The "salvage your photos" thread

[Celebration]

I've been pretty frustrated a couple of early mornings when I got a bunch of pretty bad photos of deer--mostly they were too far away and the lighting was not good, so the extreme zoom didn't work so well. Even if there had been light they were near trees and I was taking the photos against the light. The deer are quick and I don't generally have time to set up a tripod anyway. So about a zillion things were wrong with these. First, I'll give you an example of a good pose and what I did with "posterize" on Picasa.

And if anyone wants to try doing something with this photo, be my guest. Plus I am open to suggestions.

Or post some of your own salvaged photos. The bad photo, but nice pose I want to keep--



Tried to fix it without posterize, but I think it was too far gone



I like both the posterizes better!





Here are some other posterizes of other deer photos: Trust me the originals were not good-





I have some I was sort of able to salvage with soften





Would love to see before and after salvages, with soften, posterize, oil painting, whatever! I have a feeling all my deer photos will need help.

[rdking647]

1. took a couple of shots at it

1st one I just used aperture.
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/7925083430/][img][/img][/url]
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/7925083430/]aIMG_2733[/url] by [url=http://www.flickr.com/people/rdking647/]rdking647[/url], on Flickr

second attempt i said to myself the photo isnt as sharp as Id like. so what will mask that? so i went with an oil painting filter on the first edited photo.
heres what i got
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/7925084058/][img][/img][/url]
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/7925084058/]aIMG_2733 - Version 2[/url] by [url=http://www.flickr.com/people/rdking647/]rdking647[/url], on Flickr

[Celebration]

2. Thanks,

The second one looks pretty good, although the deer is a bit too red for me, and the grass a little sharp. I'm not sure that PhotoDirector or Picasa have those masks (those are what I use) and I was wondering what other programs would do, so I really appreciate it.

That second one looks a bit surreal.............

[rdking647]

3. i used simplify 3 by topaz labs

its a $40 program (although you can find coupons online for 15% off). its has a lot of "painting" effects

[Celebration]

5. I'll look into it

And definitely will get it if there is a free trial period! I'll probably need it for deer.

Soften plus sharpen helps a lot in PhotoDirector but it isn't extreme enough. I may like the poster effect better anyway, but it would be nice to have a variety.

[NV Whino]

4. You got a heron and a deer in the same shot

Wow!

[Celebration]

6. yes some poses are too good not to salvage!

The deer feed at the same lake as the herons, but still pretty lucky to get them in the same photo. Actually have them together in another salvaged photo too!

[Stevenmarc]

7. Lets go oil

Fiddling with the phone, first run through Snapseed to sharpen it a bit then run through Glaze

[Celebration]

8. wow, psychedelic

This flower child loves it!

Oh, yeah, you are the iPhone app genius? Good for you.

Thanks!

[Stevenmarc]

9. Thanks

I created another version where I ran my previous version through another app PhotoCopier that I downloaded today. They take an interesting approach where they analyzed the brightness, color, tone, detail, grain and texture of some of the world’s greatest paintings and then you apply that DNA to your shot.

This used Van Gogh's Cornfield with flight of Crows

[Celebration]

16. Funny!

Wow. Neat digital art. "Digital art" is the way to go with a bad photo!! You have convinced me of that.

[MichaelSoE]

10. A quick photoshop boost

First I duplicated the original to another layer and changed the blending mode to multiply.
I then duplicated that layer (same way, as another layer, the blending mode was already multiply)
Then I duplicated that layer (same, same)
That boosted the colors and contrast but made the deer very red.
I then added a hue and saturation layer and desaturated the reds to get 'deer color' and lightened it just a tad.
I then merged/flattened the image and used unsharp mask 200% with 1 pixel threshold, 0 radius.
Upload and posted

It's a little noisy in the body but overall it holds up against the original.

[Celebration]

15. that's pretty good

Definitely better than my attempt to make it look like a photo, and that is an interesting way to get out too much red!

I was interested to see what different software could do with bad photos, but since I like poster art anyway, I think I will stick with that.

[Callalily]

11. Please don't hate me but sometimes

a bad photo is a bad photo.

Many times when uploading after (etc.) I have those regrets about settings, aperture, etc. and let's be honest, those wonderful online "cutesy" ways to improve a photo just do not do it - at least for me.

Keep in mind . . . this is my humble opinion.

[MichaelSoE]

12. I agree. Too often the raw photograph is digitally enhanced so much it has left the realm.

Criteria for many photography contests limit the enhancement to what ever could be done in a traditional dark room. True, posterization is/was a photographic technique for printing posters With some digital effects though, one leaves "photography" and enters into the world of digital photographic illustration. Nothing wrong with that. There are some truly creative dp illustrators and at times I am jealous of their talents in that field.

It's true. Nothing makes for a great photo better than a great original, whether that be a negative or digital capture.

[Celebration]

14. I agree with all of that

I happen to really like posters as art forms. I am pretty intrigued by Posterize.

[Celebration]

13. that's fine, I don't hate you, LOL

That's kind of why I like the ones best that don't try to be a photo. So far I honestly feel I like posterize the best. But, I've always liked posters anyway, as art.

The conditions and camera precluded a good photo at any setting. As an example, the most extreme zoom only works when the mode is automatic, and I needed the extreme zoom for these. The extreme zoom only really works well in perfect lighting, which I didn't have.

I was interested in what post processing could do, and some of these are interesting in their own right.

But I haven't seen one yet that I loved that looked like a photo. I also like Paint by Number, so something that makes a photo look like Paint by Number would work for me, but then, that is a little bit like Posterize. But I like some of the nutty looking stuff as well, just not for over my sofa!

[Johnny Noshoes]

17. Here's my shot at it....

I just tried to make it the best photo I could using PaintShop and fiddling around with various Nik plugins.

[Johnny Noshoes]

18. Just a note...

I didn't use any "painting" effects. The deer looks soft focus in the original and there is only so much I could do to make it look just a little sharper without overdoing it. I brought up the structure just enough I think to make it look as sharp as it could given the original.

[Celebration]

19. Thanks, Johnny!

I realize there is only so much you can do. I was interested to see what could be done with a bad photo, if you liked the pose. I can get deer photos almost any time I want but rarely a buck looking right at me. At some point there will probably be some software that can turn a bad photo into a masterpiece, but we haven't yet reached that point. I'll save the photo for that day!

[Stevenmarc]

20. A couple years ago

I took a class with Vincent Versace called The Lazarus Effect: Raising the Dead Pixel, it's pretty amazing what actually can be done with the existing software but this is hardly a single click fix and don't know if they will ever be able to make a product that intuitive.

I can imagine Vincent's workflow on an image like this which would include quite a bit of layers and masking and use of multiple sharpening techniques which is why I went the Digital Art route, now if I was working with a Raw file, it was my shot and deer were an endangered species I probably would have gone full on Versace on this shot.

[Celebration]

21. Okay, that is interesting!

Versace, very interesting............................

Yeah, hardly worth it for a deer!!!



But I wondered what *could* be done with this, and other bad photos. You are right, though. It could have been an endangered species.

I also have one indigo bunting that I wouldn't mind resurrecting, but still, hardly an endangered species!!