Story Telling

Posted on by kritterspaw

I mentioned that I had the fortunate opportunity to have Moose Peterson critique some of my photos.  While we was very kind and even called my photos great (woohoo), and suggested that I had good technique an composition, he noted that I needed to work on my story telling.  When I think of story telling, I think of portraits… photos of people doing something, action, great expressions, expressing a moment in time.  I get that good portraits may use shallow depth of field to blur the background to highlight the subject.  But how do you do that in Landscape and Wildlife photographs?

woods canyn corner fish_SSPSi

While I am not comfortable taking photos of people, I do understand that they had great depth (sense of size) to a photograph, and tell a story of that place.  Here I caught two young adults mid catch at Woods Canyon Lake.

Expressions, if you can capture them, are worth a thousands words.  Whether you anticipate and wait for it, or just get lucky.  Here you can hear the oohs and ahhs of my friend and husband as they revel over the magnificent fall colors we were fortunate enough to enjoy.

deanna john uhahi

Or the tender moment between a deer mom and her little one.

monand lilone_PSi

Thanks, Moose.  I’m working on it.

Camera Settings: sRGB vs. Adobe RGB

Posted on by kritterspaw

buck_PEi

I was fortunate enough to go to Photoshop World in Vegas this past September.  It was a valuable experience on my levels.  I signed up for a Portfolio Review, where for $25 you bring 15 – 20 pix and they pair you with a photographer in your same category (Wildlife in my case).  I was delighted to find myself sitting next to none other than Moose Peterson himself.  Wow!  His wildlife and aviation pix are legendary.  Let’s just say, I had most certainly heard of him before!

Moose was very kind with his critique, though very humbling.  Photos that I thought were, while maybe not world class, at least good… didn’t make the cut as far as Moose was concerned.  I went home a little deflated, but encouraged and inspired to do better.  He explains his philosophy that no ‘critter’ shot should be tampered with, not even cropped!  Just when I’m finally getting better at Photoshop.   Well… I reserve the right to consider that approach, as I freely admit to the occasional crop or exposure adjustment.  Hmmm.

One very interesting comment he made was relative to my camera settings.  He took one look at the picture posted here, and suggested that my camera settings were on sRGB and I should change them to Adobe RGB.  He looked at one photo, and by that alone, declared my camera settings.  You can see that?  Really!?   I was stunned.  He explained that sRGB is 256K of colors, while Adobe RGB is 14 million colors, hence the ‘monotone’ look of my buck picture.  Wow!  Of course the first thing I did when I got back to my room was check my camera settings.  He was dead on.  I was set on sRGB.  I instantly re-set my camera to Adobe RGB.

A little research online tells a different story.  Adobe RGB is best if you are going to print.  sRGB is best if you are emailing.  But, then you can find any answer you looking for online, irregardless of what you want it to be.  For me, I have it set on Adobe RGB, and I’ll be leaving it there, unless I learn something compelling to change it.