Although Rhowan won't be six until the end of August, we held her sixth birthday party today so she could invite her friends along before school breaks up for the summer. This one was taken during a game of pass-the-parcel, just after the parcel had passed her by for about the fourth time in a row. She got her turn in the end, but she was getting increasingly frustrated until she did.
On another matter: if you've already read the EXIF data you'll note that this was taken with a 1Ds Mark II. I have a big job coming up next month so finally bit the bullet and bought the Mark II. I've only had it for a few days, and haven't had much free time to play around with it, but so far it's more than living up to my expectations.
You might also have noted that I used a different RAW processor for this one - RAW Developer from Iridient Digital. This is an OS X only RAW processor, and it's very cheap, but it produces excellent results. This one, for example, was processed almost entirely within RAW developer. All I did in CS3 was add a masked Curve to lift her eyes and a minor amount of cloning. What I especially like about RAW Developer is its Curves tool. You can adjust eight separate curves within a single dialog: RGB, Red, Green, Blue (as with a standard RGB image in Photoshop) and Lightness, Chroma (ab), 'a' and 'b' (as though you'd converted the image to LAB Color mode). Being able to use RGB and LAB Color Curves at the same time is wonderful.
I was also really impressed with the range of black and white conversion options. These include familiar tools such as Desaturate and Channel Mixer, but you also have the option of Luma (which I used for this shot, akin to using the lightness channel in LAB Color mode), CIELab Lightness (which, if I understand it correctly, is roughly equivalent to how we would perceive the scene in the absence of any colour data), Intensity and Custom Tone (neither of which I've had time to investigate).
So, two new toys, one cheap one and a ridiculously expensive one, but I'm really happy with both of them.
captured camera lens focal length aperture shutter speed shooting mode exposure bias metering mode ISO flash image quality RAW converter cropped?
4.33pm on 6/7/07
Canon 1Ds Mark II
EF 70-200 f/2.8L IS USM
200mm
f/2.8
1/60
manual
n/a
spot
100
580EX
RAW
RAW Developer
1x1
comment bymiChou at 10:20 PM (GMT) on 6 July, 2007
Very nice picture. Love the look a lot, you got really well the frustration in her eyes :)
Wonderful :)
comment bynferreira at 10:34 PM (GMT) on 6 July, 2007
Glad to see your photos again on Chromasia. Thisportrait of Rhowan is very well executed. Your two new "toys" are amazing, but the Canon 1Ds Mark II, now that's another level. What did you do to your 5D? Will you use it as a second body?
comment byPete Carr at 11:43 PM (GMT) on 6 July, 2007
Congrats on the upgrade. I'd be interested to know how you compare Raw Developer to Lightroom, assuming you've tried it. Its current my editor of choice and I'm doing 90% of my work in it.
comment by Edward at 11:55 PM (GMT) on 6 July, 2007
Beautiful eyes, as always.
David- why not let us help offset the cost of your new toys a bit? BRING ON THE TUTORIALS!!!
Beautiful portrait David. Just out of curiosity, why didn't you go for the Mark III instead of the Mark II (aside from cost of course!) ?
comment byMax Cook at 12:52 AM (GMT) on 7 July, 2007
Wow you've got all the toys now! I recently did a much needed upgrade from a 20D to the new Mark III and I'm in love. It feels great to have a "pro" camera in my hands. I love the 20D but it feels like a plastic toy now. I can only wonder what Canon has up their sleeve to replace the 1Ds Mark II.
She definitly looks a bit frustrated her, i love the way how you captured this on the photo!
comment by Jennifer at 10:58 AM (GMT) on 7 July, 2007
Lovely - I love your portraits (but then that's my thang!) Wonderful expression and fab DOF. I'm with Pete - love Lightroom, but I'm not on mac so couldn't compare. Glad to hear you've got yr new toy at last - very jealous - though not of the weight! I still am hankering after that 85L - oh and a second would 5D be nice ;-D Enjoy 'practicing' with it before your jaunt - lucky (sorry - hard working, tallented) chap!
comment by Si Goodchild at 11:06 AM (GMT) on 7 July, 2007
Dave,
Congrats on the new kit. I remember commenting when you bought the 5D that I guessed it might have been a difficult decision to decide between an affordable full frame sensor (5D) or an affordable-ish pro-body (1D Mk II or IIn). I guess you just got the best of both worlds, albeit without the affordabilty!
I'm guessing from the catchlight in Rhowan's eyes that this was bounce flash using a STOFEN. Am I right? Also, you mention a masked curve to lift her eyes: was this a rough selection around her eyes using a freehand selection and a feather-edge or did you use something a little more clever like a magic wand to just lift the whites and irises?
PS - I will keep asking this stuff until the tutorials come on-line!
PPS - still loving your old 70-200 F4L!
comment byalexandru savu at 12:53 PM (GMT) on 7 July, 2007
Nice portrait. Congrats on you daughter's birthday and on the recent acquisitions.
comment byKeith De-Lin at 01:29 PM (GMT) on 7 July, 2007
Excellent portrait as usual - the sort you don't see often in the windows of High Street photographers because it shows the real person - and very nicely rendered in RAW Developer.
What an interesting program that is; at first it looks like a cut-down, budget version of Lightroom/Aperture, but as you delve further into it you can see that it has a lot of unique features for the serious 'curvist'. I'm giving it a try, although I've got rather used to the 5-star luxury of Lightroom 1.1 and it's hard going back to self-catering.
comment byL.Reis at 08:16 PM (GMT) on 7 July, 2007
Awesome portrait! With all the "frustration" drawn by the lines of her mouth and all the smoothness on her skin and hair.
Beautiful photo, she has the same look in her eyes that my little guy gets when he's had enough of me taking his photo. The composition and lighting are truly amazing.
comment byFreddy at 12:27 PM (GMT) on 9 July, 2007
Very nice picture David.
I do not know "RAW Developer" but I know Mark II, and is wonderful, enjoy with the new toys :-)
comment byMarkus at 01:49 PM (GMT) on 12 July, 2007
David,
i´m a long time lurker and admirer of your work and i´d like to take the oportunity to post a note. You created another marvellous portrait of your daugther, i really love the toning and the look in her face. I can still remember the first time i got in contact with your site and it also was a picture of Rhowan that amazed me (and still amazes me, it was http://www.chromasia.com/iblog/archives/0506292030.php ), so it´s funny and interesting to see her grow up in your pictures.
Besides the praises, i´d like to ask you a question: how do you compare the AF of the three Canon DSLRs you own/owned, coming from 20D over 5D to the 1Ds ... you do a lot of portraits that needs exact focus on the eyes with large apertures, did the 5D Af show improvements over the 20D AF and the 1Ds over 5D? Just curious.
I wish you and your family all the best and keep up the great work!
Markus
Although Rhowan won't be six until the end of August, we held her sixth birthday party today so she could invite her friends along before school breaks up for the summer. This one was taken during a game of pass-the-parcel, just after the parcel had passed her by for about the fourth time in a row. She got her turn in the end, but she was getting increasingly frustrated until she did.
On another matter: if you've already read the EXIF data you'll note that this was taken with a 1Ds Mark II. I have a big job coming up next month so finally bit the bullet and bought the Mark II. I've only had it for a few days, and haven't had much free time to play around with it, but so far it's more than living up to my expectations.
You might also have noted that I used a different RAW processor for this one - RAW Developer from Iridient Digital. This is an OS X only RAW processor, and it's very cheap, but it produces excellent results. This one, for example, was processed almost entirely within RAW developer. All I did in CS3 was add a masked Curve to lift her eyes and a minor amount of cloning. What I especially like about RAW Developer is its Curves tool. You can adjust eight separate curves within a single dialog: RGB, Red, Green, Blue (as with a standard RGB image in Photoshop) and Lightness, Chroma (ab), 'a' and 'b' (as though you'd converted the image to LAB Color mode). Being able to use RGB and LAB Color Curves at the same time is wonderful.
I was also really impressed with the range of black and white conversion options. These include familiar tools such as Desaturate and Channel Mixer, but you also have the option of Luma (which I used for this shot, akin to using the lightness channel in LAB Color mode), CIELab Lightness (which, if I understand it correctly, is roughly equivalent to how we would perceive the scene in the absence of any colour data), Intensity and Custom Tone (neither of which I've had time to investigate).
So, two new toys, one cheap one and a ridiculously expensive one, but I'm really happy with both of them.
camera
lens
focal length
aperture
shutter speed
shooting mode
exposure bias
metering mode
ISO
flash
image quality
RAW converter
cropped?
Canon 1Ds Mark II
EF 70-200 f/2.8L IS USM
200mm
f/2.8
1/60
manual
n/a
spot
100
580EX
RAW
RAW Developer
1x1
Very nice picture. Love the look a lot, you got really well the frustration in her eyes :)
Wonderful :)
Glad to see your photos again on Chromasia. Thisportrait of Rhowan is very well executed. Your two new "toys" are amazing, but the Canon 1Ds Mark II, now that's another level. What did you do to your 5D? Will you use it as a second body?
miChou: thanks.
nferreira: yes, I'll hang on to the 5D.
Congrats on the upgrade. I'd be interested to know how you compare Raw Developer to Lightroom, assuming you've tried it. Its current my editor of choice and I'm doing 90% of my work in it.
Beautiful eyes, as always.
David- why not let us help offset the cost of your new toys a bit? BRING ON THE TUTORIALS!!!
:-)
Beautiful portrait David. Just out of curiosity, why didn't you go for the Mark III instead of the Mark II (aside from cost of course!) ?
Wow you've got all the toys now! I recently did a much needed upgrade from a 20D to the new Mark III and I'm in love. It feels great to have a "pro" camera in my hands. I love the 20D but it feels like a plastic toy now. I can only wonder what Canon has up their sleeve to replace the 1Ds Mark II.
Congrats on the gear.
hey congrats on your daughter turning six, that's really awesome. you must be a proud dad. Another fabulous shot. and right on about the new toys.
Aweosme portrait!
She definitly looks a bit frustrated her, i love the way how you captured this on the photo!
Lovely - I love your portraits (but then that's my thang!) Wonderful expression and fab DOF. I'm with Pete - love Lightroom, but I'm not on mac so couldn't compare. Glad to hear you've got yr new toy at last - very jealous - though not of the weight! I still am hankering after that 85L - oh and a second would 5D be nice ;-D Enjoy 'practicing' with it before your jaunt - lucky (sorry - hard working, tallented) chap!
Dave,
Congrats on the new kit. I remember commenting when you bought the 5D that I guessed it might have been a difficult decision to decide between an affordable full frame sensor (5D) or an affordable-ish pro-body (1D Mk II or IIn). I guess you just got the best of both worlds, albeit without the affordabilty!
I'm guessing from the catchlight in Rhowan's eyes that this was bounce flash using a STOFEN. Am I right? Also, you mention a masked curve to lift her eyes: was this a rough selection around her eyes using a freehand selection and a feather-edge or did you use something a little more clever like a magic wand to just lift the whites and irises?
PS - I will keep asking this stuff until the tutorials come on-line!
PPS - still loving your old 70-200 F4L!
Nice portrait. Congrats on you daughter's birthday and on the recent acquisitions.
fantastic portrait, I love her expression.
Excellent portrait as usual - the sort you don't see often in the windows of High Street photographers because it shows the real person - and very nicely rendered in RAW Developer.
What an interesting program that is; at first it looks like a cut-down, budget version of Lightroom/Aperture, but as you delve further into it you can see that it has a lot of unique features for the serious 'curvist'. I'm giving it a try, although I've got rather used to the 5-star luxury of Lightroom 1.1 and it's hard going back to self-catering.
Awesome portrait! With all the "frustration" drawn by the lines of her mouth and all the smoothness on her skin and hair.
Happy Birthday and have fun!
You have beautiful children! Beautiful portrait too!
Great portrait. Lovely framing and light. Good job!
lovely portrait!
Beautiful photo, she has the same look in her eyes that my little guy gets when he's had enough of me taking his photo. The composition and lighting are truly amazing.
Thanks all :-)
Great shot. Lovely expressions
I like more this :)
Very nice picture David.
I do not know "RAW Developer" but I know Mark II, and is wonderful, enjoy with the new toys :-)
David,
i´m a long time lurker and admirer of your work and i´d like to take the oportunity to post a note. You created another marvellous portrait of your daugther, i really love the toning and the look in her face. I can still remember the first time i got in contact with your site and it also was a picture of Rhowan that amazed me (and still amazes me, it was http://www.chromasia.com/iblog/archives/0506292030.php ), so it´s funny and interesting to see her grow up in your pictures.
Besides the praises, i´d like to ask you a question: how do you compare the AF of the three Canon DSLRs you own/owned, coming from 20D over 5D to the 1Ds ... you do a lot of portraits that needs exact focus on the eyes with large apertures, did the 5D Af show improvements over the 20D AF and the 1Ds over 5D? Just curious.
I wish you and your family all the best and keep up the great work!
Markus