A few from today.
Model : Angela

Camera : RZ67ProII
Lens : 110mm f2.8
Back : Leaf Aptus 22

1.


2.


3.


4.


5.


MvrGr.
Frank

[quote=Frank Doorhof,Jun 29 2008, 01:04 AM]
A few from today.
Model : Angela

Camera : RZ67ProII
Lens : 110mm f2.8
Back : Leaf Aptus 22

Hi Frank
just out of interest are you shooting those photos for clients, yourself or the model
ook mvrgr
m*

forgot to mention
I really like this series!!
m*

Is it just me, or does a lot of the stuff posted here look retouched to an extreme? To my eye a fair amount of the portraits in this thread look too sharp, too smooth, plastic. Is it heavy handed retouching or just the look of these backs?

@Marc,
These were actually shot during one of my basic workshops.
So during teaching.

@203,
Downconversion to the web makes the pictures look like sh*t to be honest.
On the originals there is ALOT of detail in the skin and they are not oversharpened.


This is the average detail you get on a 1:1 crop, and this one IS slightly oversharpened by the way, the sample was done for another forum.

Frank,

Everytime you post that eyeball you scare me.

JR

I look at hundreds of images on the web every day, obviously they've all been resized, and not all of them look like they've been gone over with a heavy duty air brush. Many of these look odd to me.

Just my opinion.

Frank

Love the work and always look fwd. to seeing more.
One comment, not a critique Image 3 looks odd being portrait but with a 'blad notched film back frame, unless it's an 'in' joke.

2 is best for me with the hand shadow picking up on the top pattern but then I look at the lighting on 1 and 4. and wonder again.
Don't go the way of some others and stop posting please, it is appreciated, even if not always commented on.

@James,
Scary isn't it
Just love the way the system captured this one.

@Chris,
Don't worry, I'm used to alot.
The blad frame is not intentional, did not notice it to be honest, to be honest I thought it looked like the framematerial of my own system but I must be wrong than, see it as in inside joke than
just playing arround with some frames.

@203,
Maybe it's my downsizing than, I know that on print I often get the request of the models if I could do it maybe one notch more, which is declined, I hate the barbie look in print, but on the net I also find the files to lack detail but to be quite honest I have simply accepted that.
I did see some files that had nice detail but when I saw the prints of those I was not so pleased, very uneven skin and in the end we all retouch for print I guess.

But I would love to see your work, I'm always curious about people that post what they do themselfs (no bad intentions).

Sure, here are a few from my recent postings here (I'm sure you have seen a few of them)

http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index....ndpost&p=202580

http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index....ndpost&p=202593

http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index....ndpost&p=202639

http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index....ndpost&p=202633

And by the way Frank, my comment was not aimed at any one photographer here. It was a general observation.

Frank two things..
One is good job you finally tried out some new lighting...:+] Looks good
You were getting stuck on that octo and using just it...
The other is.

Not to push your buttons but you should not blame the web-sizing downsizing or what ever you blamed it on... You OVER retouching your skin.. which is cool if that is the look your looking for, Just don't blame it on web-sizing.. It is really obvious you a little out of control on your skin smoothing.. in all your pictures.
Has nothing to do with downsizing.
Just had to point that out as I have seen you blame it on websizing and has nothing to do with that..:+}
Snook


Frank the crop you show has not been retouched and as you said is over sharpened..
I am a professional retoucher also so I know skin blurring when I see it.
Again the crop you showed has not been hit with the or Kodak Air brush plug-in or some kind of De-noise, medium , etc..etc.. how ever you want to skin the cat , it has nothing to do with the websize...
:+}
Just want to be clear...

@203,
of course I could have looked better
No harm done, I'm not someone looking for a problem in every comment.

@snook,
Maybe it's my style than but the crop I showed does show more than enough detail I guess.... ?
That is appr. what is used before downsizing.
Sometimes a bit more sometimes less, depending on the model.

As you can see with the samples from 203 they are much larger than what I post so more detail is saved.
But there is always discussion about skinsmooth and when I look at some magazines it's frighting when it looks like there is no pore left in the face on a A4 size.

Again I don't say I don't process the skin, and for some maybe too much but that's what I like, if the client says natural we do it natural if the client says over the top, yes sir. My PERSONAL taste is still seeing pores but hanging towards surrealisme/airbrush.

But again it's all personal taste, there is no overdoing something I think, there is a personal taste, in art you can't be wrong I think.

About light, please visit www.frankdoorhof.com/portfolio I think that shows a lot of different lightsetups, but I do use alot of softlights that is true

I have seen some of Frank's images as prints, probably 13x19 I guess, and I will say that there is a lot more skin detail in his prints than does appear in these online examples.

why don't you show them a 100% crop of the shoulder of that last #5 picture Frank.. that's probably more usefull than a crop of a diffrent photo.

Isn't there a way to retouch the images in a way they look good on the web as well? I mean.. if you find the web images not 100% show the way you really think the images are.. isn't that something you want to do something about? You might miss out on customers/girls who think it's too smooth

I have to take another one than, the last picture used a very wide aperture so showing the shoulder would be totally oof

This is the avarage work I do on the skin (99% of the work)
I also used alien skin exposure 2 on this file to add some "feel"



and here the original webversion:

Personally, I think it is not for anyone to say a photographer's work is over retouched or not. The right party to say this will be his clients, the pay-master. No other party whether photographer nor retoucher is qualified.

Gidday,

I totally agree with you Henry.

That's why I stopped putting up my beauty shots up on this site as I was getting pissed off by the purest police


Cheers

Simon

Well let's also post some landscape than:
whole album from our LA trip can be seen here: http://www.htforum.nl/fotofrank/thumbnails.php?album=53
With much more than landscapes.

I love this one (apart from banding in the sky, which I assume is either a jpeg artifact or the horrible monitor I'm using at the moment). I wonder if it might look even better in B&W...

Jeremy

Hey Henry!
I am glad when someone whose opinion I respect points out something odd about my images...then i can chose to take their advice, or not. No harm done. After all, if the members here are in no position to say what is wrong about an image, then logically they must not be in a position to say what's right about it either.

So,why would someone post a picture here in the first place? Do they want everyone to look in silence? Do they welcome praise, but not critique?

Hello Ron,

There is an artful way and a crude way in saying things. Unfortunately, most comments in a forum like this can sound down right crude and also rude. It may not be intended and it may also due to differences in cultures. However, IMHO one should always be respectful and thankful for having the opportunity to view works by others, be they good or poor works.

I have always valued your postings, ever since you shared your opinions and findings of the EOS 5D. The samples you have provided were excellent and useful to me. However, I also witnessed people nitpicking on those images perhaps they just felt it was their right to do so. Some also sounded crude. I wished then also that they had just thank you and be on their way.

Do continue to share your images from the 1Ds MKIII, which I find to be a pleasurable tool

Indeed I will.
And just for the record, I think saying someone's retouching is over the top, is one of the least critical things that could be said about an image.
If the only critique I ever got was about retouching, then I would assume I was in pretty good shape ;-)

Out of curiosity Frank, why do you put the Elinchrom logo on your images?

I hope we can get back to the original idea of this thread and that was just for posting MFDB photos with some information. That it is what has made it so successful.

Although there have been a number of exchanges, the critiques and arguments have been held down to a minimum.

So I hope that we can keep it to that intent. It has really separated this thread and forum out from the many useless threads on forums that pop up way too often.

Agree with you 100% 203..
This is a thread to show what people and what quality's are coming out of their cameras...:+}
Not a gallery of Pictures.
Also I was totally turned off from the leaf b/c all the post Frank posted, you could see that over plasticy skin in his images, which is Fine.....!
Just wanted to see if it was over retouched like I thought or if it was a tendancy of the Leaf system to give that smooth look much like the Fuji F30 did and does... Which I love for the point and shoot, Not for 15,000$ back..:+}
Now when Frank several times has said there is not retouching or skin smoothing goin on it is just the websize...
Then why when I look at 1000's of internet pictures a a day none seem to have the same effect.?

Just wanted to make sure that no-body get's confused between Over retocuhed and Websizing..
That is all...
Also showing a Close up that has not been overly retouched and saying it is the same as the Obvious overly smoothed out skin from another picture is another story!

That is why in an earlier post I posted an image with the SAME image cropped 100% to show the skin.
Again I will say, that many times the girls,I shoot many times, have such bad skin that there is no other option than to get heavy with the hand in retouching..

Not trying to knock naybody just want to get the story straight as to what frank is saying is websizing and what is very smoothed out skin from Photoshop or the likes, Not the camera, back or anything else!
You Got it..:+}
Snook

Hi,
It all depends on the poster and the way it's read.
I have made some comments on someones posts that he took the complete wrong way and even called me an A*hole.
I told him it was all in good intention and it was just meant to help him improve, better I did not do that because he became more angry....

After carefully rereading my posts I really could not figure out what was wrong and I decided to let it go.

It's sometimes the disadvantage of the written word, you can't look someone in the eye, and some people are terrible at posting things.

I always read with the idea of the best intentions of the poster, and if it's really rude I let it go, IF I respond it's to tell MY side of the story and that's in my opinion were a forum is for, and in photography you can't be wrong unless you post technical wrong pictures. There is always a matter of personal taste.
I always read what people think about my work and will defend my work of course when needed, and show by crops or other examples what is going on.
It's not really defending to show, but I think that's what keeps a forum going.

On the Elinchrom logo, Elinchrom does ALOT for me and supports me in the workshops I teach where ever I am in the world, so it's the least I can do, they don't pay me for it, it's my own choice.

@Snook,
People that read all the letters in my replies will read that I always say I DO retouch my work, but that ALOT is lost during downsizing.
If someone wants a RAW file they can always mail me, no problem.

That's also why I showed a 100% crop with the internet version next to it in my second crop post, to show what happens.

It's weird you would judge the quality of a back by internet, internet is sRGB and 8 bits and small, if you want to see the difference between a phase one or leaf back based on internet version, with all due respect but than you are never going to see a difference.

MAYBE..... just maybe.....
All the leaf photographers retouch alot and phase one user don't ???
Just kidding of course but if you say you see that in all the Leaf files I really can't place that.
I compared both in detail and changing the RAW developer did away with almost all the differences between the leaf and phase one.

I decided to test it in MY workflow and than the Leaf came out on top on shadow detail and skintones, but again change your RAW convertor and the story can be different.

In the very end my decision was based on the support I got from Leaf in the first hours after posting my questions (phase one responded two weeks after I already bought the leaf), and the overal feel of the system in which I liked leaf better.

But again if you want to judge a system on internet versions or on retouched work you are doing it wrong, get RAW files from the SAME scenes and compare flash with daylight/ambiantlight and than you can see a difference, otherwise it's almost impossible.

By the way, you asked me to post when I got the brighter screen. Got it today in the mail and posted a small review on my blog www.doorhof.nl/blog in the review section of the RZ.

So, back to the photos.

I just saw it thank you..:+}
Probably going to pick one up myself or another Bill Maxwell screen..
Thanks for the information..:+]
Snook

Will update the review in the coming days after I did some work with it.

(usually a lurker here)

Frank,

That blue sky has obviously been overly smoothed... could you post a 100% crop so that we can see all the detail?



Great work everyone... I'm a small format shooter (MF wanna-be) and I truly enjoy the work and discourse in this thread.

Keep it up!

My Best,
Shelby
http://www.shelbylewis.com

Frank, if this is something you would want to change, you can try downsizing in 2 steps - 2x the final size, sharpen a bit and then downsize once more to final size, resharpen.

Gidday,

Some thing different. Shot yesterday for a office and stationary company.


Stats

Lensbabies F6.8
Mamiya 645AFDII
Leaf Aptus 75
8th Sec 50ISO
Processed in Adobe Bridge
Lighting was with Dedo’s

Cheers

Simon

@Michael,
I resize in one step and sharpen, tried two steps but could not see a huge difference.

Frank,

if your original file is much larger than the final web image, you could try the first downsizing step to a larger size than 2x of final. The idea is that each resizing iteration carries some information from a larger size.

When image gets downsized there is some pixel averaging being performed in a specific radious around each pixel. When downsize ratio of each downsizing iteration is not very large, this radius is small and each resulting pixel is packaged with more precise information averaged from the original image pixels. If radious is large (at large downsize ratio) the averaging is so intense that details get lost.

Depending on the algorithm of interpolation, the results of performing downsizing in iterative steps or in a single step may or may not be the same. However, when Bicubic method is used (as in Photoshop), it seems to have an effect and you should get more detailed downsizing with properly selected iterations. It may be worth some time to calculate the best iteration strategy, but for now, some experimenting may suffice:) May be give it a try with more than 2 iterations, see if that makes a difference.

I will do some tests this week.

p45+ Mamiya 120mm
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@simplify: I like the second one very much.

@simplify,
What a first post.
Great shots, love the inclusion of people in the landscapes.
All are great for me.

Hi
I would like everyone to look at the work of Alec Soth that was used for this excellent story. I don't know what format these photos were taken on but for me they are very moving.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/portal/main.jht...m_america05.xml

Thanks Denis

Alec Soth works large format, typically 8x10 from what i understand. He shot the dog days, bogota series on medium format. But the rest is all large format, and always film. He´s one of my favs. I wouldn´t say the landscapes are his forte by any means. He´s much better working with people, but the landscapes are essential in telling this story.

Alec Soth is one of my favorite photographers. I own Dog Days Bagota and it is an amazing piece of work.

Here are some more of my images from the past month. P45+



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For those of you who had a look at Alec Soth's work and the accompanying article I thought I'd add that Detroit is even worse then it's portrayed. I live and work just outside of the city and have for the majority of my 55 years. The economic and political problems that face us are tremendous, strangely though, as Martha Reeves was quoted, the city is better looking and even a little safer then any other time of my adult life. But this is a photography forum so perhaps I should comment on the photography, which, I though was okay, but then again I see those scenes whenever I venture a few miles south. Attached is a shot I took last November of the Michigan Central Station which was designed by the same architects as the Grand Central Station in New York. It hasn't fared as well. I started shooting there when it was still a viable facility, I believe it stopped being used about twenty years ago. It's claim to fame most recently was as a location seen at the end of the movie, Transformers. Jim


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The special thing about Alec Soth's work is his perfect light and color. I can stare at the images for an extremely long time because I am not distracted by any kind of color shift or digital look. I would like to see how he would shoot this train station above. Your version looks very cyan and the grass is pretty nuclear, although I do like the shot.

Hi Jim
As far as good lighting and all that is concerned your photo stands way above Alec's work!
m*

Simplify,

You can start by selling your P45+ and start shooting 8x10 negative film if that lovely creamy feel you seem to enjoy in Soth's work is what you are after. Now don't be surprised when you see the film at 200% as we are used to doing so with digital cameras and then you start to question why there is not as much detail/info as Jim's nice shot of the train station. Digital just has that sterile(clinical) quality to it. This is the same as HDTVs versus HQ tube equivalents as they tend to show way too much info and the brightness level can be a eye sore at times.

Print it them both and that's another story. The 8x10 will just feel nicer not better these are just the properties of a Large Format film.

Hi,
One small not on HD tube TV's vs digital displays.
One thing first I'm not a fan of LCD's, Plasma (panasonic/pioneer) is a much better choice.

Remember that alot of HD CRT TV's are downsampling the 1080i signal to 576P to display it, Philips for example uses this technique.
It's nowhere mentioned in the manual but when looking at the service docs it's obvious.

I used a CRT projector for a long time to also view HD material and that one DID do 1080P, we switched to a JVC D-Ila HD100 (the new HD projector) and I prefer that one above any CRT (except the liquid coupled 9")

CRT is a wonderful technique for projection, for TV's in todays HD age I think plasma is an overall beter choice.

I Love Alec Soth's work and have followed his photography since his first book. I love the blending of the 'traditional' genres of Landscape, Social doc and formal portraiture. (One of the best examples of mixing Landscape and documentary was Koudelka's CHAOS)

Technically he appears firmly rooted in the American 'school' of 8" x 10" colour neg, Sternfeld, Meyrowitz, Misrach.

I am currently shifting from shooting 8" x 10" to MFDB late in a project that's been running for 6 years. The prints are very large from both media and using high quality printing processes. Some aspects of the MFDB files are smoother and 'creamier' than the 8X10 but others fall down, particularly when trying to sharpen evenly and naturally across areas of complex detail. In 8 x 10 you always have that layer of film grain to 'fall back on'. When an MFDB file starts breaking up on a large print (from long exposure noise usually) it's hard to recover...

Murray

Thanks for the comments on the train station. Please don't get me wrong, I like the Soth photographs, it's just hard for me to get by the subject matter. Personally, I prefer more graphic compositions, attached is a shot taken the same morning as the Michigan Central picture. Also, keep in mind that these photographs are imaged to look the way they do. Usually I'll work off of the basic color scheme and enhance from there. Jim


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Upon review of the Michigan Central Station image, I agree with Simplify, it got a little overcooked. Here's another look at it. Jim


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That has made some difference!... I can connect with the second image so much more fundementely (gave up on trying to spell that apologies)

I would be interested in knowing what lens you used to capture that image Jim ... is it two 35mms stitched together?

Thanks and regards

Ros

www.roskavanagh.com