First Nikon Portrait Shoot

JimFuglestad · October 8, 2009

So... after 6 years of shooting Canon, I got tired of looking at the same buttons, switches, displays, and handling. I get bored too easily, I guess. My lenses had been depleted through damage and loss, so last week I decided to make a switch to Nikon.

I picked up a 70-200 and 18-50 and bought a used D300 off dgrinner Bill O'Neil.

Did a shoot last weekend with a borrowed D70 as I had the lenses but no camera, and finished it up this evening with the D300 - 20 minutes after I had the camera in my hands. Not recommended.

Anyway... hope everyone here is well.

kidzmom · October 8, 2009

I LOVE THESE! Thank you for posting this. I did a shoot of myself when I was pregnant on stairs like those (they were made from wooden railroad ties). Anyway, I'm inspired again! I LOVE your processing and those boys are gorgeous!!!! NICE NICE NICE!

rhondavid · October 8, 2009

I'm impressed. Great shots of some handsome little guys. Congrats on your new gear. You are off to a great start based on what I see here.

Way Off Piste · October 8, 2009

JimFuglestad wrote:

So... after 6 years of shooting Canon, I got tired of looking at the same buttons, switches, displays, and handling. I get bored too easily, I guess. My lenses had been depleted through damage and loss, so last week I decided to make a switch to Nikon.

I picked up a 70-200 and 18-50 and bought a used D300 off dgrinner Bill O'Neil.

Did a shoot last weekend with a borrowed D70 as I had the lenses but no camera, and finished it up this evening with the D300 - 20 minutes after I had the camera in my hands. Not recommended.

Anyway... hope everyone here is well.

I think these are not only great shots, but I love your post work! Enjoy your new D300!

Swartzy · October 8, 2009

Beautifully captured and processed Jim. Lovely work as always. Nikon you say? Nice to see you around!

Kinkajou · October 8, 2009

#3! #3!

That is just awesome.

VayCayMom · October 8, 2009

Goes to show it's not the camera that makes it great, it's the person using it!! NICE! # 3 just about takes my breath away.

angevin1 · October 8, 2009

Sweet photos!

JimFuglestad · October 8, 2009

@kidzmom... Thanks for you comments! I do love those stairs. Fortunately they're scattered around the neighborhood I live. And yay for being inspired again! Mission accomplished!

@rhondavid... Thanks! I am excited about the new gear. I'm so not a gear-guy, but this change is motivating me. Now if I can just figure out how to use the dang thing...

@way off piste... processing is half the battle. At least. Moreso, shooting in a way that supports how you post-process is close to the other half. The gear is just for fun.

@swartzy... it's nice to be around again! Taking it all down a notch makes it more fun to share and participate on the photography forums again! It's been well over a year since I've done much of anything to do with photography, and I've started to miss it.

@kinkajou... Yeah, #3 is definitely my fave as well. That one surprised me. And that one was with the D70!

@vaycaymom... I like to believe the gear doesn't matter - although sometimes it does - mostly just to make us confident and enjoy the shooting! Thanks for the comment!

@angevin1... Thanks! Now I need to figure out what to shoot next!

Thanks everyone for your comments and your welcome!

Jim

toddb · October 8, 2009

great work
Fantastic captures and love the processing. Love the posing -- how much of that was your direction and how much of it was how the boys naturally are?

printergirl · October 8, 2009

Wow. Very nice work. I must say #3 and #4 are my favs in the bunch. Nice PP work.

Qarik · October 8, 2009

KAPOW! these are great! #3 and 4 just steal the show. #3 is fabulous. :ivar :ivar The only I am not so keen on is #1 dueto the boys face looking bit dirty.

PrettyKitty · October 8, 2009

Wowsa!
Gorgeous pictures! Like everyone else I like #3 the best.

Would Care to share a little about your processing method? Just a hint?

goldilocksandmy3bears · October 8, 2009

LOVE these!!!

Can you share your PP (haha whoops that sounded funny) let me re-word that can you share the processing techniques you used on these.

JimFuglestad · October 9, 2009

Thanks again everyone! Qarik... interesting. I saw the milk mustache when I was shooting and was undecided about whether I wanted it left on. I decided that it could always be removed. I'm still undecided whether I want to. He came with the milk mustache, and it's who he was that day. I did remove it on some of them, though. I'm sure I'll offer a version without, and although I think it's cute, just the fact that I wondered about it is reason enough to realize that a client may not feel the same way. If it were a full mustache, or more pronounced I'd probably like it more.

Many have asked about my PP, err... wait, that was only goldilocks... it was the post-processing you were interested in.

So... I'm pretty much an open book with my processing, as much of it that I can remember, anyway.

A few things to know first. I dislike Photoshop. These were edited in Photoshop because I made a mistake of buying a Mac Quad Pro and Paint Shop Pro doesn't run on a Mac. I'm now installing Windows on my Mac so I can go back to Paint Shop Pro . I swear by it. I've never used an action in my life. I wouldn't even know where to start.

Although I keep it simple, it's not easy. Nor quick. When I find a photo that touches me I can easily spend several hours nick-picking it. And really, that's only a long time if your doing it to 100 photos. When you find a photo that deserves it, 12 hours isn't too long to make it great.

There are primarily six things you need to know how to do in your editing tool:

1. Individual selections (lasso tool)
2. Layers and blend modes
3. Channel Mixer (or your BW conversion of choice)
4. Levels
5. Color Correction
6. Dodge and Burn Tool

Generally, with only a few exceptions, I don't do much more than those 5 things. I just perform the steps over and over and over to several parts of an image. Often painstakingly.

A couple other things to know... My processing begins before I even take the first shot. I shoot unorthodoxly. I do not shoot to get proper exposure. I won't use fill. I intentionally underexpose my photos. I've been doing it for years and I haven't been convinced not to. I've tried a few times but wasn't able to get the results I like. I will often shoot at ISO 800 when I could shoot at 200 - just to get texture. I'll shoot into the sun because I want to emphasize rim-light or flare. Flare's a good thing. I shoot jpg. I don't care about recovering highlights because I underexpose. How elegant. ha Underexposing, in my preference, provides a textured look I can't otherwise achieve.

Okay, I was going to share how I post-processed these...

Remember first that the photos are all dark and stuff when I look at them for the first time. I'm disappointed when they're accidentally exposed properly.

I don't have a set order of what I do first, it's usually what strikes me first. I'm going to use the #3 image in this example because it seemed to be most appreciated. And maybe I guess I first need to share the original.

Ugh. Yeah, here's one technically bad picture. At least I didn't have to worry about blown highlights! :ivar

The first thing I did was address the dark eyes. This shot needed eyes that popped. So, a simple selection of each eye and then I performed levels on them to brighten them. I also realized that I'd like this better if I could see the teeth a bit better, so I selected them as well and slightly leveled them.

Next, I wanted the image to be overall brighter, but less bright around the edges. So, I duplicated the layer, applied levels to the whole image, and then used the eraser around the edges to make the boy stand out a little bit.

I don't remember for sure, but I think I did a little selective burning around the sides and corners of the image - but very VERY slight.

I then duplicated the image and applied a burn blend mode at about a 4-5% opacity to the top layer. This helps create a little depth and contrast to the image in all the right places. Then, I think I duplicated the layer and applied a multiply blend mode to the top layer. A multiply blend mode is awesome for creating or emphasizing texture (my favorite trait in a photo). I'm sure after I did the multiply blend mode I did another levels on the whole image. Then, for the final step, I duplicated the layer again and applied a soft light blend mode at maybe 20%, then merged the layers, duplicated the layer again, and applied a soft light blend mode at about 15%.

That's pretty much it. I probably did the eyes one more time after it was all done to make them how I wanted them.

Basically I jack around a lot with duplicate layers and blend modes - and where I like the effect on the image I leave it - where I don't I erase slightly over the top. I always merge the duplicate layers. I almost never have more than two layers on an image at any time.

I know this wasn't specific, but it's pretty much how I do every image. Sometimes more, sometimes less - but the six components mentioned above always play a role.

Oh... for the stair photos, I pretty much incorporated many of the same steps, but I often don't like how the colors look after I do soft light or overlay blend mode layers, so I duplicate the layer, use channel mixer to create a monochrome image, and then change the opacity of the bw image to about 30-45% over the color image. It kind of works like desaturating - but not quite.

I hope this helps a little bit. All I can suggest is that you play, play, play. Try blend modes just to see what they do. Erase over parts of the top layer. Use selective editing.

Don't hurry. It takes time to get an image right, and it's usually worth it in the end. Oh... also... don't spend the time on an image that will never get there regardless of how much time you spend.

Have a great weekend!

If you're interested, here are two more of the originals...

This one was actually exposed more to the right than I would have liked. An accident.

Jacobovs · October 9, 2009

Amazing shots! 3 really does take ones breath away!

kidzmom · October 9, 2009

That was an awesome step by step. Thanks so much for taking the time to write that all down!

I am new to post processing and having a GRAND time. I know you said you didn't like PSE that much (unfortunately what I was told was best). Anyway, that being said...I have a few questions for you.

1. Do you NEED layers? Why can't you edit directly to the original? ie just do the levels on the eyes in the first background layer? I have not yet begun to experiement with layers. Not sure how to, but I have used Lighting, color control, lasso and color correction.

2.What is an action? What does this mean? I've heard it before but I haven't yet figured out what it is!!!

Yesterday you commented on my photo of the little girl with the finger in her mouth. You mentioned I was almost there....I tinkered with it a bit more. Do you have any thoughts? You were very right about the redness around the eyes. The minute you said that I wanted to fix it!

Thanks for your suggestions and your step by step walk through. Very helpful

VayCayMom · October 9, 2009

kidzmom wrote:

That was an awesome step by step. Thanks so much for taking the time to write that all down!

I am new to post processing and having a GRAND time. I know you said you didn't like PSE that much (unfortunately what I was told was best). Anyway, that being said...I have a few questions for you.

1. Do you NEED layers? Why can't you edit directly to the original? ie just do the levels on the eyes in the first background layer? I have not yet begun to experiement with layers. Not sure how to, but I have used Lighting, color control, lasso and color correction.

2.What is an action? What does this mean? I've heard it before but I haven't yet figured out what it is!!!

Yesterday you commented on my photo of the little girl with the finger in her mouth. You mentioned I was almost there....I tinkered with it a bit more. Do you have any thoughts? You were very right about the redness around the eyes. The minute you said that I wanted to fix it!

Thanks for your suggestions and your step by step walk through. Very helpful

Sorry to kidnap your thread for a moment Jim.. Kidzmom, it took me a while to figure out what an action was too. Say you want to do a particular process to your photos, let's say you really like to darken the edges and lighten the middle, an action is like pressing speed dial on your phone, it does it automatically .. all the steps required without you having to do it all manually. You can make them yourself, I don't know how myself, you can download free ones from lot's of places online and you can buy them from ton's of people and places online. Check out Pioneer Woman online, google it, wonderful blog, lot's of info and free actions.

divamum · October 9, 2009

Jim - I had a look at your website and your work is just AWESOME - I am totally blown away by just about every portrait that's there; if I have "style" to which I aspire, I think it's yours. Nowhere near there yet, although having fun trying (still too busy being banal to get more secure with the technical aspects of things, and graduate from "enthusiastic, somewhat-educated n00b" to "actually knowing what I'm doing, but I do know what I'd LIKE To be able to achieve... someday.... with a bit of luck and a tailwind...

). Thanks for sharing these, your processing tips, and the comments I"ve seen you post in other threads - I sure hope you stick around this place long enough that I get to learn from you!

Ed911 · October 9, 2009

Nice work Jim. I really like your post processing...what depth. Good to see you're back.

And Jim...you're right about the equipment...once your get some reasonably good stuff...it's all about the end user and what you do with what you get.

Thanks for sharing...

First Nikon Portrait Shoot

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