Making 2 separate scans to preserve details in shadow and highlight

A
Posted By
artonio7(remove)
Jul 25, 2003
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Adrian… there are some great photo’s in that group… thanks for posting!

with warm regards,
Tony
http://artonio7.com

"Adrian" wrote in message
Recently, I decided to attempt a scan of negative taken inside the visitor’s center of Teotihuacan (outside Mexico City) with its view of the "Pyramid of the Sun." Unfortunately, the brightness to darkness ratio would either allow detail of the pyramid, but the model of the city in the foreground would be lost to darkness. And the inverse was true, if I opened up for detail in the shadows, the pyramid through the windows would be totally blown out.

What I decided to do was to make 2 separate scans, one for the detail in the pyramid and a separate one for the detail in the city model. I then opened both in Photoshop, with the background detail as the bottom layer, and copy/pasted the shadow detail scanned image over the bottom layer and just erased blown-out parts of image to reveal the detail of the pyramid. Finished example at this link:

http://www.amenfoto.com/gallery/mexico/teotihuacan_view.html
Adrian

"A Picture’s Worth a Thousand Nerds"

http://www.amenfoto.com/
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M
Mxsmanic
Jul 25, 2003

J. A. Mc. writes:

Thank goodness for PhotoShop’s masking and layering!

If only it could do it in 16-bit mode.

—
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M
Mxsmanic
Jul 25, 2003
Adrian writes:

What I decided to do was to make 2 separate scans, one for the detail in the pyramid and a separate one for the detail in the city model. I then opened both in Photoshop, with the background detail as the bottom layer, and copy/pasted the shadow detail scanned image over the bottom layer and just erased blown-out parts of image to reveal the detail of the pyramid. Finished example at this link:

http://www.amenfoto.com/gallery/mexico/teotihuacan_view.html

Nice work.

It’s tedious to combine scans in that way, though. Ideally, you should use a scanner that can get it all on one pass. You don’t have problems with pixel misalignments then, either.

Even more ideally, if you are on a tripod, you shoot two or more exposures at the original scene, so that you have ideal exposures for all the important areas. I’ve only very rarely done this, and it is very tedious to combine in Photoshop, but the contrasts involved were so great (about 15 stops, as I recall), that I had no choice.

—
Transpose hotmail and mxsmanic in my e-mail address to reach me directly.
WS
Warren Sarle
Jul 25, 2003
"Mxsmanic" wrote in message
…
Even more ideally, if you are on a tripod, you shoot two or more exposures at the original scene, so that you have ideal exposures for all the important areas. I’ve only very rarely done this, and it is very tedious to combine in Photoshop, but the contrasts involved were so great (about 15 stops, as I recall), that I had no choice.

Reindeergraphics.com has plug-ins to align and combine images like that.
H
Hecate
Jul 25, 2003
On Fri, 25 Jul 2003 22:51:40 +0200, Mxsmanic
wrote:

Even more ideally, if you are on a tripod, you shoot two or more exposures at the original scene, so that you have ideal exposures for all the important areas. I’ve only very rarely done this, and it is very tedious to combine in Photoshop, but the contrasts involved were so great (about 15 stops, as I recall), that I had no choice.

For anyone whose interested in macro photography, rather than light balancing, multiple shots can be a good technique too to make up for the loss of DoF. For example, a 1:1 of a flower with a trumpet (no, it’s not musical, that’s a description <g>). I’ve done that and taken five shots, using a tripod, all from the same position, but with the focus set on different depths of the flower. This results in a number of photos which, if combined, give you a great DoF all the way down the flower head. This is, IMHO, one of the great techniques you can use with PS which is extremely difficult done any other way.

—

Hecate
(Fried computers a specialty)
K
kaispowertools
Jul 26, 2003
"artonio7/Tony/Anthony/" <artonio7(remove)@adelphia.net> wrote in message news:<bfrq8r$i1h34$>…
Adrian… there are some great photo’s in that group… thanks for posting!
with warm regards,
Tony
http://artonio7.com
Thanks, Tony. You’ve got some excellent work yourself. I particularly enjoyed the pastels, not everyone realizes that you’re working with pure pigment in creating your artwork.

best to you,
Adrian

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