First DSLR

[Dick McGowan]

If you have the kit lens......the "sweet spot" is f/8 or so they say.

 

[Dan Cook]

I'm enjoying the Rebel so far.

 

[Jim Hunt]

OK, so I pick but the horizon is off by about 5 degrees and some sharpening and saturation would make it pop. I can post a corrected example if you like.

 

[Dan Cook]

sure that'd be cool.

Another thing: how do you access RAW images taken?

 

[Dan Cook]

ignore the RAW question; figured it out.

 

[Jim Hunt]

sure that'd be cool.

Another thing: how do you access RAW images taken?

 

[Dan Cook]

What did you do? I can't really tell a difference between the two.

 

[Jim Hunt]

What did you do? I can't really tell a difference between the two.

All done with Photoshop CS2.

I leveled the horizon first. Since there was no horizon, I used the deck and made sure it was straight up and down. Naturally the photo became smaller after that.

I then sharpened the photo using the unsharpen mask

Amount: 85%
Radius: 1 pixel
Threshold: 4 levels

I raised the black point in levels to 5 (from 0).

I then push the entire saturation to 10 and then the red channel to 30.

See the time difference side by side?

 

[Dan Cook]

Cool. Can you do this with Elements as well?

 

[Mike Hollingshead]

Cool. Can you do this with Elements as well?

Yes.

I'm not sure you can work in 16 bit with elements though(but who knows maybe you can with the newer versions). It's worthwhile to have something you can work in 16 bit with.

 

[Eric Flescher]

thanks for posting that website

thanks for posting that website. I will have to explore it although I already have too many books.


**

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understanding-histograms.shtml

If you don't understand the histogram I'd learn.....and use it over what the brightness/exposure looks like on the LCD. If you hit play to view an image and then click on info, you'll see it pop up. Images don't like to be brightened up later in PS, they'll be noisier than if you'd shot them right(even using a low ISO).

About that kit lens. Mine sucked, but mine was also the earlier version, a completely different lens....at least I'm pretty sure. I've heard better things about the newer kit lens they send out with those. Hank Baker just said on highinstability last week the rebel kit was a good lens. So maybe they've got something much better than the old version now.

Not sure what you know or don't, and what you are looking to hear, but a DSLR is a DSLR, essentially. There's only going to be a very few things you can do to get the images right. I made this page on basic stuff a while back: http://www.extremeinstability.com/misc07-1-26.htm Just not a whole lot to the workings of a camera. It's best to save yourself some "trouble" and do away with all the auto and "various landscape/sports/etc" settings, and just learn the basics that get you where you need to be.