Any tips before a STI photoshoot

[M///Power]

I will be doing a photoshoot with a black STI the Friday.

I am using a Nikon D40x with a 18-135 lens.

Any tips on how to make it good shoot?

[hansvonaxion]

Can you give us any more info?
Like location, time? I'm assuming no lighting?

If you're a beginner, it would be a good idea to find some pics you like the look of and try to emulate them. Try to de-construct the photo, think about the time it was shot, what lens was used, the angle of the car and how low/high was the camera.

When shooting, take some time to look at the scene. Look for anything distracting, like a telephone pole that pops out of the roof, an awkward reflection, or anything around the car.

One more thing, try to focus on getting one great shot rather than shooting a million different shots from a million different angles.

Good luck.

[otispunkmeyer]

take a polariser (circular) if you got one... it can take some nasty reflections from glass and body work if you find that they are a problem no amount of car rearranging can sovle

when i shoot cars i like to pick up on the details, headlamps (on or off, i love HID's so id get s shot of the headlamps when theyre on or something), rims, brake discs, calipers etc

here is our lexus, its not a great pic, the sky was nasty, theres trees popping out the bonnet, theres lamposts and even my car in the background but using the wide end you can get something like this



if u got a tripod, take one.... it might come in useful, especially in low light.

also if you had a tripod, you could wedge it in the back seats of the car and take a long exposure of the dash/front of the cabin whilst the owner drives (fast) to get some cool blurry-travelling-at-hyperspeed effects like this

[hansvonaxion]

^Yeah tripod.

And shooting a black car is tricky. Dawn or dusk is best and keep in mind the car basically becomes a mirror so its good to have either a nice open horizon or something flat/lacking detail to reflect back into the car.

Heres someone elses pics off Google, sorry for thievery

[M///Power]

Ok thanks.

All that really helps.

I will be shooting from the afternoon until sundown.

[M///Power]

Does anyone have any post processing tips?

I would like my pictures to look like these:

[scathing]

Originally Posted by M///Power

Does anyone have any post processing tips?

I'm pretty nooby, but my two favourite processes are Auto Levels (or manual, if it doesn't work out, like here where you can see the colours are completely different even though the car's location and the ambient lighting is unchanged) and Curves.

If you're only publishing to web, sharpen it and then shrink it a little before sharpening again. At a certain point you'll find it oversharpened when you reach your desired size (here's one of my early efforts), so just go back.

My camera shoots at 2152x1700 (or whatever it is for a 4 megapixel camera with a 4:3 aspect). I'll normally sharpen, drop it to 1950 pixels wide (maintaining ratio) and sharpen again. Reduce to 1750, sharpen again.

Depending on the photo, any sharpening further than this will oversharpen so after this second application of the filter I'll just drop to 640 from there.

[hansvonaxion]

Usually sharpening should be left to the end and done once.

M//Power what program are you using for PP?

Levels is good. If you shoot Raw you have more control over the processing. Use the Colour temperature and tint and, if needed, exposure slider.

There are as many ways of processing a digital photo as there are radiators in a Veyron, find one that suits you.

The shots you posted have had quite a bit of work done. The thing to keep in mind is that you may need to take more than one exposure (depending on the conditions) to expose the whole scene correctly. If you're including sky you might want to take a couple of extra shots, one overexposed for the black car and one underexposed for the sky, and blend them together later. This is where a tripod comes in handy.

Anyway, post them when you're done and we'll rip the shit out of them.

[scathing]

I remember reading a web tute ages ago.

They showed that if you sharpen as you reduce and do it in steps, rather than once after your image is at the desired size, its a lot smoother and more natural.

Personally, I've found it depends on the image but I now do it out of habit.

[hansvonaxion]

You're right, I've never heard that before.
From Adobe's site...

Sharpen your image multiple times in small amounts. Sharpen the first time to correct blur caused by capturing your image (scanning it or taking it with your digital camera). After you’ve color corrected and sized your image, sharpen it again (or a copy of it) to add the appropriate amount of sharpening for your output medium.

Basically they say twice, once at the start and once after resizing. For web use I don't think its that critical either way.

When resizing you could also choose "bicubic sharper" to compensate for the softening caused by resize.

[M///Power]

I am using photoshop CS3.

Thanks for the sharpening tips

As for the sky, what is the best way to get a dramatic sky?

[hansvonaxion]

Originally Posted by scathing

my two favourite processes are Auto Levels (or manual, if it doesn't work out, like here where you can see the colours are completely different even though the car's location and the ambient lighting is unchanged) and Curves.

Auto levels will struggle in mixed lighting like in the examples you gave. Thats why either shooting in RAW helps, or at least setting the white balance to the main light being used rather than leaving it on auto. I used to shoot in auto WB mode until I did a shoot under constant lighting in JPEG mode and then had to spend hours trying to get the colours to match .

About the sky, like I said you can take different exposures for the sky and the car/background and blend them later. I think the examples you (and I) gave are a little overdone. If its a clear sky and you use one exposure you can use a gradient to add colour to the sky (or use a split ND filter).

Heres someone elses pictures I stole again to show the effect of split ND filters (same effect could be achieved with multiple exposures).







Quick google search took me here.

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally Posted by M///Power

I am using photoshop CS3.

Thanks for the sharpening tips

As for the sky, what is the best way to get a dramatic sky?

well, tone mapping and doing HDR's can give you that dramatic sky (im sure theres a tone mapping plug in for CS3). tone mapping if done right can bring out some good drama

or sometimes, if you have managed to catch some detail in the clouds, you can apply gradients to the sky in photoshop to darken them and bring out the edges more



again, its not brilliant, but for the sky i put some darker gradients over the clouds, and i used like 10% opacity to build it up



this ones my best HDR, it was 3 exposures and then tone mapped in DPHDR.

if you dont want the HDR effect, (which i imagine you wont) its probably best to get a tripod, expose for the car, take a shot, then expose for the sky, take a shot, then merge the exposures in the photoshop.

[hansvonaxion]

I like that second shot otispunkmeyer, nice work.

Shadow/highlight adjustment is often overlooked and sometimes a little tweak works wonders. A lot of people have trouble showing restraint with HDR, but the shadow/highlight is more limited so it almost "forces" that much needed restraint.

Where are the pics?

[francis]

My shot with HDR tecnique only 1 jpg and a little help in CS clean teh noise

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally Posted by francis

My shot with HDR tecnique only 1 jpg and a little help in CS clean teh noise

francis you must show me how to do those... i tried to follow stuckincustoms tutorials but get a bit lost around the part where he 1) manages to actually make photomatix produce something that doesnt look like sick and 2) brings the HDR into the photo shop and blends it with one of the original exposures...

photomatix causes me great pain because i cannot, for the life of me, fathom the tone mapper.... everytime u slide something it gets worse!

[francis]

hi, sorry by late , use the Dynamic Photo HDR software and the processing is easy...

http://www.mediachance.com/hdri/index.html

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally Posted by francis

hi, sorry by late , use the Dynamic Photo HDR software and the processing is easy...

http://www.mediachance.com/hdri/index.html

oh yeah i have used that before.. it is a heck of a lot easier to get decent stuff out of than photomatix and its tonemapper

whats more the demo version only puts a minuscule tag in the bottom corner of the finished photo... unlike photomatix which plasters it with a logo.

its what i use to do my HDR's. its just a faff loading things to and from mac/windows to do it since DPHDR is windows only