How to: "Christian Schmidt" Look

[Michael Bonner]

Originally Posted by fryday

Here's my attempt. Let me know what you think.

fryday, I think you may want to try converting to the SRGB profile before posting.

[Michael Bonner]

Originally Posted by BobZZZ

This is not quite the same but on similar lines F Stop mag has a how too from Jonathan Tay who explains how he lights and comps these type of shots. http://www.thefstopmag.com/?p=259

That's a great read and quite relevant! Thanks for the link!

[Michael Bonner]

Originally Posted by Gt_max

WOW... your result is the Closest !
can you please explain the procedure ?

Surely. It's really nothing more than a series of small tweaks pushing towards the end result by correcting what I see is "wrong" with the photo. Here's what I did:

Profile conversion: Convert, Apply, Convert, Apply, dupe, multiply, blend if, curves.

Result is too warm - Color balance layer: -15, -2, +55

Walls are too dark - Levels layer: 0, 1.25, 236 (input)

Still too warm - Curves layer: R midpoint 128/132, B midpoint 128/113 (Output/Input)

Highlights blown out - Dupe b/g, levels within duped layer, 0, 232 (output)

Shadows too green - H/S layer, Greens -100 saturation, all colors with the exception of blue and cyan pulled down somewhat, overall saturation -23.

Done.

All the numbers stated above are the exact numbers from the layers in my PSD. They work for this image (and by work I mean got me the result I was looking for), but they'd be completely different for a different image. I arrived at each value by seeing what I didn't like about the current state of my image and moving sliders and bending curves until it looked "right." This may not be the fastest, easiest, or even the best way to go about it, but that's the approach that I often use and I've found that it often gets me the results I want.

Best of luck.

[Gee]

I really dig what does John Tay.
I already read his iview few weeks back and i was really impressed by his portfolio.
Btw, him & Schmidt just changed my way to "conceptualize" photography and i'm testing a lot of stuffs atm. My cam died few days back but i'm gonna work with some nu gear and... much better than the older one. I'll try to do some stuff with few things i learned from Tay.

[Verywierd]

I'm not really a great fan of Christian Schmidt (nor do I dislike his work either). My attention was caught mainly by the length of this thread and the arcane discussion over technique. After looking at the escalator example at the beginning of the thread, I did the attached. Is this sort of what it should look like, or am I missing something?

[Michael Bonner]

Originally Posted by Verywierd

I'm not really a great fan of Christian Schmidt (nor do I dislike his work either). My attention was caught mainly by the length of this thread and the arcane discussion over technique. After looking at the escalator example at the beginning of the thread, I did the attached. Is this sort of what it should look like, or am I missing something?

Your version's great- how did you manage to keep the end result looking so clean (especially in the shadows) working on a photo this small?

[Verywierd]

Um, I hesitated to post my workflow because it was so basic and people might throw bricks at me :-)

1. Create blank layer. Fill with pure white. Apply in Colour blending mode. Back down opacity a little so that the result is not B&W. Mask the layer, and use a very faint grey brush to bring back some of the colour in the stairs and anywhere else you feel needs it (like the black handrails and the aluminium below it).
2. Create a curves adjustment layer and tweak the shadows and highlights to even out greys and prevent burn out in the whites.
3. Use a graduated neutral density layer (i.e. dark grey to light grey) with dark at the bottom and light at the top applied in soft light blending mode. Adjust opacity to taste. This reverses the acutal lighting and makes the image steadily brighter towards the top of the escalator.
4. Merge all of this, make a duplicate and apply in soft light blending mode (just a few % opacity) to increase contrast a tiny bit more.
5. Using whatever method you prefer to make a very slight "soft focus" glow to give the whites and metal a slight pearly look.

Thats it.

(Ducks and runs away.)

[Michael Bonner]

Originally Posted by Verywierd

Um, I hesitated to post my workflow because it was so basic and people might throw bricks at me :-)

1. Create blank layer. Fill with pure white. Apply in Colour blending mode. Back down opacity a little so that the result is not B&W. Mask the layer, and use a very faint grey brush to bring back some of the colour in the stairs and anywhere else you feel needs it (like the black handrails and the aluminium below it).
2. Create a curves adjustment layer and tweak the shadows and highlights to even out greys and prevent burn out in the whites.
3. Use a graduated neutral density layer (i.e. dark grey to light grey) with dark at the bottom and light at the top applied in soft light blending mode. Adjust opacity to taste. This reverses the acutal lighting and makes the image steadily brighter towards the top of the escalator.
4. Merge all of this, make a duplicate and apply in soft light blending mode (just a few % opacity) to increase contrast a tiny bit more.
5. Using whatever method you prefer to make a very slight "soft focus" glow to give the whites and metal a slight pearly look.

Thats it.

(Ducks and runs away.)

Can't argue with results. Although that does leave me with a large pile of sadly unthrown bricks.

Thank you for posting your workflow! As I said before, you did a wonderful job with the photo- I think yours is the best result in the thread, source file nonwithstanding. I really love your steps, in particular the graduated ND layer- thinking about an image in those sort of nuanced ways is something that I can really appreciate.

My only question pertains to your curves layer- what do you mean by evening out the grays, and when preventing burnout, did you actually drag the white point down?

Thanks again for sharing!

[sirespen]

oh cool! Thanks!

[Verywierd]

Originally Posted by Michael Bonner

Can't argue with results. Although that does leave me with a large pile of sadly unthrown bricks.

Thank you for posting your workflow! As I said before, you did a wonderful job with the photo- I think yours is the best result in the thread, source file nonwithstanding. I really love your steps, in particular the graduated ND layer- thinking about an image in those sort of nuanced ways is something that I can really appreciate.

My only question pertains to your curves layer- what do you mean by evening out the grays, and when preventing burnout, did you actually drag the white point down?

Thanks again for sharing!

When I had gotten the rest of the image about right, the areas around the top left and right corners stayed a little too grey, possibly due to the fact that the original image was fairly low res and there was residual colour noise. Anyway, I just picked the problem spots with the curve dropper and then shifted that part of the curve very slightly up/left, while putting enough points on the lower part of the curve to prevent the black end of the curve from shifting. This helped even out the "whiteness" across the upper walls without creating banding or a sharp perimeter.

[Gee]

and what about the tones? the colors?
lookz amazing

[Verywierd]

Originally Posted by Gee

and what about the tones? the colors?
lookz amazing

If you're talking about my pic, thanks, but that's all I did. The rest is juggling the various adjustments until it looks "right". The advantage of using a white layer with a mask is that you have very fine control over both overall and spot saturation. I didn't add any colours or use anything like the replace colour functions in PS or any special plugins as I wanted to do something that others could duplicate.

[Gee]

well about schmidt i'm really interested on the colors usually.
sometimes it's just wicked.
really

ok, i'll try the white layer

[P_fuzz]

those AIM profiles links are not working any more...

anyone has it or where else can I find it?
I would love to give it a try!

[palms1]

Originally Posted by pixelhunter

Page 10

Well it made it to page 11 but p Fuzz is right the links are down ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !!! ! !! ! ! ! ! ! !

Palms