Archive for the 'how to' Category

Sigma DP1 AML-1 Lens review - In Video and Pictures!

Images of AML-1

About a week ago I received the much awaited (at least by me) close up lens made by Sigma. I must say that I was happily surprised about the little leather box that came with the lens! Soooo retro and beautifully crafted! WELL DONE SIGMA! Now, is the lens as good as the box it came in? :D

Images of AML-1Images of AML-1

I’ve read numerous threads over at dpreview on different solutions and I’ve seen magnificent macro shots with all sorts of filters - some good, some not so good. Now, when the Sigma AML-1 was announced I was a bit surprised on the closest distance which is 20cm - not very Macro on a 28mm lens is it?! :D and in order to show you just how close 20cm is and what it feels like - I made this little video. If you watch it on Youtube then you can see it in higher resolution. Embedded is low res.

The lens is very bright - not sure you loose any light. Can’t really see any difference in shutter speeds and the lens says nothing about it. You can’t focus to infinity with it on - but it’s made for closeups so it’s not really a problem. OOF becomes BEAUTIFUL! Especially welcome when you’re making movies. Along with the extremely sharp lens and sensor it becomes almost unreal. Take a look at the shot of Linn, click it and the full version will load. It’s so so detailed. If the DP1 only had MORE resolution when making movies!! :D

Sigma DP1 AML-1 test images

The AML-1 as a slight negative distortion in corners - The opposite to the type of distortion we’re used to with normal lenses. But it’s not noticeable in day to day images. The picture below shows the effect, look at the window and you’ll understand what I mean.

Sigma DP1 AML-1 test images

Sigma DP1 AML-1 test images Sigma DP1 AML-1 test images

Conclusion. I should have had TWO lenses or even three and stacked them, that would probably give very nice macros. Right now you don’t get close enough for that type of photography with only one lens. For movies and portraits such as the ones above it’s a wonderful solution and gives you new views - plus that the extreme OOF is perfect for videos.

Btw, the lens / filter itself is very very well made and NO CA can be found. At least not in any of my photos so far. Contrast and sharpnes are really top notch.

DP1 movie school.. movie.

Listen carefully in the end and together with this movie you can go and create your own great DP1 epic thing. AEL + WB + Close focus + ND = great stuff!

1. Lock white balance to dominant light source (or whatever you want) in this case “sunlight”

2. Move camera around and press AEL (lock exposure) when you think you got a good overall working exposure. Sky skin should be ok.

3. Press the “Focus” button (one time up on the four way dial on the DP1) this gives you close up mode or Macro mode (focus is now about 30-40cm from camera)

4. It helps to have a ND grad filter ready. Most occasions are perfect for this, makes a nice moody feeling. Very much used by the film industry. You can of course try different colors etc .

5. If you attach a polarizer it gives even more dramatic feeling to your movie. Deep nice colors with cool skies and less sweet in faces. If you have the wrong size you can hand hold it. haha

6. Upsize your video using “super resolution” with Video enhancer software (free 30day trial). PC only. I use VM-ware to run it on my Mac.

You don’t need a close up lens. I don’t have one. I will try to find one though. :D Film in macro mode MUST be cool!

Dp1 + polarizer + movie!!!


This was FUN! I took a lot of photos this way too, a cool way to frame your subjects but a bit tricky to balance it all. One hand filming and trying to keep sturdy and control the polarizer at the same time. AND walk. I’m not a woman am I.

Filmed with the Dp1 of course. :)

Red Blue Yellow color filter + Tobacco tone

Using a filter holder + Cokin filters you can play with black and white the good old way. First I tried with filter and then I tried the photoshop / lightroom way - I used the predefined color filter option that is available in photoshop in order to make a fair comparison. Click for “the big picture”. The black and white “real” images are made by using the monochrome wb option inside SPP. And yes, it could have been a more intresting scene but it works.  You get similair result directly from camera if you select in-camera black and white jpeg mode. see this image.

When I bought my mini cokin A (amature) holder then I bought some filters at the same time. All ND’s were sold so I had to buy some colorful ones instead. One was called tobacco or coffee grad - can’t remember what word they used. Both works. :) And I have done several black and whites with it on and it works great. One cool thing is also that when you put camera into black and white mode (jpeg) and use a filter such as this you get really nice nice results directly out of the camera. Feels cool too when you aim as you see the result directly on the LCD.

Cokin color filter test. Dp1.

Direct output from camera using filter and black and white mode: (ISO800)

direcly-from-camera-bw

New SPP due soon! First preview.

[edit - Sigma today announced the new version for PC and Mac here as well as first DP1 update]

Working with SPP - DP1 all shots Elmia foto video 2008

I’ve been lucky enough to get my hands on a beta of the next SPP 2.x and for those of you being irritated of green corners I can now tell you that green corners are now only a bad memory! :D I could only test the PC version but it ran extremely quick under vm-ware, actually much faster than my Mac version of SPP3.1. I did try some SD14 files and especially reds are now better. But this article will concentrate on DP1 images.

I thought that my photos from Elmia foto video 2008 could be used for this preview and at the same time you can see what I do in SPP and maybe learn something about processing. In every image there is important data inside. Exposure, ISO, White balance as well as processing. All kinds of situations ranging from high iso mixed light to long exposures in tricky situations. And as an extra bonus - studio shots! Continue to read this article.

Continue reading ‘New SPP due soon! First preview.’

DP1 Sigma Photo Pro “How I” movie.


Sound level is HIGH! Unless you LOVE my voice turn down your volume! This movie shows how I work with DP1 raw files in SPP 3.1 on a Mac. If you wanna try this at home, download some of the raw files to get started. Step two? Get the camera!

I’m currently trying to upload to youtube - resolution will be much worse but faster to load and divided into two parts. This movie is 500×375px, 128MB small and 16 minutes long. Download it for local playback using VLC or other flash player.

HDR with one shot iso3200 process - movie! :D

Turn volume down! Sounds like old radio with broken speakers. And, beware, you might need to know your RD in order to really follow - anyways. It’s a simple workflow. :)

Learn flash photography | Club shots

[Update 2008-01-2: RAW package with club-shots for download!]

To get good pictures in bad light condition is easy if you know how to do it. This guide will show you one, easy way with the help of an external flash. You can use your on-camera flash but results will probably not look as soft and as pleasing. It works the same way though.  This guide in swedish.

Preparation. All things written here works for most Nikon / Canon / whatever branded flashes / SLR cameras (even advanced point and shooters). I use the Sigma SD14 + a EF-500DG. I like it because of colors and sharpness. You need a flash where you can twirl and rotate the head.  (see picture below)

my flash

Set the camera in Manual mode (M) - aim the flash straight up and turn the head as seen on the above picture, you should have the white side of the paper aimed at the person you’re photographing. (see abetterbouncecard.com - Mine is heavily inspired by this one). You can use A mode as well and let camera control shutter speed but I like to be in charge.

Aperture. Now I tune aperture to F1.6. I use Sigma 30mm almost wide open so that shutter speeds are durable at ISO100 - if your lens is slower you might consider ISO400 - 800 or even higher - if not you will have to stand still for a second or two just waiting for the shutter to close. I also use F1.6 so that main subjects become sharp and background soft and cozy. See background on below picture.

Locatelli Friday

Shutter speed. When you decided you aperture it’s time for your shutter speed. Now don’t look at the speed itself, look at the under / over exposed information +-0 thingi - you see this in your view finder. The higher this number is, the brighter the background is. The lower - the darker. Darker means faster shutter speed.

Fill light. The main subjects will be more or less the same whatever you select and is controlled by the TTL. I’m often down to -2 or even lower because I want main subjects to stand out a bit more (see picture below).

flashinstructions

Above picture was a misstake and I used in camera Jpeg. I suggest you use RAW in order to get the most out of every picture. Click for higher resolution.

I always use ISO100 - this to get punchy living colors and perfect sharpness down to pixel by pixel level. You never know what you might wanna do with these pictures and it’s always nice to be able to print really really big.

Assist light. Whatever flash you use - a good assist light is of great importance. If you have it, it will work automatically. Without it you can forget using fun lenses such as the 30mm. remember that at F1.6 focus is extremly narrow and it’s cruzial that focus hits the eyelash and nothing else. (Focus on the eyes to get the most pleasing results. Lucky for us ladies paint them for us!).

Experiment. If you wanna go wide you can use a lens such as the 10-20 and shoot at F4 and 2-8s - that will give you cool colors and fancy dancing, you need to be quite stable though seconds are loong time and  don’t bring a tripod.

Also try to hold still for a moment and the quickly move away, that’s what I did to get this blue trike above her face. (below picture) Shutter speed 1.6s at ISO100 and F1.6.

Lounch(s) Saturday

White Balance / LCD. I use Sun White balance on the SD14 because it gives the most pleasing results on the LCD. And this is VERY important. If it looks bad on the LCD you will not get an OK from the person. Doesn’t matter how good you’re in the computer since they don’t know that. Later I adjust colors in my raw developer, SUN WB is a great starting point. Sunlight and flash is very close in temperature.

Good luck!

Articles including lots o photos and some more info:
http://www.rytterfalk.com/2007/12/30/lounges-saturday-2912-avenyse/
http://www.rytterfalk.com/2007/12/30/excet-saturday-2912-avenyse/
http://www.rytterfalk.com/2007/12/30/locatelli-friday-2812-avenyse/
http://www.rytterfalk.com/2007/12/30/tranquilo-friday-avenyse/
http://www.rytterfalk.com/2007/12/22/sd14-at-night-clubs/

Studio trial’n'error software. Where is it?

I’ve been searching the internet for a studio setup test drive type of software that gives you the possibility to try different soft boxes, light sources, temperatures, backgrounds, lenses but nothing to be found. Is this an area that has been over looked or is it me that just don’t know how to find it?

I’m taking something simple to use, easy to setup and that isn’t branded but covers most things that you can do in a studio and with some common used shapes, bodies, things as test objects.

This way you could by using the computer find the look you’re after without the need of 3D Studio Max or Alias - and without a model. Of course there should be some standard setups included that you can play with. mmm..

Does this exist already or is there any good programmer out there that wanna do this with me?

Raw pack 3 and Flash movie!


Click to download four SD14 RAW files
Download RAW pack 3 now.

I just bought a screencast software named iShowU - very small and cool. Makes screen movies in real time in whatever file format you want. Cool! The Lightroom movie you see is made with it.

Software recommended: Sigma Photo Pro, Adobe camera raw 4.1 or Lightroom 1.1

Skype me | whenever..

UPDATE! For the moment the “Call me” button doesn’t work, if you know how to get the small javascript used to work, please tell me. Will update this post whenever it’s fixed. Until then,

Please feel free to give me a call! If I’m not at the computer you will be redirected to my mobile phone (you don’t pay anything). If you’re in Sweden you can use this local number: 031-360 7486 and still get to China. Download skype at www.skype.com

EDIT: If you’re a skype user, my user name is “rytterfalk” - add me and we could have a chat some day.

Che Guevara PS work | how to movie.

Jacob as someone elseWas looking at some photoshoptv episodes and in one episode they did some very ugly transparency test, what I now will show you is how to exercise that way of working in a little more nice, useful way. :) We can call this the “che guevara PS exercise”.

OBS! This exercise has nothing to do with my political viewpoints of any sort. Remember I live in China and these types of images are everywhere. :)

It’s short but useful. At one part I hold down the ALT key in order to divide two handles. You will probably get what i mean when looking. If not, ask me.

Play Quicktime movie now!

Find image to play with!

SDx mockup | how to

Mockup

Here you see all the images that I used in order to create yesterdays mockup of a future version of a pro Sigma camera. From the top right you see a Nikon D2x, that one gave me the viewfinder. I like the look of that one. (F90 style) Under the D2x you see the new Nikon D200 and as you see it has a monster to LCD. I took it. The rest of the mockup would be a mix between my beloved Sigma SD10 and the Sigma created Kodak 14c body. There is details pretty much created by myself as well but in big this is what I used and done.

Clicking the links takes you to the part of each cameras review where you can see the full images. Maybe you can create something better?! Please try and post. I will post in in this article.

Closer look at my mockup

Send in your version and it will be shown here:

Continue reading ‘SDx mockup | how to’

High pass sharpening | how to

high pass sharpening how to movie
I found a sharpening method that is very interesting and fun to play with. And it’s called “high pass sharpening” . This little movie (18MB) will show you how it works and what you can do with it.

Play High pass sharpening movie.

Download photo used on movie for your own practise here.

Test print target | free download!

Test print target. There is many test print targets out there and I’ve been searching to find the perfect one. None has really been great so I decided to make my own. This test-print is made for testing grey scale, CMYK as well as RGB possibilities on your printer.

Thanks to Günter Hördt, Thomas Mottle and Yi Ding I not only have a great test target for printers I also have great photos to look at. All photos are taken with Sigma cameras btw. This target is also a great way of testing different sharpening methods in order to get that great look out of your prints.

Image data:
File size 10.8MB | 8bit AdobeRGB | 287 x 184 mm @ 300Dpi | 3385 x 2173 pixels.

(click on image to download original TIFF, 10.8MB (re-uploaded, should work now)
Or right-click on link and select “download linked file” Don’t convert to CMYK before printing.

Color correction | action download!

Download Color correction action file for Adobe Photoshop. Provided to you by Bob van Ooik. Unzip and load. It will do most of the work for you. Remember to always press OK after each dialog. Look at videos for further instructions.

Color correction | How to

Color correction for everyone. Color correction is not always simple, and what I wanna show you is one way that I found (on the internet) works very good. If you have a monitor that isn’t calibrated then this method might save your day. All three movies shows the same thing, but with different scenes. I made them as a test.

Do this many times and soon you can do it on the fly and it’s a great way of at least check how your image could look like. And I know I should have sound and say something. I’ll try soon.

Play Part 1 (12.9MB - this one includes how to setup your curves tool correctly)
Play Part 2 (2.5MB - DivX test)
Play Part 3 (4.8MB - tricky indoor scen)

Hold down the shift key when setting numbered markers. You can only set 4. (one black, one white, two grey) Grey marker I set two because grey point is tricky and you might wanna test two spots.

Feedback please.

Changed my hard drive!

After traveling the country side of yunnan my computer had multiple times crashed into the walls of the bus (or truck or whatever transportation available). It still worked, but I felt that somehow the speed had gone down and the overall feeling was that one day it would crash. I did benchmarks (using Xbench) and results where really bad and I went out in the search for the ultimate replacement.

After reading this article at Barefeats.com I decided for the Hitachi 7K100. Without any guarantees left from Apple (my computer was bought in may 2004) I decided to do it myself, I googled for some time and after hours of searching (donno why) I found this splendid how to article.

Everything went well, it’s a tricky thing to open a powerbook! :) But now it’s all together and all my software reinstalled, and benchmarks?! From a mediocre score of 33 to a much improved 46 (sometimes as high as 48) I can really feel how much faster everything is! I was thinking about a MacBook pro but Now I’ll keep my baby a little longer.

:) And I have a feeling that something much improved is around the corner. There is no new 12″ and 17″ and why have the capability of playing full HD (1920×1080p) when you don’t have a blue ray or a HDDVD drive?!

Günter Hördt | Baryte paper action

Günter Hördt, fellow photographer showed on dpreview Sigma forum how to make a warmtone baryte paper feeling to images. He gave us a step by step explanation and I decided to make an action for easy use. Download the action here! (right click and Save as)


Copyright Günter Hördt
Click image to view more images by Günter Hördt.

Sending BIG files..

Thanks to a fellow photographer Peter Argyropoulos at Dpreview I now know how to send BIG files. Using a free service called Yousendit. I gave it a try today with a 30MB tiff (Thanks Anton Kjellén) and when the mail arrived I got a link to the tiff file and downloaded with 30kb/s.

This is indeed very good news for me. The current roof of 10-15mb is by this gone, and I can receive huge image files. So from now, TIFF’s are welcome! :D