Fixing Images

Here's a question that I've starting wondering about. It all boils down to a simple question, however, I'm going to ask it by describing a couple of situations and then sum it up with a question.

After I take the photo, I open it in Gimp. First ufRAW takes it so I can tweak curves which is a requirement of working with a RAW image. This is the digital equivalent to developing the film unless I'm way off base.

Once I get it into Gimp I tend to do 3 or 4 adjustments.

1) I'll bump up the contrast if I feel it needs it.

2) I'll increase the saturation a bit.

3) I'll sharpen or use the unsharp mask.

Now, let's go back to the camera. Let's return to the point where I'm about to take the photo. If I spend a bunch of money on better lenses and nail the focus I know that will get me a much sharper image. I've already run into a few shots that I've taken with my nifty fifty that really didn't need to be sharpened.

What do I do to "increase saturation" when taking the photo?

What do I do to "increase contrast" when taking the photo?

Is it a case of a longer exposure? Am I just experiencing a situation when I don't have enough light and should be considering a flash? Maybe I need a wider/narrower aperture? What mistakes am I making that cause me to make these adjustments in post?

Can anyone explain this?

I get the impression from casual reading that it's in part that it's digital. It doesn't capture things with quite the subtlety that the human eye, or even film is capable of. Having said that, I'm assuming there's an equivalent to my camera's Picture Control. It has half a dozen, oh, styles I guess you would call them, where it changes various saturations, balances and contrasts on the jpeg or preview according to which one you select.

In PSE, once you have the plugin for various cameras installed, you can choose these same modes to give the same results of the camera's adjustment to your review image in place of Adobe's ACR. I don't know if uRAW has the same capabilities, though I see a section for camera profiles on their site. If you haven't downloaded yours it might be worth a try. I can't tell from the site if it has the different "style" modes for each camera.

In PSE's RAW module there is a very definite difference in the way the photo looks when moving from one style to another. Most of the time I use what Nikon calls Standard (also what I shoot with it set to, so the preview on the camera looks pretty close). It seems to give a good overall balance in most circumstances. Other choices are Neutral (which really shows that the Standard adds saturation), Vivid, Monochrome, Portrait and Landscape.

If I don't like the way it looks I can try another style. I also find letting Adobe take a first whack at it with its various auto corrections helps, or at least gives me an idea of what to try if the results aren't quite what I want.

Hope this gives you some ideas for poking around for what you need.

Maybe I'm not explaining myself well enough. I wrote a lot of words but what I'm really getting down to is this:

How can I improve the contrast - in camera?

How can I improve the saturation - in camera?

I find when I take shots I sometimes see more contrast or saturation in real life than I do in the resulting image. Is it that the camera cannot capture that information or am I doing something wrong?

If you are working in RAW, you may not see a large amount of saturation and contrast until you edit your image. When you do your editing try upping the clarity and vibrance first and you may find you do not even need to touch the saturation slider at all. If you are shooting in jpg, you have the options available on the camera to change the photo or you can do custom settings on some cameras but basically your camera is doing for you what you would be doing in post anyway. The only other thing I can suggest is to really think about your exposure. That is the biggest factor I think, in how your photos will come out.

The only way I can think of Iggy, when shooting RAW, is to avoid over-exposure. That's when colours wash out.

Perhaps take the photos with auto bracketing on or simply take a few shots and bump the aperture up (higher f-stop, smaller aperture) each time. I do that with sunsets.

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Here's a question that I've starting wondering about. It all boils down to a simple question, however, I'm going to ask it by describing a couple of situations and then sum it up with a question.

After I take the photo, I open it in Gimp. First ufRAW takes it so I can tweak curves which is a requirement of working with a RAW image. This is the digital equivalent to developing the film unless I'm way off base.

For me this (or your #1) is a redundant step - but I use photoshop. I use levels or curves to get the overall tonal range (contrast) right. Then I'll find smaller areas and I may tweak the local contrast there as well.

Once I get it into Gimp I tend to do 3 or 4 adjustments.

1) I'll bump up the contrast if I feel it needs it.

One important step that's missing is colour correction

2) I'll increase the saturation a bit.

This may or may not be necessary. It is surely not a given imo.

3) I'll sharpen or use the unsharp mask.

Now, let's go back to the camera. Let's return to the point where I'm about to take the photo. If I spend a bunch of money on better lenses and nail the focus I know that will get me a much sharper image. I've already run into a few shots that I've taken with my nifty fifty that really didn't need to be sharpened.

What do I do to "increase saturation" when taking the photo?

Increasing saturation mostly has to do with the light lighting the object. If the light is too harsh saturation is DECREASED. If it is soft and diffused (like on a cloudy day) saturation is increased.

You can also underexpose (up to a point) and this too should increase saturation, but may underexpose other parts of the image.

What do I do to "increase contrast" when taking the photo?

Is it a case of a longer exposure? Am I just experiencing a situation when I don't have enough light and should be considering a flash? Maybe I need a wider/narrower aperture? What mistakes am I making that cause me to make these adjustments in post?

Contrast is the difference between the light and dark values in any scene. Here's the quick answer...I'll simply change 1 word in your question. What do I do to "increase contrast" when LIGHTING the photo?

The outdoor light that is lighting your scene is difficult to control. For ease, let's say you are shooting at night. very little light - very little contrast. So it's up to YOU to add the light you need to increase the contrast. (FLASH PERHAPS) The identical principle applies during the day. If the sun is too bright and making the scene too contrasty, reduce its quantity/quality by using a diffusion sheet or move into the shade.

Unless you have a team with you...this is often hard to do and a lot has to do with what you are shooting. Normally you search or wait for the good light.

UNLESS you are in full control of all the lights as in a studio. Contrast control is usually done in PP. In the darkroom, it was done by using filters.

Can anyone explain this?

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Hope that helped - Marko

I took a while to respond to this only because I wanted to spend some time on my response.

Gimp doesn't open RAW natively. It goes "through" ufRAW. In ufRaw I can tweak a lot of things before it gets pushed into Gimp for editing. I noticed when I tried Photoshop Elements it did something very similar. There are tons of controls in ufRAW for levels, curves, colour adjustment, etc., etc. most of which I never use. Mostly because I still don't really understand what I am supposed to do with them. I generally just tweak here and there until I get something I like and then I only stick to 2 or 3 specific controls.

No, I don't always bump saturation but if I think I'd like to have more saturation I will either do it in ufRAW or in Gimp. It doesn't appear any different to me regardless of the tool. Your description of the harsh vs soft light being the delineating factor of saturation was what I didn't understand. It now makes more sense and I'm sure I've read it somewhere before but inconveniently forgotten it. :( And your description of contrast has educated me as well. Thank you.

The key, I guess, is that you need to have the right light when you take the shot whether it's artificial or sunlight. Instinctively, I've always known this but I never seemed to make the connection between the available light and the attributes affected by it.

I think I understand it more, now. Thanks to everyone for your help.

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The key, I guess, is that you need to have the right light when you take the shot whether it's artificial or sunlight. Instinctively, I've always known this but I never seemed to make the connection between the available light and the attributes affected by it.

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This is indeed the key imo and one of the reasons that many great photographers spend WAY WAY WAY more time waiting (for the good light) than shooting in mediocre or bad light.