Did you ask them why Dave?

Regards
David

Fantastic news Shaun, richly deserved for your hard work and considerable talent. I am chuffed and surprised that you have thanked me for my support - I haven't really done anything much! It should be me thanking you for helping me over the past year or so, as you have really fired my enthusiasm for photography and for landscapes in particular.

If you get really rich and need an assistant give me a call and I'll be there like a shot

You might be able to get that 645 now!!

Best wishes
David

Having been there on the day John, I have to say that your image is completely off the mark in terms of how the scene looked in real life. Please don't read this as a criticism as it is not intended to be, it's just an observation that whether it looks more natural to most people or not, the reality is that the scene was nothing like this.

I think the trap that everyone is falling into here is trying to make it look what your mind thisnks is 'Natural', but this is impossible if you weren't there. As I said in an earlier post, even though most will feel that image 2 looks unnatural, it is actually much closer to how the scene was in real life than image 1 is. The light at the time was indeed very blue; to most people that will not be familiar and therefore does not look natural.

I hope this makes some sense.

Regards
David

That's a very interesting observation as both images are exactly the same pixel dimensions. It suggest that Photoshop is applying more compression than the software that Nigel used, either when re-sizing images or during the 'save to jpeg' process, even when maximum quality is selected.

Regards
David

I think is is just common sense isn't it? Every piece of software is written differently and so all can produce different outcomes from the same inputs and I don't agree that you can get the same results regardless of the image processing software used. If this was the case we would all be using freeware programs and not purchasing Photoshop & Lightroom etc. I work in software and know only too well how differently results can be depending on the code written, even if two sets of code purport to do the same thing.

Regards
David

The comments added have made very interesting reading, especially for me as I was present when the picture was taken! The colour balance is actually far more accurate to the real-life scene in Image 2 than it is in Image 1! This contradicts the majority of comments placed about Image 2 looking unnatural, and is possibly because not many people are about at this time in the morning when the light is very blue!

Image 2 was processed in ACR and Photoshop, and has not had the blues emphasised at all (there has been a tweak to vibrance and a very small saturation increase across the board, but absolutely no adjustments to the relative blue levels). The blue tinge on the trees is consistent with the original RAW File, and is a consequence of the light at that time in the morning.

I fully agree with the comments that Image 1 has far greater detail in the mist and is overall a more pleasing / detailed image which does look more natural if you don't have the benefit of knowing what the scene actually looked like in real life. For example, on the bottom right where the reeds are, Image 1 is more brightly lit here (as if the sun is on the reeds) and also there is detail of different colours in the water near the reeds. This makes the image more pleasing, however in real life, this was not visible; the reeds were in near darkness and there was very little definition in the water surface, and this is more accurately rendered in Image 2.

I think this test does demonstrate there are massive differences between software for processing, but also that human perception and decisions play a huge part. A better test would be for the same person to process the image on 2 different program flows (Nigel, could you do this?) and then compare the results.

If I had been asked to judge between the two, without having the benefit of taking the image, I would also have chosen Image 1. My sincere thanks to Nigel, who did a superb job of processing the file and to everyone who has commented on the results.

Regards
David

As above, a very cute pup and some glorious shots, especially #1 and #2.

Regards
David

£120 for a K-x in excellent condition with only just over 6,000 shutter actuations - sounds like a bargain to me. I would be snapping your hand off if I didn't already have 3 Pentax DSLR's!

Regards
David

Okay, so here are the shots. they are simply named Image 1 and Image 2. I will not be telling you which was processed by Nigel and which by me (of course this also means I won't be revealing which is the Photoshop version and which is the PDCU4 plus other software version).

The results of the processing have been fascinating for me. One RAW image, two very different results. Please choose your favourite image by voting. You are of course very welcome to leave your comments too, but what we are most interested in is simply, which image do you like the best, which do you find the most attractive and which do you ultimately perceive to be the best quality? This is a difficult one for me as I know what the scene looked like at the time, clearly Nigel and yourselves do not.

Without further ado, here they are:

Image 1



Image 2



Thanks in advance for your comments and votes!

Best wishes
David

Hello again Stan, it's uncanny what you have said in your last post! I found the same with the 55-300 - it absolutely hates filters! Without them it's a brilliant lens. I also have bought some Hitech ND Grads and can tell you they are superb for the money. Excellent clarity and all round performance. I often use mine in conjunction with a polariser, with little or no discernible loss in sharpness and the results have real impact.

Regards
David