Once at the end of this summer I got a lot of lab test prints measuring 10 x 15 cm
I immediately started watching in the hope to find among them anything worthwhile, noting in passing their own mistakes and bad luck.
Among other caught my eye and the picture, reminding me of one my trips to Prague. In general, this picture without thinking made no claim to special art, but as a tourist sketch, I thought it quite has the right to exist. Sorry, ladies legs a bit off a slice, I thought. We had to proceed carefully. And with the sky I am not very lucky. Too monotonous boring it looks in this picture (picture left).
It should be noted that the clarity and sharpness of this picture in my claims have arisen. The image on the left was obtained scanning a print 10 x 15 on a flatbed scanner. I tried hard to bring it closer to that obtained from the minilab prints. Largely succeeded. Only solution, unfortunately, leaves much to be desired. But what to do? Flatbed scanner and a screen resolution of about 72 dpi leave no hope for the transfer of a large number of small parts. And it’s not about that, in general, in this article we …
Send a picture of marriage is clearly not wanted, and I decided to look at the negative, cherishing the hope that the picture is not so bad as it presented the minilab. Considering the results of the scan on a film scanner (picture right), I realized that I was hoping for a reason. As it turned out, his feet cut the ladies I’m not, and minilabs. Even though the sky is gray, but not so depressingly monotonous, as the imprint.
Here we must note that I do not blame the staff minilab for their results. Sky just do not fall into a narrow range of densities that can be transmitted on paper. Minilab operator always tries to put an exhibit on the plot important elements of the image, to which the sky, alas, almost never applies. The legs were also clipped unintentionally. The specifics of machine framing and uneven mezhkadrovyh intervals on the film may well lead to this result. Many laboratories honestly warn clients about this possibility cropping the image. Photo print for 10 cents apiece, the operator minilab, of course, will not spend time on a scrutiny of all the negatives and meaningful framing.
The first obvious conclusion: the use of film scanner greatly helps to see the image the way it was recorded film. Get photos of the minilab, you’ll always look at the result of the operator’s eye and upset, noting numerous inconsistencies. A good idea to do scanning in person, rather than resort to others. As I mentioned above, mezhkadrovye distance may be different within the same film, while many scanners are equipped with frames, calculated on the same mezhkadrovy period of fixed length. In other words, in this case the legs may be clipped, and scanned in a specialized Photocenter.
Now let’s talk about the sky
With a dull monotonous sky have to fight quite often. Modalities such a struggle just three:
1. Application of polarization or gradient filters. The method is very effective, but helps not in every situation. Thus, gradient filters are used mainly in landscape photography. In this example, the gradient filter would not have saved the situation as very prominent tower, too, would fall into a zone of its action. The effectiveness of the same polarizing filter depends on its position relative to the sun, as well as general lighting. In addition, a polarizing filter affects not only the sky, but the whole picture in general.
2. If the sky is uniformly gray (almost white) or pale blue, can only think about how to reduce the occupied area of the frame. Only in rare cases a large proportion of the sky in the frame can be justified by any artistic idea.
3. If the skies are at least some shade, you can try to pull them in hand-printing, or computer processing. But it is hardly count in this case, the satisfactory operation of the minilab operators.
Without belittling the importance of the first two approaches, comment on a little more detail the third approach.
The above photo shows the Prague sky can be a bit dramatic, raising the contrast in the highlights of the image.
Photo left – the result of scanning film scanner. Photo on the right was obtained with the Curves tool from Photoshop.
As far as this operation is justified in this case, will not discuss. I do not insist on any artistic value of the snapshot. 
Here, I just wanted to show beginners the easiest way to solve this problem. Sometimes it can help the deformation curve in the light in another direction. In each case, useful experiment.
Consider another useful technique to highlight the details in the sky. I must say that I am not its author. In the description of several variants of this method can be found in various publications.
- In fact, a new layer contains the red channel of the original image. Set its mode Blending = Luminosity and if necessary slightly adjusts its transparency (Opacity).
Result with Opacity = 100% is shown in photo number 2.
- If you want to enhance the effect, it should also slightly decrease the parameter gamma in the new layer Background copy. This can be done, for example, in the window Curves, shifting the center point of the curve down a bit. The result of this operation is shown in photo number 3.
Sometimes used and elementary way: simply change the parameter gamma for the entire original image (see photo left).
Clouds, of course, in this case accented, but the color images are somewhat displaced. The above is more complicated procedure to allocate the clouds with little change in color tone of the image.
You can combine both methods, I have mentioned in this article.
The second obvious conclusion: “Saving the sky” can only be made when initially contains at least some details and / or shades. Milky white sky to save nearly impossible. Well, perhaps radically create it from scratch in Photoshop.
And finally a few words about a soap dish
On the Internet you can constantly come across the opinion that it is impossible to get a decent result with a digital camera, a soap dish. Only with the help of SLR, considered by many to be a technically perfect shot. Of course, I can not shout down a powerful chorus of supporters of this idea, but I think that to say a few words it is still necessary.
The fact that the above is just a snapshot of Prague and was made soap box Yashica T5. And this is exactly the case when I have no complaints about the work of the chamber. What is more, SLR, I just could not get this picture. So, why: the picture was shot just for instance, no statement was not. A few seconds before the shutter, I did not know what I come up with the idea to shoot. I just stood on the corner and looked at the square, and turn off the camera dangling from my hand strap. Shot lined up unexpectedly and quickly. I raised my camera and turn it on. The lens cover opens automatically. Another second – and the picture was taken.
If at that point in my belt hung SLR, I first took a few moments out to remove the lens cap. Then turn on the camera. Then give to work out a passive focusing system, hoping that she coped well with its task. And only then doge the shutter button. I’m afraid, SNG time would be lost. Besides, I said nothing about the fact that when you turn the camera could be in the wrong mode, and some time it would take to ensure that the desired mode set.
In my opinion, this was just the case when a good soap dish is better than a reflex. The word “good” I would particularly like to emphasize. Of course, I would not expect the qualitative result from a simple camera for $ 20, fitted with a plastic lens.
In order to support his view illustration, I cite here an increased part of the photo, with which I began my story.
The fragment is part of the scanned-in film scanner shot wide 50%. Scanning was carried out with a resolution of 2820 dpi. No processing in Photoshop was not done. If you have a screen resolution of 800 x 600, then we can assume that you are considering a fragment of the full image with a size of 1 x 1,5 m do not know about you, but I think this picture is more than satisfactory for such a large increase. Budget optics SLRs often leads to less quality results.
If you want to see this piece at 100% (ie 1:1), download sky_fragment100.jpg (its volume is less than 160K). I used a milder compression, so this file is almost equivalent to the original TIFF-file.
I note also that the picture was made on the film Agfa Vista 200, of which many are treated with prejudice. Personally I have no complaints on color reproduction to films Agfa, one of which, incidentally, was made and the second illustration to this article.
The third obvious conclusion: do not remove the camera and the photographer. A good soap can get pretty good technically shot.