JeTexas Posted July 14, 2011 Share #1 Posted July 14, 2011 Advertisement (gone after registration) I shot alligators, birds, squirrels, etc. on black & white film last weekend. I've scanned them into the computer, but I'm having a terrible time getting the animals to stand out. The red cardinal just blends into the tree and the green alligator just blends into the brown bank. Since the images were already in black & white, the color sliders don't do much of anything for me. I made about five layers and over-lightened each one, then dropped the opacity to slowly get to this point where the alligator is fairly well defined, but it seems like his head still doesn't stand out enough. Any ideas? The beggar by ffacker, on Flickr Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 Hi JeTexas, Take a look here How do you get animals to stand out in black and white?. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
jaapv Posted July 14, 2011 Share #2 Posted July 14, 2011 On film? You are left with dodging and burning I think. Best done in a wet darkroom. You lose to much by a scan imo. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie Roberts Posted July 14, 2011 Share #3 Posted July 14, 2011 So you're stuck with luminosity moves here, but that's still a lot! It's not just dodge and burn (though that would help). You could boost contrast by quite a bit (and move lighter and darker tones farther apart all at once) and that would help a lot. You can do that with a number of tools; Photoshop, Silver EFX, and others. We used to do that in the darkroom with multigrade papers, toning and filters Then you can dodge and burn to make something really work... If you want us to work a couple of examples, send a little higher res file... maybe the bird too? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
JeTexas Posted July 14, 2011 Author Share #4 Posted July 14, 2011 I didn't think to use the dodge tool. I'll try that. I'm definitely running into an issue with film scans where if I try to lighten the photo, I just get film grain and dust showing. Unfortunately, I don't have an enlarger for actual darkroom printing at home. If you click the photo, you can access and download the full resolution version from Flickr. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
username1 Posted July 15, 2011 Share #5 Posted July 15, 2011 Select the beach and lighten it with brighten and contrast then burn in the head just a bit. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
stunsworth Posted July 15, 2011 Share #6 Posted July 15, 2011 If you use Photoshop create a mask using the lasso tool and then a levels adjustment layer on the selected area. Repeat as necessary. Far more flexible that the dodge and burn tools IMHO. Make sure you select a feathering value of say 50 pixels to avoid the selection looking obvious. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
username1 Posted July 15, 2011 Share #7 Posted July 15, 2011 Advertisement (gone after registration) Select the beach and lighten it with brighten and contrast then burn in the head just a bit. gator | Flickr - Photo Sharing! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
250swb Posted July 15, 2011 Share #8 Posted July 15, 2011 Why not just post your reworked image as an attachment? Posting it on Flickr kind of makes it look like your image to other Flickr users doesn't it? Steve Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
username1 Posted July 15, 2011 Share #9 Posted July 15, 2011 Don't know how. That's why. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Geschlecht Posted July 16, 2011 Share #10 Posted July 16, 2011 Hello Everybody, Part of photographing in B&W is learning to pre-visualize photos in tones instead of hues. Photographers today live in a World mostly made up of a flood of hues both in reality & in reality's images. Because of this people today have to separately learn the relationships of tones as they exist unrelated to the hues present & create & expose for these tones if they want to produce satisfactory B&W images in the camera @ the point of exposure. It is certainly possible to take an image pre-visualized in hues & transpose it into a photo made up of tones. It may nonetheless be an interesting experience to learn to previsualize the tonal relationships (think in black & white) & photograph the scene so the tonal relationships required to produce the desired finished print are in the original captured image in the camera. Many photographers have learned to both previsualize their (mostly) 3 dimensional subjects in 2 dimensions & @ the same time understand the tonal relationships involved within the scene & have produced sucessful B&W pictures & have been doing so since around 1829. Best Regards, Michael Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamie Roberts Posted July 16, 2011 Share #11 Posted July 16, 2011 So here's the original post run through Nik SilverFX Pro 2... [ATTACH]268140[/ATTACH] I just ran a high-contrast preset and a bit of a tone (but of course you could do the same with curves and a high-pass in PS). About three clicks total--no specific dodge and burn. It might be too much contrast, but you get the idea. You could do a few more things, if you like... I'll post them when I get a chance. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
250swb Posted July 16, 2011 Share #12 Posted July 16, 2011 I think its one of those photographs that at the final analysis says 'get much closer to the subject:eek:' and post processing problems will disappear. No, seriously you should go back with a longer lens, shoot wide open for some differential focus, and focus on the animals eyes (any animal). There doesn't seem much of a way to separate the overall detail and tones in this one, its all too confused. Yet one thing does occur, and I know you want to shoot in B&W, but if you shot in colour and scanned for colour when you import the image into Photoshop you will have far more options with the B&W conversion. So if the croc/alligator type thing is greenish in colour you can apply a green or yellow filter in B&W conversion and the croc will come out lighter. Of course this can be done when you are using B&W film, but 'real' filters slow the lens down, but you get the same effect. Steve Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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