Picture of the Day

[bgrayvy]

Upper Queets River in Olympic National Park yesterday.

[Tuckerman]

NH U16 GS qualifier.

Loon

[Wiilbert]

[smmokan]

Took this yesterday in the back yard as the sun started poking through the clouds:

[smmokan]

Taken this morning from the top of the Niwot Loop trail looking out towards the Flatirons above Boulder:

[BaNosser]

[smmokan]

The Flatirons in Boulder, towering above Chatauqua Park on the south side of town just as last night's snow started to taper off:

[The AD]

Final sunset of February.

Sunset Beach Stroll by kirknelson, on Flickr

[splitter]

I've been getting into large format stuff. But I don't have 25-40 thousand dollars for a large format camera. So, with the help of photoshop merge, I've been shooting large block-fomat pano's.

I'm still new at it, but here's 30 photos, around 93 MB's, of my truck after skiing today. Really, just dialing in the process. Obviously 93 MB's doesn't translate to any computer screen. But I've had a Lagunitas IPA and I'm on my second Great Basin (reno) Deathwish (moment) 22. It took that long to render this in PS. So, here ya go. No, I didn't take any skiing photos today…

[Fuzz]

I've been getting into large format stuff. But I don't have 25-40 thousand dollars for a large format camera. So, with the help of photoshop merge, I've been shooting large block-fomat pano's.

I'm still new at it, but here's 30 photos, around 93 MB's, of my truck after skiing today. Really, just dialing in the process. Obviously 93 MB's doesn't translate to any computer screen. But I've had a Lagunitas IPA and I'm on my second Great Basin (reno) Deathwish (moment) 22. It took that long to render this in PS. So, here ya go. No, I didn't take any skiing photos today…

Sounds like what's called a "Brenizer method" these days? Several shots taken at shallow DoF/wide apertures then stitched together. I tried it once but it didn't work out. What focal length and aperture did you use?

[splitter]

Sounds like what's called a "Brenizer method" these days? Several shots taken at shallow DoF/wide apertures then stitched together. I tried it once but it didn't work out. What focal length and aperture did you use?

almost. This is shot at 85mm on a crop, so not quite wide angle. Stoked he gets to name it, but the technique is there for anyone. Especially if you come from our school of thought with big, wide views of the world and then you want some small DOF. Not too mention, clients that want shit printed at 6 feet + so sharp you could cut your finger on it.

I feel weird giving somebody who kills it like you specs. I feel like you have this nailed….


edit to add: this is at 2.2, 85mm on a crop

[Supermoon]

Sounds like what's called a "Brenizer method" these days? Several shots taken at shallow DoF/wide apertures then stitched together. I tried it once but it didn't work out. What focal length and aperture did you use?

That's what I thought it sounded like too, though he usually just shoots portraits with it I think.

[Dromond]

^^^ I always thought that was an interesting idea but never game it a try myself. Do you auto-stitch is somehow? Also, have you consider trying a large format film camera? They cost a lot less than 25K, although processing and scanning seems really tough for something that size. I haven't given it a go myself!

[Fuzz]

almost. This is shot at 85mm on a crop, so not quite wide angle. Stoked he gets to name it, but the technique is there for anyone. Especially if you come from our school of thought with big, wide views of the world and then you want some small DOF. Not too mention, clients that want shit printed at 6 feet + so sharp you could cut your finger on it.

I feel weird giving somebody who kills it like you specs. I feel like you have this nailed….


edit to add: this is at 2.2, 85mm on a crop

Thanks for the info. The name was "given" by the internet -- Ryan himself has said that the technique has been around way before him, and he just happened to do/share/post it at the right time to get the internet's attention. And thanks for the compliment on killing it, but I struggle just as much as anyone else. Part of my not being able to do such shots is also the fact that I've tried to not use Photoshop (and just kept everything in Lightroom) as much as possible. So I've not tried practicing a lot to try to get it right. Now that I've started using PS more (e.g. for multi-exposure blending and for editing commercial work), I might give it a go.

Funnily enough, I've found myself not shooting wide open as much since moving here. I used to shoot wide apertures a lot before, but with landscapes, I'm usually at f/16 these days. I need to rediscover the joys of f/2 again!

Btw, which 85 are you using?

That's what I thought it sounded like too, though he usually just shoots portraits with it I think.

Yes, usually for portraits, but I've also seen some with static objects. For me, static ones will probably give me good practice.

[BaNosser]

tonite from Mt Vernon

[splitter]

Thanks for the info. The name was "given" by the internet -- Ryan himself has said that the technique has been around way before him, and he just happened to do/share/post it at the right time to get the internet's attention. And thanks for the compliment on killing it, but I struggle just as much as anyone else. Part of my not being able to do such shots is also the fact that I've tried to not use Photoshop (and just kept everything in Lightroom) as much as possible. So I've not tried practicing a lot to try to get it right. Now that I've started using PS more (e.g. for multi-exposure blending and for editing commercial work), I might give it a go.

Funnily enough, I've found myself not shooting wide open as much since moving here. I used to shoot wide apertures a lot before, but with landscapes, I'm usually at f/16 these days. I need to rediscover the joys of f/2 again!

Btw, which 85 are you using?

Yes, usually for portraits, but I've also seen some with static objects. For me, static ones will probably give me good practice.

I hear ya. And it sounds like Ryan is humble himself.

We just bought a new house and my wife wanted something big to go over the fireplace. My goal was printing a landscape/pano on a 5-foot sheet of aluminum. There are some old horse pastures fenced in on the property and I thought about reclaiming the wood and mounting the aluminum print to the wood as a backer.

My problem, like most here, is I want stuff to print tack sharp. I get nervous if the resolution thingy majiggy is in the yellow at all rather than maxed on the green with whoever I'm using to print (millers, bay photo, adorama). So I figured some thoughtful panos were the way to go.

I never had photoshop until I picked up the Adobe Creative Cloud package in late December. I really wanted to try to do some HDR and I needed to update LR. I was using LR3 still. I've been unhappy with the HDR's and would like to do more exposure blending with masks and layers like you've been working with.

But when I started playing with panos, pretty much the time I uploaded my first newly stitch image into LR, I decided I wanted to try the stitching technique with a smaller DOF. This truck photo was really just practice. There is a portrait/static-ish shot I need to go do with a friend. He has a new (old) Corvair Briarwood van he just got running and wanted to do a photoshoot. I thought the brady-bunch grid style pano would be perfect for him and his van.

Thanks again for commenting. I hope I wasn't to cavalier in my first response. LIke I said, it took PS a long time to render that and I used that time to drink beer. It wouldn't even let me do the optimized jpeg, it said I didn't have enough RAM for it. So that is baseline.

I'm just using the 85mm 1.8G from Nikon

I've posted this before but this was the first little attempt at smaller DOF. I actually cut off a fair amount of the frames on the left side. I didn't like the comp it gave it. The bokeh started to distract from the tree. This is 6 photos, compared with the 35 shot for the pick-up. Again, 2.2 at 85mm

[From_the_NEK]

Very cool info above. I'll have to try that sometime.

In the meantime, I'm back from vacation...

sunset6 by Tim_NEK, on Flickr

Backflip by Tim_NEK, on Flickr

Walkway2 by Tim_NEK, on Flickr

[splitter]

more Brenizer method. And it's a selfie.
After a few good days in the Rose backcountry, it was a quiet groomer day at Mt Rose ski area.

16 photos at 85mm, f/2.8

[BaNosser]

I imagine you could make the upper trees in focus if you wanted to correct?

[BaNosser]

.

nice shot of Venus..

[Supermoon]

I imagine you could make the upper trees in focus if you wanted to correct?

You could, but the point of the method usually is to achieve a shallow DOF that imitates larger format cameras.

There's also some technical difficulties probably in that the image will shift slightly in size as you focus.

Split, how'd you move the camera to get you in it? Or is your body encompassed in one image?

[Fuzz]

I hear ya. And it sounds like Ryan is humble himself.

We just bought a new house and my wife wanted something big to go over the fireplace. My goal was printing a landscape/pano on a 5-foot sheet of aluminum. There are some old horse pastures fenced in on the property and I thought about reclaiming the wood and mounting the aluminum print to the wood as a backer.

My problem, like most here, is I want stuff to print tack sharp. I get nervous if the resolution thingy majiggy is in the yellow at all rather than maxed on the green with whoever I'm using to print (millers, bay photo, adorama). So I figured some thoughtful panos were the way to go.

I never had photoshop until I picked up the Adobe Creative Cloud package in late December. I really wanted to try to do some HDR and I needed to update LR. I was using LR3 still. I've been unhappy with the HDR's and would like to do more exposure blending with masks and layers like you've been working with.

But when I started playing with panos, pretty much the time I uploaded my first newly stitch image into LR, I decided I wanted to try the stitching technique with a smaller DOF. This truck photo was really just practice. There is a portrait/static-ish shot I need to go do with a friend. He has a new (old) Corvair Briarwood van he just got running and wanted to do a photoshoot. I thought the brady-bunch grid style pano would be perfect for him and his van.

Thanks again for commenting. I hope I wasn't to cavalier in my first response. LIke I said, it took PS a long time to render that and I used that time to drink beer. It wouldn't even let me do the optimized jpeg, it said I didn't have enough RAM for it. So that is baseline.

I'm just using the 85mm 1.8G from Nikon

I've posted this before but this was the first little attempt at smaller DOF. I actually cut off a fair amount of the frames on the left side. I didn't like the comp it gave it. The bokeh started to distract from the tree. This is 6 photos, compared with the 35 shot for the pick-up. Again, 2.2 at 85mm

Thanks for the reply. The things I messed up were not shooting enough images to make a large enough final stitched version and not choosing the background properly. Having decent separation between the subject and the background (which I didn't do) allows the shallow DoF to be more stark and creates that special look. You've inspired me to try it again -- maybe this weekend.

Regarding HDR, I like doing it manually using luminosity masks (more natural look), and this tutorial from Jimmy McIntyre on 500px is what got me started.

[Fuzz]

Btw, here's a thread on POTN about sample "Brenizer" method shots. Some of the older image links are broken, but still a lot of very good examples.

[splitter]

You could, but the point of the method usually is to achieve a shallow DOF that imitates larger format cameras.

There's also some technical difficulties probably in that the image will shift slightly in size as you focus.

Split, how'd you move the camera to get you in it? Or is your body encompassed in one image?

Bingo. on both accounts. I think you could split up the portrait subject if you were shooting someone else and could move pretty quickly. In this case, I am one frame. That's about how big the frame is so you can imagine them all stitched together. I focused on the arm of the chair I'm sitting in and did the 20 second self-timer, ran over, and tried to look natural. Then I switched back to the 5-second delay, switched to manual focus, and shot the rest of the comp.

Thanks for the reply. The things I messed up were not shooting enough images to make a large enough final stitched version and not choosing the background properly. Having decent separation between the subject and the background (which I didn't do) allows the shallow DoF to be more stark and creates that special look. You've inspired me to try it again -- maybe this weekend.

Regarding HDR, I like doing it manually using luminosity masks (more natural look), and this tutorial from Jimmy McIntyre on 500px is what got me started.

What I'm digging about panos, and this technique in particular, is the new method for choosing comps and how to get it. I'm obviously trying some simple things but I'm happy with what I'm learning. I also wonder what possibilities there could be with some shutter speed manipulation when shooting.

For example: There is a neon sign (there are lots of neon signs) on a quiet road here in town. Normal, non-HDR LE's at night almost always gave me blown highlights in the sign with a lot of extra light blurring the crisp edges of the neon tubes.

Being able to isolate the sign with the small DOF and still shoot wide angle sounds appealing enough, but slightly longer shutters as I shoot the surrounding darkness to pull a little more detail out sounds really intriguing. Nothing drastic, it would have to blend well in PS. But shooting the neon at 3 seconds, then the next closest frame of images at 4 and another frame at 5-6 seconds sounds like a neat, and possibly doable way of adding some dynamic range to nighttime shots.

Thanks for everyone for commenting. I'm a little obsessed so when I get to shoot and post, it'll probably be a pano or some version of this Brenizer method. Unless it's just a cute, quick portrait of my little man.

[BaNosser]

You could, but the point of the method usually is to achieve a shallow DOF that imitates larger format cameras.

got it.. thanks