘Load'. If there is not a dedicated profile select the nearest generic one such as ‘sRGB Color Space Profile' .

4

Check the ‘Step by Step (Wizard)' button > next

5

Give the profile you are going to generate a name > next

6

You will see a box with a white outer and a dark rectangle inside it with another rectangle inside that.

 

Set the monitor contrast to it's highest setting.

Now adjust the brightness so that the inner box is as dark as possible without going completely black and keeping the outer white frame bright. > next

7

In the phosphors box keep the setting generated by your setting in step 3 > next

8

Deselect the ‘View single Gamma only' box. Three boxes with a central box will appear, one for each colour channel.

 

Use the sliders under each channel box to make the center box fade into the outer box, squinting slightly can help determine when this happens.

Now select ‘Windows Default Gamma' 2.2 in the gamma box. > next

9

Now set the white point, a figure of 6500K > next

10

In this screen leave the setting at ‘Hardware White Point' > next

11

This screen shows before and after radio buttons. Check ‘Finish'

Finally remember monitors change quite quickly so get into the habit of adjusting it regularly. A CRT should be done weekly, and LCD monthly. Laptops can be problematic as the quality of the image can alter with the screen angle.

A standard basic flow gets the image into a form that can be fine-tuned. As with all things in PS there is no correct way; just the one that works for you.

This is my standard flow modified for levels; my preferred method is to use a combination of levels and curves detailed in the curves section.

Open levels and adjust the histogram in each colour channel using the outer pointers. The mid tones can be adjusted as required using the center pointer. Moving this to the right will darken the tones, to left will lighten the tones. With a well-exposed file you should now have an accurate reproduction of the original scene, this what is of prime importance to me as a pro.