Help with PP - deer babies

[lvcrtrs]

I'm not sure if this is the forum for this type of request for help. Please move if it should be elsewhere.

I had these 2 babies come to my yard over the weekend. They just laid down and stayed there until hubby left the house and it scared them. Have seen them before with their mommy, but no mommy this time...

I took many pics through the porch screen. I thought if I could get help with one then I could go back and work with the rest since they would all be about the same.

I'll show one I did.
I didn't know the best way to post the originals for someone to try to edit because they are supposed to be resized to post. Guidance is welcome. I resized the original so you could see it. Then I cropped the original and resized it so it would be the closest to the one I worked on for you.

Please tell me how you would adjust it, or edit and post, telling me what you did.

Thanks so much. Sherry

Original resized to 800 on long side.

Original cropped to 5x7 and resized to 800 on long side.

After I did the following: crop, levels - auto, contrast +30 (never fooled with contrast before), sharp +150, resized to 800 on the long side

 

[tirediron]

What sort of help are you looking for? What type of end-result would you like?

 

[itznfb]

did you shoot raw or jpg?

 

[JerryPH]

My comments:
The levels were WAY off. Becuase of this, once corrected for:
- The shot was lightly oversaturated
- The shot was lightly oversharpened.

It's kinda hard to fix it above the levels and saturation levels... but there is detail there that can be exploited.

This is more of a PP question... maybe in the future place this kinda question in the area for photoshop or post processing?

Question: Is your monitor calibrated? If not, what you see and what I see are TOTALLY 2 different pictures. My monitors are calibrated every 2-3 weeks. Also, why were you using ISO 1400? These are not fast moving... even a shutter speed of 1/80th is easily hand holdable at 200mm focal lengths. Also, you were up to 1/320th and F/5.3 for some reason. Why not F/2.8. ISO 200 and something around 1/100th shutter speeds? Much better final results.

Final and most important question. We know where Bambi is... where's Thumper??

 

[Lyncca]

If you like this, I will give you what details I can, but a lot is trial and error and your tastes. Jerry's looks good to me, but I wanted to give a little more warmth to make it look a little more fairy-talish:

 

[JerryPH]

Yeah, I had to desaturate it a lot once the levels were corrected for becuase the grass looked unnaturally neon green-ish to me. I also added a light vignette to it once it was done... to kinda place the focus closer to the center of the shot a little.

 

[lvcrtrs]

did you shoot raw or jpg?

jpg

My comments:
The levels were WAY off. Becuase of this, once corrected for:
- The shot was lightly oversaturated
- The shot was lightly oversharpened.

It's kinda hard to fix it above the levels and saturation levels... but there is detail there that can be exploited.
I like this. It looks natural. The levels and contrast sometimes makes the colors more pronounced (which I like sometimes as well). Then in the digital picture frame they can look even more so (which looks unnatural). But you don't know until you put them in there.

This is more of a PP question... maybe in the future place this kinda question in the area for photoshop or post processing?
Will do.

Question: Is your monitor calibrated? If not, what you see and what I see are TOTALLY 2 different pictures. My monitors are calibrated every 2-3 weeks. Also, why were you using ISO 1400? These are not fast moving... even a shutter speed of 1/80th is easily hand holdable at 200mm focal lengths. Also, you were up to 1/320th and F/5.3 for some reason. Why not F/2.8. ISO 200 and something around 1/100th shutter speeds? Much better final results.
I would say my monitor is not calibrated?? Since I've never done anything with that. I had the camera set on shutter priority. I was using 320 for hummingbirds earlier. I have the ISO set at 200 but on auto so it will change when it thinks it needs to. I was using a 70-300 from the second floor porch. I think it can only do F4.x at best. Without going to manual mode which I don't think I am ready for, would I be best to stay on shutter priority and just use the lower speed? I know I can change the ISO so it will stay on 200.

Final and most important question. We know where Bambi is... where's Thumper??

The more animal babies around the better. (Even if they eat everything). Just hoping mom was busy in the woods, not on a permanent vacation.

If you like this, I will give you what details I can, but a lot is trial and error and your tastes. Jerry's looks good to me, but I wanted to give a little more warmth to make it look a little more fairy-talish:
Hi Lyncca, I like the deeper colors too. See my note to Jerry. When they looked good to me on the computer screen (like yours) they were way too intense in the picture frame. So, I'm very happy to settle for a middle ground. Both you and Jerry got rid of the "whiteish" overall look and no one would know how far you were away or that a nasty screen was in front of you. How did you do that?

What sort of help are you looking for? What type of end-result would you like?

I was looking to get rid of that fuzzy look from shooting through the screen and that flat whitish overall look.

 

[bmrust]

Here's my attempt:

Not sure if that's what you are going for... and honestly I didn't spend the time to check the histogram to see if its off... but I thought it helped out quite a bit and it was very quick and easy.

Go to Image / Adjustments / Curves

Click on the White eye dropper, click the white in the rocks.

Click on the Black eye dropper, click the black of the eyes.

That's all I did


EDIT: Guess I should mention that I did all of that in Photoshop.

 

[musicaleCA]

Jerry, what did you use to save that JPG? It looks like the compression algorithm had a fit.

 

[lvcrtrs]

bmrust,
That really keeps the colors in the natural zone too. And, it will get me to work with a new feature (curves-new for me) in PSE. Thank you for your time.

I imagine they won't have their spots much longer. I only seem to see them when I get a day off, never in the am or pm so I would really like to salvage the pics I got.

Thanks to all for your time to help me.

 

[itznfb]

here is my edit
i do a lot of shooting through glass since the majority of my shots are at the zoo. and this is pretty standard for what i do to try and overcome the issues presented by glass.

 

[lvcrtrs]

itznfb - please tell me how you did your edit.

 

[itznfb]

i manually edited the color balance with the midtones touched down to the reds and yellows and highlights a touch toward the green/blue and shadows also a touch toward reds. basically adjust the midtones first until you get a more natural looking subject, in this picture include the grass as the subject as it will be affected by the midtones and adjusting the highlights to a warmer color will help get rid of that hazy look generated by the glass and give a more natural feel.

then i bumped up the contrast using a contrast preset under the curves preset options in cs4. i'll have to verify that when i get home.

then i toned down the saturation to a natural feel.

 

[lvcrtrs]

Thank you itznfb.

 

[JerryPH]

Jerry, what did you use to save that JPG? It looks like the compression algorithm had a fit.

Know what I did? From within LightRoom 2:
- added a little back (+8)
- desaturated (-23 !!)
- added a bit of a vignette (-25)
- exported

That's *it*. The rest was all in the picture. That "neon grass" is still in dire need of attention, but I had 10 seconds to do something and my time limit was up. :lmao: