los angeles men's fashion and beauty photographer ronald n. tan

I made a Facebook page for my pet portraiture, http://www.facebook.com/pages/Zaw-Zi-Chit-Chit-Pet-Portraiture-By-Ronald-N-Tan/339156796391.

Please join the page let me know if you need photographs of your pets!

How do we turn an ordinary backyard photo into a “WOW!” image?

Exposed so that highlight isn't lost. -1EV from the in-camera reading on Chit-Chit's dark fur. I've manually measured the white balance using a grey card. Processed in CaptureONE PRO 5.1.

I used BW Panchromatic as a start and additionally tweaked the whites and darks in the image all using CaptureOne PRO 5.1.

Since I am going through a “monochromatic” phase, when I set Chit-Chit up, I was imagining the final outcome of the image. Playing with dodging and burning, I’ve created drama, depth, and character to the plain ordinary backyard-lit photograph!

Try pre-visualizing the final photograph before pressing that shutter!

Photomatix is really fun! I wonder if I would ever incorporate this “look” into my magazine work. We’ll see.

I never read software manuals–it shows how easy and intuitive the user interface is. I first do a rough run where I “memorize” what settings does what at certain settings and the rest I allowed my calculative and experimental mind to roam free.

Wheeeee! Fun, fun, fun!

This is the home of Zaw and Chit in the backyard. They never use it.

THIS POST HAS BEEN RE-EDITED 25TH OCTOBER 2009.

Here is a pseudo-tone mapping tutorial. My 8-Bit layered TIFF file zipped. You’ll see my original corrected image, tone-mapped image, and the final image as I intended.

1) Grab my file located here:

2) Buy or download for trial Photomatix PRO: http://www.hdrsoft.com/

3) Enjoy!

In this tutorial, you’ll go from this image: (Starting image–provided). I attached this image to show how the starting image looks like. A lot of folks would stop here, but if you want to take your images to another level of dramatics, read on!

Chit-Chit. CaptureOne PRO 4.8.3. "+0 EV"

Tone-Mapped via Photomatix PRO:

Here are the Photomatix PRO settings: Detail Enhancer only.

Pseudo HDR / Tone-Mapping Part

1. Download the 0EV, -1EV, +1EV file of Chit-Chit here: Chit-Chit_0EV_-1EV_+1EV.zip

2. Make an HDR image and apply the Detail Enhancer settings from the above screen capture. You should now have an image that looks like mine (Chit-Chit Tone-mapped).

3. Correct the lens distortion via the Distort –> Lens Correction Filter in Photoshop.

4. From this, you can in any direction you wish. If you get good results, send a web-sized version to me via the contact page. I am curious what goodies you cook up!

5. Here is my version: Chit-Chit-102209-009_3_4_5HDRI_tonemapped_Tutorial.zip

Here is a thought or photography tip to some starting out.

It is always good to set the proper or “near-right” white balance at RAW capture. This is accomplished via using a Gretag McBeth Color Checker card or those “Grey Cards” you can purchase at photography retailers.

When you don’t have them, try to find something “grey” or neutral in the same lighting situation and/or distance as your subject.

When I was shooting Chit-Chit, I did not want to go back and get my color checker card. So, I looked for something neutral in the vicinity and similar lighting as Chit-Chit. I found these rubber mats for the dog house.

Here is screen shot of the original RAW capture and the white balance corrected. I also corrected and enhanced the contrast to give that initial, “Oomph!”

If you’re using any RAW converter software, call up your “white balance tool” and try to find RGB areas that are near equal in value on the grey/”neutral” reference image. For my reference image, I got 7750K with Tint = 7. I applied those settings over and you can see the before and after. It made a HUGE difference in image perception and mood.

IMPORTANT!

Leo Lam: May I add a suggestion? “The monitor must be calibrated for this method to work, otherwise, make sure you use a grey card (like the Gretag Macbeth or WhiBal) for white balance”. Without calibration, any “fine tuning” at the end is futile…

If there isn’t any “grey” or neutral objects in the scene, Chit-Chit has some grey patches of fur that could be used as starting guide and later fine-tune in photoshop. The purpose of white balancing is showing to people that what’s naturally “white” appears as white. If you look in the uncorrected image, Chit-Chit’s white stripe on her chest appeared grey.

You can play with the white balance setting to your heart’s content in RAW, but I like to be technical and scientific. Every shoot I do has some sort of neutral grey or reference image.

HAPPY WHITE-BALANCING!

I decided to showcase my pet portraiture.

http://pet-portraiture.ronaldntan.com/

Here they are again taken a few days ago on the 25th Sept.