Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/12/30
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Andrew, Thanks for one of the most interesting posts I've ever read on the matter. This might change my (electronic) life. I had never even thought of double scanning+merging . Regarding Livepicture technology: not everyone has access tp n x 50 Mb of disk space on web servers.... Most of us are stuck with the constraints of JPEG ! Alan Andrew Nemeth wrote: > > It's stating the obvious, but online digital delivery > of photographs requies just as much skill & technique > as taking the original photo. > > Some tricks I have learned: > > o Use C41 colour neg film. It has a much wider exposure > lattitude and is more forgiving of different light source > colours. My current favourite is Kodak PJ100. > > o If your image contains an extreme range of highlights > and shadow detail, then scan the image twice - once > for the highs & once for the lows. Then merge the two > images digitally. > > o A Polaroid SprintScan 35 (or 35+) is easier to work > with because it gives you better software control over > the image capture, mainly in being able to edit individual > RGB curves. The Nikon scanners are better hardware-wise, > but their software lets them down (IMO!) > > o Use PhotoShop (current version 5.02) on a mac (G3/ 128++ RAM) > with a 6x8 graphics tablet. Get to know PShop well - it is > an amazingly powerful program. A good book to get is: > > "Real World Photoshop 4" by David Blatner & Bruce > Fraser. > > o Having praised pshop - *don't* use it to save your final > JPEG images! Use a specialised program to do this: > "ProJPEG 3" (pshop plug-in) for mac <www.boxtopsoft.com> > "JPEG Optimizer 3" (app) for wintel <www.xat.com> > > Neither of these is hyper expensive, and yet they > give precise control over the JPEG process and give > you the highest quality/ smallest download images > possible. > > o Keep in mind that different people have different monitors > set to different levels of darkness. Which means an image > which looks fine on your setup may look hopelessly dark > and blue on mine. Or vice-versa. You can never win with > this & at times it will drive you nuts! > > o As for the moaning about www images not having the detail > prints do - check out Livepicture's server based solution > called 'zoom'. It allows you to upload 50 MB images with > all the detail you could ever possibly want. With these, > users can view them low-res, then zoom in for details - > hence the name. Okay it ain't perfect, but it works > <www.livepicture.com> > > o So where is Leica in all this? Quieter cameras, better > lenses! Does it matter for digital? IMO yes. In the > six months I have been using Leica I have found an > improvement in my image quality, especially in handling > contrasty light. For VR work (my main speciality), the > Leitz 16mm is streets ahead of the alternatives (& hence > my main reason for going Leica 6 months ago). > > For an example of a recent Leica non-vr image (R6.2, 90mm > Summicron, PJ100) using the above techniques, see: > > <http://www.nemeng.com/photo> > > ... a bit saccarine perhaps, but it *is* after all the > christmas holidays! > > Regds, > > Andrew Nemeth > > VR MEDIA SOUND PHOTO JAVA > nemeng Warrimoo Australia > www.nemeng.com