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Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

The Little Green Box

I just shot a photo of eggs in a wrens nest. I thought I had everything lined up and made sure it was in as sharp a focus as I could get. Once I had it up, it showed printing up to 3 ft. by 5 ft. capabilities. When I look at it with the "green box", it shows the photo as very noisy. I then dropped the available size down to 24" by 15", but the lack of clarity is still there. I need help and I'm very frustrated.

carolina wren nest by bellesouth studio

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Hi, Rebecca,

The green box always shows a version of the largest, possible size -- not the largest size you make available. That's why I turn the green box off when I've removed the larger sizes. I don't see the point of previewing sizes which are not offered for sale.

I've also noticed that what I see in the green box is not necessarily what I see when previewing at 100% on my own computer. That's always concerned me.

 

Heather Applegate

9 Years Ago

No matter what size you offer, the green box will still show the highest resolution of the photo. Kinda misleading.
Was your ISO high or did you have to lighten up the exposure while processing? That will make it noisy (as I'm sure you already know).

 

Heather Applegate

9 Years Ago

Do you have topaz DeNoise? Can probably save it a bit.

 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

thanks Ladies. Yes I had to lighten up a bit - I used an LED ring when I shot because the nest was tucked down in a basket on the back porch, among old tools and such. (there was a an old bristle bottle brush built right into the nest!) I used Topaz deNoise. I just seem to be going backward in my shooting, I really feel so frustrated and I don't want to keep bothering the mama bird taking even more shots. Heather or Wendy, did you look at the picture? I guess I should try turning off the green back, but I have this fear it will look bad no matter what!

Rebecca

 

I just looked at it, Rebecca.

Sorry to say it does seem extremely noisy/blurry -- more than I would expect under just about any normal shooting circumstances. I've never used any type of ring light, so can't speak to whether this is a common problem.

Maybe Rich will be along with some input on this. It seems like his kind of puzzle.

Good luck!

 

Joseph C Hinson

9 Years Ago

My green box does not work on this computer. No matter where I click on the photograph, it shows the extreme left hand upper corner of the shot. So keep that in mind as I respond. But if you have noticed some noise and have cut the top sizes from selling, the best course of action would probably be to edit the shot and size down as you do. On the other hand, there should probably be some noise or grain in the part of the shot that is purposefully blurred. I'm a big believer in the green box though. I think if we are trying to sell large images to prospective clients, they should be able to see it as large as we want to sell it. Which is another reason to size down if you're not selling at the largest size possible.

 

Jeffrey Campbell

9 Years Ago

What ISO camera setting did you use?

Setting your ISO on the lowest available setting will drastically reduce noise. The lowest setting on my camera is 100 - I never shoot on anything higher for my work here.

 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

I think it was 200, it was on automatic focus. I will have to see - it could have been some ridiculous number. When I use the close up (the little flower) feature, it tells me that checking my iso is not available.

I think Rich is probably tired of my questions. :)

Rebecca

 

Jeffrey Campbell

9 Years Ago

I loosely suspect when you chose the flower feature the camera also chose an automatic ISO based on the lighting and bumped it up higher. Depending on your camera if available, and to reduce the noise, you would want to make settings yourself.

The way I do things is:

- Set my camera to Aperture Priority, which allows me to choose what lens f-stop I want depending on the scene, to control the depth of field. On something like the birds nest I would take a few pictures at different f-stops (e.g. f/8, f/11, f/13, f/16, f/22) and decide what I liked best.

- Set ISO to 100, which gives me the best noise reduction for my camera.

- By setting aperture priority the camera will decide how long to expose the scene based on above settings.

- I shoot raw format and white balance is not an issue for me, because I modify it in post editing.


 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

Thanks Jeffery - I shoot raw format, but I had the white balance set on cloudy. And what you suspect is correct - it does select an automatic ISO. I'll change a few things around.

Rebecca

 

Bradford Martin

9 Years Ago

When you underexpose an image you get noise. When you then lighten it up that noise becomes more visible. Check your image at 100% view before you even upload it.
Those image modes are harder to really use than just learning the right way. Flower modes sometime assume you are on a tripod.

If you don't want to disable the preview just downsize the whole image. It is really way too big for the image quality anyway , even if you denoise. Downsize and view again at 100%. If it looks good enough, upload and disable the top 2 sizes. You may be able to save this, but this is far beyond the noise I would consider trying to fix.

 

Roy Erickson

9 Years Ago

" I " don't like the green box and don't use it often - on photo's only and only if I'm selling in the largest sizes. I don't belong to one group because the administrator insists that the green box be available. I don't believe in it's accuracy and I've often wondered if they are using the file they print from or the degraded one you see in the 900 px

 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

thanks,Bradford, I was on a tripod. I don't think I can save it. I went out and shot another round this morning, but I just can't get the eggs in focus. The nest is about knee high, but tucked way down into a basket. I've been looking at them in RAW on PSE12 and the edges of the eggs just aren't sharp. Rather than scare away the mama bird completely, I think I'll not bother her for a while.

Rebecca

 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

And just to show that I'm not a total loss as a photographer, here is something else I took after I attempted to shoot the bird eggs.

rusted urn detail by bellesouth studio

 

Jeffrey Campbell

9 Years Ago

Belle,

Here's a little tip when using Photoshop. On the above picture you posted you will see noise in the red oval shaped area on top. You can select that area of the image and use the blur tool to smooth out the noise.

 

David Patterson

9 Years Ago

Rebecca...my older camera that had the flower setting took the camera out of the raw mode, and into the .jpg mode. So that may be why it didn't let you adjust the ISO.

 

Melissa Bittinger

9 Years Ago

Rebecca, you have extra views on the bird's nest from Greensboro NC because I kept trying to get the stupid green box to work....arrrgggggghhhh!!! Worked just fine on the Urn but no go on the nest. Sigh, okay without having that, it looks like the eggs are fine but it does look noisy in the blurred straw part. Either that or I'm distracted by the amount of blurred nest material in the foreground. If you want to keep that particular offset composition I might suggest a texture overlay maybe over the blurred areas? For me, it's blurred to the point of being a bit uncomfortable to view...like I forgot to put my contacts in or something! Maybe if it was blurred and softened even more alone or blurred and add texture overlay? - I think that would be worth trying. Might would fix some of the noise issue and be less distracting from the eggs - which are super cool! A trick I've used recently, well everything I do is 'recently' since I'm still learning post processing...anyhow...I don't have photoshop but I do have LR and Topaz, so I've used LR selective brush to reduce clarity (and/or noise) which softens stuff maybe somewhat like the blur tool would in photoshop. Maybe someone can answer that who is familiar with both programs.

 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

thank you Kind friends - I will make the changes suggested tomorrow.
For now I head to bed for hours of sweet slumber!

Rebecca

 

Bob Galka

9 Years Ago

If you look at the properties of your image on your computer it will tell you all the setting on your camera when the image was taken.

 

Bellesouth Studio

9 Years Ago

Jeffery, I took your advice, since I couldn't sleep very much after all.
David, it still stays in raw, but the ISO is changed according to what I'm shooting.
Melissa, I will experiment with that!
Bob, I know this information, but often forget to look, thanks for the reminder!

rusted urn detail by bellesouth studio

 

Bradford Martin

9 Years Ago

I f you have trouble focusing it may be you are too close and exceeding the distance limit of the lens. Backing will allow the lens to focus and also give more depth of field. You seem to have plenty of pixels so you can always crop off a bit. As a former bird nest researcher I can tell you that mama will not abandon her eggs, unless you do something to make her fear for her life. If you keep your visit short the disturbance won't matter. My own wildlife photography ethics keep me from approaching nests in conservation areas but I would do it on my own property.

 

This discussion is closed.