Camera to Photoshop to Smugmug Process
jh4wvu
Registered Users Posts: 169 Major grins
I am just getting started with Smugmug and will have to do my processing a little different from what I am currently doing. I wanted to start this discussion to get an idea of how other get there images ready for SM.
Options that I thought about doing....
A. Upload original image directly from the camera - no post-processing.
B. Open images up in Photoshop CS with batch processing to Sharpen then Save as...jpeg 10/12 and then upload to Smugmug.
Note: For most of my galleries -- the largest photo I will be selling is an 8 x 12. Anything larger will be in a seperate gallery and will be processed in PS before uploading.
I would like to get your opinions on what you do to get you images ready for posting. I am using a Canon 10D which create excellant photos but on the soft side which is why I thought about sharpening before uploading.
I appreciate your feedback and comments.
Thanks,
Chris
Options that I thought about doing....
A. Upload original image directly from the camera - no post-processing.
B. Open images up in Photoshop CS with batch processing to Sharpen then Save as...jpeg 10/12 and then upload to Smugmug.
Note: For most of my galleries -- the largest photo I will be selling is an 8 x 12. Anything larger will be in a seperate gallery and will be processed in PS before uploading.
I would like to get your opinions on what you do to get you images ready for posting. I am using a Canon 10D which create excellant photos but on the soft side which is why I thought about sharpening before uploading.
I appreciate your feedback and comments.
Thanks,
Chris
0
Comments
We notice from the prints we ship and the feedback we receive, consumers like their prints sharper than pros do. Consumers judge the quality of prints and the printers they were made on by their sharpness. We had someone post on dpreview the other day that our prints were awful, and when I followed up to see what was happening, it was that his local photo store was applying additional sharpening, which we don't do with the true color option, which he chose. Since ours were fuzzier, his conclusion was our printers were pretty bad.
Just about every good print lab I know says what we say about compression: no one can tell a JPEG 10 from a JPEG 12, but they're 1/3 the size.
Thanks,
Baldy
I'll wade in on this one, but first. Why will you have to change your processing? How are you doing it now?
As with anything my processing method is evolving, for the better I hope. First I only shoot raw. The raw image is processed normally. In PS Color balance tweak, Shadow/Highlight, and what ever else. Image saved as .psd or .tif. Then crop and use the FM plugin for the 10D to upres to to 300 ppi. Save that to .psd. I've started using the LAB sharpening, see ruff's two threads on the subject. I save that as .psd and as .jpg (from now on at 10:D). Up load the .jpg to SM.
I don't reopen a jpg file to work on it, I have psd or tif for that.
Hope this helps
Mitch
Basically, I am currently using Imagefolio to run my gallery and have the ordering setup so it uses Paypal to process the payment. Then when an order comes in I actually process each photo according to the size ordered -- make color changes, contast, etc - if needed and sharpen using FM tools.
Prior to posting on the web I batch process the images in PS to reduce the resolution to 72 dpi. Then I use Digital Dutch's Arles Image Web Page Creator to only reduce the images to 400 pixels. As it reduces the images, sharpens and adds a copyright statement to the photos all at the same time and is faster than doing it in PS. It doesn't open each photo like PS does.
I then upload them via FTP to a folder on my server for my customers to view. I would upload the full images and tie them to a photo ordering page (like EZprints) but I don't have the space to upload the full size images.
Question --- so the images you upload to SM are already 300 dpi?
FYI, up-rezing the photo to 300 dpi isn't necessary. EZ Prints will up-rez your photos for you, and they do so with an algorithm that's designed for use with their printers. Further, depending on the item, 300 dpi isn't exactly correct since there are printers doing 302, 254, and 200 dpi. That results in more image quality loss that wouldn't have had to occur as they have to up-rez or down-rez. It'll result in a better photo if you just let them do it.
Up-rezing in general isn't something you want to do since you're really inventing new data, and the data isn't really that "intelligent" anyway. It should only be done as a last step by a printer who knows what they're doing. Almost never for display.
(I wouldn't shoot in RAW, either, but that's another subject entirely).
Don
Again, not to beat a dead horse, but I wouldn't resize/uprez/downrez your photos *AT ALL* if you can help it. Each operation destroys data in your photo, FAR more than saving at a lower JPEG setting or not shooting in RAW.
Upload your original resolution (cropped, yes, but not resampled) to smugmug and enjoy knowing your prints will come out gorgeous.
Don
Mitch
OK Don, I'll bite. Why would you not shoot in RAW? I assume for some work-flow related reason? Or perhaps you see it as a crutch for those not shooting with proper settings? Your post implies for some image quality reason, and I have a hard time accepting that.
Also, I have a question for you about re-rezing. Since joining smugmug, I have adopted the practice of re-rezing my 4×6 print images to 302 dpi because I understood EZ-prints wouldn't resample these--giving me the best representation of the image I uploaded. It seems to me, to have the best control over sharpening, one should re-rez, then sharpen. Would your contention be that I should perform final sharpening on the original image size and accept that when EZ-prints re-rezes and re-sharpens, I'll get the same or better results compared to re-rezing and sharpening at 302 ppi?
Thanks,
Ben
www.ackersphotography.com
I find this essential, but if you don't shoot a lot or often, then photoshop might work well.
-winn
Actually, I just did such a thing in Photoshop CS2 and Adobe Bridge, in my first try at a CS2-to-Web workflow. In Bridge, select 18 raws, open them all in Camera Raw. Determine initial good settings, work out noise reduction settings, sync to other 17 open raw frames, blam. Oh, wait, client wanted black and white. Set saturation to zero, sync ONLY Saturation to other 17 open raw frames, blam. Make individual exposure/tone tweaks, crop any frames as needed (we're still in Camera Raw CS2 at this point), now ready for the mass raw conversion, go. Walk away for a couple minutes. Come back, they're all open in Photoshop now. Run batch action to fit to web size, run batch action to run Smart Sharpen (a godsend), done and done. Now I run a batch of Save for Web, and I have a folder full of Web-ready JPGs. Anything left to do? Oh yeah, drag 'em all to Smugmug uploader. Wow! I like CS2.
Method 1:
If I shoot jpg then I could bring it into PS make corrections if needed and sharpen the image and save it as a jpg 10 then upload to SM.
Method 2:
If I shoot in RAW -- bring it into PS, make necessary corrections/sharpen -- save as jpg 10 then upload to SM. Now in PS when a RAW image is first opened there is an area to change the Size (Pixels) and the resolution. Should I have these set as if I were shooting in jpg (3072x2048 and 180 dpi) or something different?
Usually I am fine with just uploading the original however I wish the sharpening that EZprints does is a little heavier.
Thanks for all the feedback especially with a newbie.
Chris
In Photoshop there are 4 places to change the pixel count. Camera Raw, the Image Size command, the Fit Image command, and Save for Web command. It doesn't matter that much where you change it. If you are aiming for a maximum quality upload, don't change it at all - just set it to the same as the camera's native image size, which would normally be whatever the RAW default size is, which should be the same as the maximum quality JPEG size. Sounds like in your case that's 3072x2048.
What to shoot in is definitely a personal preference, which is why I didn't go into detail before. But I'm happy to now.
High level details:
- RAW sounds like an image format, but it's really not. Canon and Nikon's RAW images are very different. As a result, software can't reliably read them, and when you switch cameras or software or other parts of your workflow, you might be stuck. You're using something that's proprietary to store your precious photos. Want to read that RAW image in 10 years? Good luck.
- RAW is big, cumbersome, and "expensive". It takes your camera and your PC a *long time* to open, process, store, and use RAW images. Time is money. Time waiting for your camera to write the image also means you lose precious shots. I'd much rather have 2-3X as many photos of my subject and get the best shot than have mediocre shots that are imperceptibly different.
- RAW vs JPEG12 vs JPEG10. No-one can tell the difference. Look at them at 4X zoom or printed out with a loupe. Do your own side-by-side comparison, don't take my word for it. But there have been contests online for people to pick which is which - no-one has been able to do it. Pixel for pixel, to humans, they're identical. Yet JPEG10 is much smaller, and thus, faster to work with in your workflow, easier to backup, easier to move, etc.
I could go on, but I think you get the point.
Don
I think the easy answer is to do what I would do in your case: Do it both ways, get prints, and compare them yourself.
If you're not wanting to go through the effort, I'd let EZPrints do it. They're the experts and they consistently deliver amazing quality. We've got a 20x30 that was made from 100dpi hanging on our wall. It's *gorgeous*. We took it to COBA (a local pro/geek camera club) and showed it off, people couldn't believe how nice it looked. They'd never seen up-rezing like it.
Don
We've printed more than 1,000,000 (!!) prints. Straight from the horse's mouth, here's what we've learned:
Since # of pixels and compression are never (way way less than 0.1% of our complaints from 1M prints) an issue, why use RAW? Why bother upsampling and downsampling and stuff? Focus on your color correction.
Don
Camera: Olympus E-1, 54mm f/18 1/160s ISO 100
File: Camera is set to RAW + JPEG (highest quality)
Lighting: AB 800 set 1 stop too dark
Color: Camera's Auto White Balance
The original in-camera jpeg, scaled down:
Note the brightness, which was intentionally set 1 stop too low, and the white balance, which is less-than-perfect.
I brought the RAW into Bibble, slid the brightness slider to +1 stop, and
clicked on the background to set whitebalance. Here's the result:
Then I opened the jpg up in PS. I added a curves adjustment layer, and
moved the upper right point to half-way (half the light = 1 stop), and
tweaked it very slightly to try to match the brightness of the raw file. I
then clicked with the gray selector on the background to set the white
balance. Here is a 100% comparison:
RAW file, brightness, WB................................................In Camera JPEG, curves, wb
I'll leave the conclusion up to interperation.
-winn
I really don't think there are a lot of people out there shooting in RAW because of pixel count and compression issues. Most people, I hope, are shooting RAW because it provides the greatest latitude in color correction (and exposure)--exactly what you suggest people focus on. I know I am.
You may have a point about upsampling and downsampling. While the arguement that to get exactly what you want, you should resample and sharpen at the print resolution makes logical snese, the proof is really in the pudding. I think I'll run some tests as you suggest, and see if the extra effort is worth it.
Thanks for your thoughts,
Ben
www.ackersphotography.com
Hmmm. Well, I'll take the RAW.
Look at the posterization in the lower left highlight of the JPEG--not good.
Also, the JPEG obviously received some in-camera sharpening the RAW file did not. Again, I favor the RAW in this respect, because you can sharpen the final impage yourself.
Ben
www.ackersphotography.com
As has been the case lately here, ol' onethummb is almost completely off his rocker here! As was mentioned before, no one shoots raw for file size or compression reasons! Geeesh, man.
We shoot raw to get the extra dynamic range raw provides with many cameras, and the after the fact exposure adjustments, color temperature, and whitebalance adjustments. Nothing beats a raw file on an image shot with improper white balance. Nothing beats raw period.
You might have a point using third party raw software, but not a very big one. Raw is the number one tool for correcting a poorly color balanced shot and that is the bottom line. It is also the standard file used on tough exposures because of it's originality and versatility!
Also good points were made that the photographer can make some adjustments better than the camera, after the fact, like sharpness for sure!
Geesh, please at least find out the advantages of using a raw file before you try to say a jpg10 is the same thing as my raw to 16bit tiff!!! So stop the bs now. If you have the time, shoot the raw file, otherwise, you are cheating yourself if you don't!
When you print large prints jpg10 is no where near the same as a raw to 16bit tiff. That's the facts jack!! I'm not saying you can't get somethig good from jpg10's but you wony get the same thing in almost all cases as you would if you would have shot raw. Now, a perfectly exposed and balanced jpg is tough to beat with raw to the nakid eye at most sizes, but how many of you shoot everything perfectly? Yup, thats why you shoot raw when you have the time.
My preferred raw file is the .mrw
Get raw or get lost! hahahah
-winn
Raw can blow jpg10 away in many instances, and almost everyone that knows anything knows that.
rawk on and peace out
Please post how you prepare your images before uploading them to Smugmug. I think this was what I was wanting to know in the beginning. It is nice to see what others are doing which may help me as well as other newbies.
Chris
work image over with raw ps plugin built by a third party programmer that designed the software for the specific raw file
convert to 16bit tiff adobeRGB file
set softproof to smugmug proofing profile (or cymk in some cases, according to some-particularlily facework)
work image over to make it look real gooood
check out of gamut warning and make adj as needed
make sure crop is proper
flatten and convert to 8 bits when called for
convert to srgb
upoload to the smug
But as a result, this isn't an apples-to-apples comparison. Bibble apparently makes it easy to set the whitebalance and brightness, but that's merely a tools thing - not a format limitation. There's no reason you can't, using other software, do the same thing to the JPG or a BMP or TIFF.
I can take a photo and edit it in Photoshop and then edit a copy in Microsoft Paint and guess which one will look better?
Try doing an apples-to-apples comparison using only the same tool that reads RAW (say, Photoshop CS/CS2) for both and compare.
Don
You don\\\'t seem to understand the raw format, onethumb. A raw file and a processed jpg are two different things. One lets you recreate camera settings, photoshopping or painting a jpg is nothing more than \\\"guessing\\\" at what you should have. You give up a ton of what you gain in raw by even shooting jpg in the first place. You can not do the same thing with jpgs that you can do with raw files. Don\\\'t even try to think you can.
That is a fact.
Btw, if you want a free paint program that works well, try fantastic machines paint engine, couple that with buzz pro and a few nik filters and you won\\\'t have to lean painter or spend a bundle....but it won\\\'t get that dynamic range and exposure lattitude back without shooting the original in raw.
[url=""]http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/Glossary/Digital_Imaging/RAW_01.htm[/url]
In bibble, I set the RAW file's white balance by clicking on the white background. I adjusted the brightness slider +1 stop. I then copied these settings, and applied them to the in-camera jpeg. Here are the results:
I encourage anyone who cares to download both files and post your own results. You can download them here: http://brilliantphoton.com/forums/onion.zip
-Winn
I beleive I followed the suggestions of Baldy and Onethumb (sort of at least). Processed the image and sharpened in PS. No uprez, but did crop to 11x14. Now on my epson 2200 I can make 13X19's no problem, but I do uprez. Then made a second with 16x20 crop, did not recrop 11x14.
Here are the numbers:
11X14 @ 186.37 DPI
12 compress 3.65 MB
10 compress 1.46 MB
16X20 @ 128 DPI
12 compress 3.40 MB
10 compress 1.35 MB
Ok...Baldy and Onethumb.
I am shooting with a 10D in RAW.
1. When I order an 11X14 from the 11X14 crop at "compress 10" I will get as good a print as when I uprez and print to my 2200, right?
2. When setting custom prices for either the 11X14 or 16X20 I get the message "Some products not listed due to small image size. Try uploading a larger image." HUH? Larger how?
3. If I were to order a 16X20 from the "compress 10" would I be happy? with it.
Mitch
[url=""]http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/Glossary/Digital_Imaging/RAW_01.htm[/url]
Some banter on Raw and dynamic range from the *famed* Petteri:
[url=""]http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1000&message=13296843[/url]
Some more unscientific examples and banter in a current 96 post thread on this subject.
[url=""]http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1019&message=13351398[/url]
What are the image diminsions in pixels you are trying to upload? If what you are saying is correct, it looks to me like the system is telling you you need more pixels, not megabytes. Pixels and megs are two different things. It sounds like you are using too small of pixel counts for the print sizes. (You need larger real image diminsions) Maybe onethumb can post a link to the minimum pixel counts needed for the various larger print sizes.