Interpretation of images and use of Photoshop and LightrOOM - John Gravett – 24th Sept 2021

Last night John Gravett made a welcome return to demonstrate his post processing wizardry. A selection of members unworked on images had been sent to him to look at and discuss. We saw him work on at least one image from each member who had submitted them.

John made a number of key points which all members can use when taking their images:

· When taking an image, always look for distractions around the edge.

· Check everything you want is in the image, if necessary, take another one. If you cannot get all the scene into a single shot take multiple shots and merge as a panorama.

· To avoid the first two, do you need to move your position slightly?

· Use a wider aperture when taking images of people in an informal setting in order to blur the background and thus prevent it from being distracting.

· If you are shooting a high contrast scene it could be beyond the dynamic range of the camera leading to blown highlights or blocked shadows in the picture. If you have no graduated filters with you John reminded us to take images at different exposures then merge the images in a programme such as Lightroom to create a realistic looking High Dynamic Range (HDR) image. Most cameras have an Automatic Exposure Bracket (AEB) option which can be used to facilitate taking the images but if the facility doesn’t exist within the camera the shots can be taken manually then merged in Lightroom or similar. Remember that cameras with smaller sensors such as bridge, M4/3 or APS-C cameras have a smaller dynamic range than full frame so AEB is highly relevant.

· If there is writing in your shot it encourages the viewer to read the text, so only include if it’s a necessary part of your image or blur it out if it is a distraction..

He then demonstrated how he would process a range of our images, offering members many useful hints and tips in both Lightroom and Photoshop.

Our thanks to John for an entertaining, informative and really useful evening. We look forward to your next visit in January.

Next week Christine Widdall will be giving us a presentation, via zoom, entitled ‘Portfolio’ where she will show us a range of her work including birds, macro, landscape and architecture – something for everyone.

The following week, 8th October, is our 1st open competition of the season, John Williams is the judge.