246 Exposure and editing

[Occam's Razor]

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If this is not the correct forum apologies. Iam using this camera and I am wondering which software users prefer. My main difficulty whilst editing is lightning the shadows whilst keeping the sky as is. I am struggling to do this effectively in Elements and wondering whether Lightroom would be better and whether there were any on line resources that I could use to help me establish a better workflow. Any advice would be welcome.

[jaapv]

You should be able to do this ijn Elements, but try On1, Affinity, Capture1 or Lightroom. Note that Lightroom is a subscription.

[Occam's Razor]

Being more specific. Can anyone tell me how one can actually keep the highlights in say, elements (usually the sky in my case) unaltered whilst lightening the shadows. Do users select the area to be lightened leaving the sky unselected or perhaps use curves? I am looking to find out whether there is a way to deal with what must be a common problem in editing photographs. I am aware that there are various packages which will do this I am just trying to find out how. I wonder if there are any online tutorials. I cannot seem to find them.

[a.noctilux]

My monochrom use since the first one (CCD/M9) was this usual sky/or other bright area "white out".

I don't rely on post-processing, as I'm quite lazy guy.

 

So, my solution found was as simple as when use b&w film (which has more "room to play with" in "toes" and "shoulders" curves ).

I've learn (still learning now) to use physical colored filters and "under- exposition- when-in-doubt":

with landscape, I just put on orange, or red filter (which one is another story ... ) depending on the sky cloudy or blue  and the main subject "colors".

and in general use most of time yellow, or green (in fact this last came with idea that M246 can show the "almost accurate rendering" in EVF or LCD of filter in use),

With my very small skill ( I've tried out, took some curses, but no success ) in post-processing, this is my main solution and easy to come by til now.

Exotic green filter use:

here (Monochrom CCD, so no EVF use)

 

 

Edited September 4, 2019 by a.noctilux

[Likaleica]

DxO labs Silver Effects Pro 2

https://nikcollection.dxo.com

[PaulJohn]

12 hours ago, Occam's Razor said:

Being more specific. Can anyone tell me how one can actually keep the highlights in say, elements (usually the sky in my case) unaltered whilst lightening the shadows. Do users select the area to be lightened leaving the sky unselected or perhaps use curves? I am looking to find out whether there is a way to deal with what must be a common problem in editing photographs. I am aware that there are various packages which will do this I am just trying to find out how. I wonder if there are any online tutorials. I cannot seem to find them.

Your problem is one of dynamic range which in landscape photography can often be the case that the dynamic range exceeds the capability of the camera (even thought the 246 has very good dynamic range). adjusting curves gives good control but takes practice. Usually its enough to play with the shadows slider which I assume your software already has. If the shadows are noisy its because the dynamic range is too high for the camera to cope with. 

The usual way of dealing with higher dynamic range scenes is to either use a grad filter or take several shots at different exposures using a tripod and blend them together using software. Nik collection quoted above has a component especially for this purpose.

[adan]

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Just to check - you ARE shooting in raw format (.DNG)?

If so, then the best place to bring up shadows is at the point you open the .DNG file with Adobe Camera Raw to bring it into Elements. (Elements cannot open a DNG file directly - it has to call up the ACR raw-import window to do so - should happen automatically).

As PaulJohn mentions, there is a slider in the ACR image controls for "shadows," which will selectively lighten the darkest tones while leaving the brightest areas mostly untouched (and a corresponding "Highlights" slider to correct any small changes in the highlights). Also sliders for setting the brightness of whites, blacks, overall brightness ("exposure"), and contrast.

You can - once in Elements - then also do some fine adjustments by making feathered selections of smaller areas. I use the "lasso" free-drawing selection tool as the most organic and controllable way to choose areas.

Photoshop has a dodging/burning tool that is also useful for localized brightness control - can't remember if Elements includes that (it's been 15 years since I used it).

But I almost always make a global shadows adjustment on import first. Among other things, it is a non-destructive change (you can reopen the DNG and change the settings at this stage) and you are working with the full original set of raw data. I would guess 70-90% of my tonal adjustments take place in the raw-conversion step, with only the remainder done in the final image program (depends on the picture, of course).

Below is a Monochrom v.1 image, showing how the Shadows slider in the ACR controls on import of a DNG can bring up detail and separation and general brightness in only the shaded areas (evergreen shrubs, dark clothing, architecture shadows) without affecting the brighter tones in the scene and sky. Although I did tweak the highlights a bit darker to keep them the same as the original, and adjusted the very deepest blacks to keep them from graying out to charcoal-gray - creative choices that can be used or skipped.

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Edited September 5, 2019 by adan

[Occam's Razor]

Thanks that is really helpful folks. I have been out with my camera today and have also had a play with ACR. Although still not up to speed quite yet, I have had the "how? question answered- so thanks. I am now just working through things and practising and trying to establish a workflow.