Carriers

Went to Portsmouth on Satuday 15th August and went up the Spinakker Tower. Good view of the Carriers. HMS Prince of Wales in the foreground and HMS Queen Elizabeth in the background.

Going to be honest here. A very interesting photo, but there is a lot wrong with it. Very underexposed and the headland at the top of the picture adds nothing to the image.

Here is a quick edit to correct exposure and crop/clone to remove headland.

Must have been the glass of the Spinakker Tower as the camera is working ok.
Thanks

It is an interesting shot but it could have been better exposed. I like the included background - for me it frames the top of the image and it also adds to the impression of 3D depth in the scene.

IIRC you have previously mentioned that you're not keen on post-processing (apologies if I'm wrong). However, do you use in-camera adjustments? The Custom Image settings (brightness, contrast, etc.) enable adjustments which could have enhanced this capture - see link . There is also the Clarity adjustment (in Image Capture Menu 3) which helps to enhance the contrast of details in the scene.

Another consideration might be the choice of lens - did you use the excellent D-FA 28-105? This one has the modern HD coating which improves light tranmission compared with the old SMC. Its imaging can be further improved by applying the K-1's in-camera lens corrections. (I'm unsure whether they will work with the older film era lenses - can anyone confirm this?)

Philip

Could be, I think it is more likely the meter has been fooled by the large amount of water in the scene. Water is very reflective and the meter will do what it is designed to do, render this as a shade of middle grey. A bit like when taking pictures of white swans or a snow scene, you need to overexpose the image to keep the whites "white".

A fascinating image nonetheless.

Lens corrections are available for some of the film era lenses. The three FA LTD lenses plus the FA* 24mm f2 and FA* 85mm f1.4 are included in the K1 software. I am pretty sure the FA 50mm 1.4/1.7 are too.

I remember back in the day taking the camera meter reading off the back of my hand or the grey card. Would this work with modern kit, I think it would. Of course the hand/grey card had to be in ambient light.

Indeed it would work with a modern camera. The basic principle of camera meters is the same now as it was then. Metering has moved on with matrix metering being more advanced than centre weighted. Matrix means it can weight sections of your scene which will work very well in over 90% of cases. For the rest there is no substitute for understanding when you need to step in and use the compensation features of your camera or go for manual exposure.

Digital cameras give us something we never had in the film era, the histogram and the instant review. These enable us to get any compensation right immediately.

ps. I remember watching a documentary on Norman Parkingson. He was doing a portrait shoot with a medium format camera. First thing he would do was to put a Polaroid back on the camera. The ones where your film image would appear after a few minutes. This way he would get a good idea of how his lighting was working before taking the shots.

Interesting to see the two versions of the picture. To me, they are quite different pictures, not different versions of the same. The original says 'Carriers in Portsmouth harbour', with the eye drawn to the carriers. The modified picture says 'Dockyard with big ships alongside', with the eye drawn to the dockyard buildings. No rights or wrongs here, just different.

Re exposure, I wonder whether the camera is being fooled by the colour cast that comes from the (presumably thick) glass window? I vaguely remember having a similar problem a long time ago when taking pics of aircraft from an airport departure lounge during a long and boring wait for a flight.

Steve
PS: Haven't done a 'back of the hand' exposure for a very, very long time. Perhaps it's time for a revival, if only to confuse the phone camera crowd. Just wait for pictures of backs of hands to trend on social media... .

Thank you, Peter.




Philip

All interesting comments.
The lens used was the Pentax DFA 28-105mm at maximum length (105mm).

MrB, you are right, I do not use any PhotoShop type software, it comes out of the camera as a JPEG 3. IIRC my eyes saw it as my image shows it, so it must have been the glass of the tower.

thanks everyone.

My take on the colour and a mono version. A good capture and full of detail.








Best regards

Another one with the oldest commioned warship in the world, HMS Victory and one of the newest HMS Queen Elizabeth.




Again it is the glass.

It does look like the glass is throwing the white balance out John.

With a slight correction.




Best regards

This could be another "here's the RAW file off you go" images to get everyone's take on it?!