Doug's Kenya/Tanzania Video
Doug, how much post processing do you do? I think I detected it in the Cape Buffalo, the leopard in the tree, and some others.
Though they differ in quality (yours are much better than mine), it is amazing how we all seem to get some of the same shots! I had to reduce the size (hence poor res) of the photos below to post them here.
"Hey, nice wheels! What's under the hood?" A juvenile baboon sitting on the hood of one of the safari vehicles at Lake Manyara. Just before I took this photo he and his friend were licking the hood which evidently had been recently cleaned and waxed.
A Cape Buffalo in a small herd that was just below the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater:
A mated pair or two female(?) giraffe.
Maasai Warrior. Actually the village spokesman who is working on his degree at the mission school. He had an "Ironman" digital watch on his right arm and just peaking out below his traditional garb were a pair of Michael Jordans or khaki shorts! : )
A juvenile male, one of three lions trying to figure out how to cross a small stream occupied by (guarded by?) an ornery hippo. They wanted to join the rest of the pride so paced back and forth. His face was splattered with mud from an earlier, unsuccessful attempt. Though not graceful, they finally made it to the other side.
I use this photo as my laptop desktop. It reminds me of Marty the zebra voiced by comedian Chris Rock in the animated movie, "Madagascar":
Though they differ in quality (yours are much better than mine), it is amazing how we all seem to get some of the same shots! I had to reduce the size (hence poor res) of the photos below to post them here.
"Hey, nice wheels! What's under the hood?" A juvenile baboon sitting on the hood of one of the safari vehicles at Lake Manyara. Just before I took this photo he and his friend were licking the hood which evidently had been recently cleaned and waxed.
A Cape Buffalo in a small herd that was just below the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater:
A mated pair or two female(?) giraffe.
Maasai Warrior. Actually the village spokesman who is working on his degree at the mission school. He had an "Ironman" digital watch on his right arm and just peaking out below his traditional garb were a pair of Michael Jordans or khaki shorts! : )
A juvenile male, one of three lions trying to figure out how to cross a small stream occupied by (guarded by?) an ornery hippo. They wanted to join the rest of the pride so paced back and forth. His face was splattered with mud from an earlier, unsuccessful attempt. Though not graceful, they finally made it to the other side.
I use this photo as my laptop desktop. It reminds me of Marty the zebra voiced by comedian Chris Rock in the animated movie, "Madagascar":
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Comments
Like your photos a lot -- great animal expressions, fun situations, and your explanations give a lot of interesting background.
It IS interesting how we get many of the same shots. We must all be wired similarly.
I read a lot of photo mags (usually in the bathtub), particularly Digital Photographer (UK), which is expensive, but a lot better than the usual stuff on the stands. And I imagine almost all amateur photographers that get in pretty deep post-process their images -- it's half the job. I'm sure all the pros use Lightroom and Photoshop. The magazine I just mentioned gives technique after technique with those programs.
I post-processed some of your photos to give you some idea of how I might do it, but I don't know how to get them onto this reply. I'll give you a link to Smug Mug so you can look at them, in a few minutes.
Let me know how you get the pics onto the forum.
Doug
Here's the link to your post-processed photos:
https://iluv2fly.smugmug.com/Alans-Africa-Images/n-5mwfzq/
Monkey: Reduced highlights slider on LR; increased shadows; increase Vibrance (form of saturation); changed Tint to reduce purple tinge; crop; add gradients to darken top, sides, and bottom of image to place more light and attention to subject.
Giraffes: Increased Exposure slider; increased Shadows slider to lighten and bring out detail in shadows; increased Vibrance; add Gradients for darkening sky and tinting it more blue; lighten eyeballs with brush tool in LR.
Zebras: Increased Contrast slider for zebra's stripes; crop to place zebra in a Rule of Thirds position; add Vibrance; mask background and darken; lighten teeth with Brush in LR.
Might have done a lot of other things, but can't remember. But it's not work -- it's playing, just fooling around. And of course, everyone has their own ideas about what makes an image looks good and what adds more punch.
Best,
Doug
We did it four years ago and dream of returning also ... July 14th ... leaving on a jet plane July 12. (;-)
Thanks for posting the video. I enjoyed view every minute of it.
Safe Travels,
John
Doug
Wow, great job! I can truly see the differences (big improvements!). I especially like what you did to the giraffe and zebra, lightening and color. How about I send you all my originals so you can work your magic on them! ; ) ; )
Truthfully, I run out of energy and enthusiasm to do much with my photos after I get home. I go through and cull out most duplicates and any that are out of focus, etc. But other than that . . . . about all I have done is send off about a dozen photos from each of just two of our 9 trips to be enlarged and printed on canvas- I'm REALLY behind.
I have an older version of Photoshop that I haven't used in a long time so would need to re-learn it all again. I don't shoot in RAW, just at 18 MP (approx 5184 px X 3456 px) but I no longer have a desktop so use my PC laptop which only has a 15.5," 1366 X 768 res screen, for editing and post-processing.
FYI, to post the processed photo below, I right clicked on it in SmugMug, selected "Copy Image Location" from the drop down menu, then returned to the message screen, clicked "Insert Image," (mountain w/sun button) in the message tool bar, then placed the cursor between the start image and end image html code and left clicked again to paste the URL. Like I have posted previously, the current Tauck forum software can't handle images wider than about 640 px- I had already reduced the ones in my post. Hopefully, the new forum software will automatically resize and also allow direct upload from your computer (right now the image must already be hosted on the internet somewhere).
p.s. I hope to do better during Botswana, SA, Zambia in 2019!!
If I recall, you have the 6D? I loved that camera. Anyway, I just do the videos in Apple's Photo, pretty quick and easy. And, easily modifiable -- so you saw my wife's version with her chosen music. I made a version for myself with jazz, and another one with stuff like music from The Good, Bad, and Ugly. May not go too well with Africa, but it keeps me awake. LOL.
Then there's the version for the relatives, which has images of me and my wife in it, and a dopey video clip for our relatives to show our diggs at the Four Seasons.
Doug
Must be just fantastic on canvas! I haven't spent money on that kind of thing because I did a print on metal of an image of a starry milky way at Yosemite and it came out too dark. And I don't have pictures my wife would like to keep around on a more permanent basis. I did have made an 18 x 22 of the leopard with green eyes in the tree that turned out really nice (special for $6.99, LOL) and I hung it near my RC workshop.
Anyway, I think one's enthusiasm increases with
1. getting some facility with the tools, so you can do it quickly (takes 2-10 minutes in Lightroom for me).
2. seeing your own work improve immensely with you post process success.
3. making your workload more manageable by upping your threshold of what you want to keep and getting rid of the losers ASAP -- before you get home. Lose those losers on the airplane coming back.
Seems to me that if you're going to put more images on canvas, gaining some facility with Light Room (only take you a couple of hours) would boost your enthusiasm and produce some great images for that medium.
I'd suggest that the best bet is a free trial (think it lasts for a week) of Adobe Creative Cloud, that you can download to your laptop, if it will take it. Creative Cloud is the host desktop program for Light Room and Photoshop, as well as many other Adobe imaging programs. When you get Creative Cloud, LR and PS come with it, and they keep updating themselves to the latest version every few months! So if you go beyond the trial, it's ten bucks or so a month for the subscription.
You're probably shell-shocked by Photoshop. It's too complex and is really for pros, designers; it's the whole OR; you only need the clinic -- Lightroom. So, free CC might be worth a try.
Before even trying it, if you have some interest in re-kindling that inner RT-trained photographer in you, you might go to Amazon and buy a used copy (it's old, but excellent, anyway) of Jay Dickman's Perfect Digital Photography.
It is a fantastic guide to taking great pictures, and the second half has a really easy to follow chapter on using LR. And, if you get even more into it, you can read the chapter on Photoshop.
Sigh, I'm still envious of your flying experience.
Doug