Help on laboratory photo set?

schmoo

This week I was asked to take photos for a campus brochure. Normally this wouldn't be an issue but the situation ended up being much more difficult than I had anticipated:

1. The laboratory we are working on is a cleanroom facility that manufactures live cell products for human cancer vaccines. This means cGMP, teletubby suits, masks, goggles, double gloves, the whole deal.

2. I was dressed in the above, which made shooting... fun. It made "seeing" each shot difficult as well as moving around to capture the action very tricky (almost tripped and fell twice!)

3. Everything is the same color in there. Beige or white or silver. (i.e. Not the most inspiring and beautiful of scenery)

4. Mediocre fluorescent lighting. Flat.

5. As a result of #4 I was shooting at ISO 800, handheld of course. I went with the 24-105 with the IS because my only faster lens is the 85mm and the room just wasn't big enough for that.

6. I had to get out of there before they actually opened the flasks because my camera is "dirty." Which gave me approximately 20 minutes to do everything from start to finish.

I'd really like some feedback on the few that I've processed so far in the event that I need to reschedule with them to reshoot. I played with curves extensively but I'm really worried about the noise popping out and the WB being off. And I still think they look underexposed. Maybe even a bit soft. Not having a lot of media experience I am unsure yet as to how they will handle my digital files when I'm finished so I'm extra worried about the quality of them.

Not to mention that this is could be my first possibly major publication... :

pathfinder

Stephanie, HI!!

Sterile, off white lab spaces make for sterile off white color images:D:D

Funny, I did not hear you mention flash, or off camera flash. That would solve a lot of the lighting problems. Have you seen my thread about Christmas candids with off camera flash?

Using an EOS flash with a foamie diffuser bounced off a wall helps brighten a dark environment without looking like a harsh flash lighting. Shoot in Av and balance flash against ambient. Then you can shoot at ISO 200 or 400 instead of 800. Better color, what there is of it, less noise, sharper images due to shorter shutter speeds, better light in general.

The fluorescent lighting of the lab is strongly overhead, which gives very bright tops of heads and shadows under eyes, chins, bellies, etc, etc. The paper being looked at on the desk is too dark as a result of the shadow of the worker for instance.

I really think you did fairly well, given the imposed limitations on equipment and the nature of the facility.

24mm is probably not nearly wide enough with a crop camera for this subject either. A wider angle lens would allow much closer, tighter shooting of the forground elements, like the Coulter counter.

But directional flash would create much more dramatic directional lighting, and then B&W might be a consideration. But even in color, this is a monochromatic world basically. Shoot more shots of people doing things too. Brightly colored solutions are always good, even is they are fakeD

I do not think I know a short simple answer to shooting this area. The working conditions - suit, goggle, gloves, etc are annoying ( I use similar gear every day:D) the lighting is overhead and flat, and there is very little color. You will have to work on all of these areas to create dramatic shots - I think better lighting is the first requirement.

You have a very experimental eye, schmoo - put it to use here, do not let the facility intimidate your creative juices. I have seen your work and I know that you can get some great angles here if you relax and approach it more reflectively.

And bring a flash, and borrow an ST-E2 to trigger it.

schmoo

Jim, thank you so much for your in-depth suggestions!

I admit, no I did not use external flash. Embarrassingly it is because I don't own one... and while that is not a very good excuse the second part of that is because I didn't have the time to rent one for this, either.

I thought about it and thought about it even more after I first read your suggestions. While my inexperience with flash units certainly makes me very timid and nervous about experimenting with one for such a major project, I know I need to get this done. Our director is out of town until next week so I have to wait and see if I can reschedule to re-shoot, but I think your advice has given me a sufficient kick in the pants to learn more about lighting.

Also, you are right about the 24 not being wide enough. I admit that I was considering the IS factor more than what I might want to achieve with composition.

If I do get the chance to get another go at this I'll be posting results from that and see if they are better. Having only 20 minutes for all of this was nerve-wracking... especially right after Marc said that he takes days to scout, consider and shoot!

Thanks again -- I love me some feedback!!

pathfinder

Steph, I thought you did good under the situation you were given.

Your color balance is good and you WERE shooting indoors, under flourescent iights - not the easiest task in the world.

Your shots are sharp, and your compositions are effective.

And you seemed quite aware of the challenges involving the safety garments, gloves, lighting, environmental colors etc.

I was just trying to help you think outside the box, so to speak.

I don't know if you can borrow an EOS 580EX - the university newspaper might have somthing like that. An off camera cord can help a great deal, but it has much shorter than the reach of an ST-E2 indoors.

BinaryFx

schmooo wrote:

I'd really like some feedback on the few that I've processed so far in the event that I need to reschedule with them to reshoot. I played with curves extensively but I'm really worried about the noise popping out and the WB being off. And I still think they look underexposed. Maybe even a bit soft. Not having a lot of media experience I am unsure yet as to how they will handle my digital files when I'm finished so I'm extra worried about the quality of them.

Schmooo, although you mentioned tone/sharpness - I would like to bring up gray balance. All of your shots are slightly warm in the highlights to midtones (shadows often being neutral). OK, a brief note on sharpness, or more importantly, having a steep contrast range in the midtone area of the image and or major area of interest, either through use of curves as recommended by Dan Margulis and/or by filtering, as below.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/contrast-enhancement.shtml
http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=16827&view=findpost&p=118202
http://www.naturescapes.net/062004/gd0604.htm
http://www.dgrin.com/showpost.php?p=567170&postcount=33

For example, the third image of the bottle. I can make an educated guess that the label would be white and that a human would perceive the colour/tone as a neutral/white. Photoshop Info palette readings of the label indicate that an average area is 235r 216g 211b, assuming sRGB as the editing space. This equates to 88L 7a 5b in LAB info readings. In an RGB editing space (not RGB device space like monitor or scanner), equal values (R=G=B) indicate a neutral, the closer the three numbers are to each other, the more neutral the hue. In LAB, zero AB values indicate a neutral. The A channel has the opposing magenta/green hues, while the B channel has blue/yellow. Positive AB values indicate warmness, negative coolness. The higher the value the greater the intensity. So 7a (warm magenta) and 5b (warm yellow) with a high lightness value of 88L indicate a light warm red "white".

The same goes for the neutral midtone areas, like the various metallic silver type surfaces. It is obvious that there are slight variations in tone and hue between these surfaces, but all read as being slightly warm.

All of this can be addressed with setting a neutral whitepoint and other neutral tones, both neutrals and colour areas will be cleaned with this global colour editing move.

I will post a quick example in a few minutes.

Regards,

Stephen Marsh.
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx/

BinaryFx

Left is the original.

Centre is a quick levels eyedropper adjustment, neutral midtone eyedropper move on the 'silver' metalwork above the bottle cap (60L 0A 0B), followed by neutral highlight eyedropper move on the label (90L 0A 0B). The order plays a major role, as each affects the other. If the neutral midtones are considered more important, then they would be set last rather than the highlight (one usually sets, shadows, then highlights then midtones).

Right is manual curves to each individual RGB channel, going 'by the numbers'.
http://www.ledet.com/margulis/PP7_Ch02_ByTheNumbers.pdf

Using an adjustment layer, one can change blending modes to colour or lower opacity or use blend if sliders or other moves to limit the results of the correction into the original image. These two edits have moved the image from subtly warm, to cool and neutral.

Even if the third more neutral file is printed in a magazine, depending on the press and page content and the GCR used for the CMYK separation of the image, the image may or may not print neutral, or subtly cooler, or subtly warmer, or perhaps right for hue but slightly darker or lighter etc.

Hope this helps,

Stephen Marsh.
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx/