Two For Tuesday – 157
It’s weird having two digital cameras. Each one seems to do some things better and some things worse than the other one. We’ve determined which one to use for most situations; but we still tend to switched back and forth in our Tuesday photo sessions. So, we decided to post approximately the same photograph and let our visitors decide which one is better for NSFW photos. For now, we won’t say which picture was taken with the new camera and which picture was taken with the older camera. Please let us know which photograph you prefer and why. As always, click ‘em to ‘big ‘em.
I prefer the richer and broader range of colours in the top photo. But I suppose it depends upon how accurately that represents CG’s skin tones. Is her tan as deep as it appears?
PS. I forgot to state the obvious – how great she looks!
What Alfie said…both times. For fading tan lines, those look pretty good!
The bottom photo does appear to be overexposed. In the hands of a skilled operator, an inferior camera can kick a superior camera’s ass. I think it’s more a matter of figuring out what’s what with your new and old cameras. You know? Thanks for the examples.
I think I like the top one better overall. The 2nd pic looks a bit more “washed out”….but I guess it is more preference. She looks great no matter what camera you use
Top one is the winner in my opinion. I do a LOT of photo editing and although you can “warm” the tones in the bottom photo it would also make the walls beige. Great hotel series. Thanks as always. J&W
The subject is lovely in both photos! The colour is definitely better in the top photos.
I really enjoy your blog, thanks for making the effort to write it and post the photos.
Your photo editing leaked some data, and it’s easy to tell that the photo on top was shot by a Pentax Optio M50, and the one on the bottom was shot by a Pentax Optio 750Z.
It’s hard to compare those two photos because the exposure times are different 0.02 for the M50 and 0.025 for the 750Z, as well as focal length, and because the white balance is not set correctly for either of them. The photo on top is too rich and dark, and the one on the bottom is too washed out.
Do yourself a favor and buy a whibal which is an inexpensive, known color, reference, target made of durable plastic.
To use the whibal, you take two shots: one of your subject, and either immediately before or immediately after, another one of the whibal in the exact same light. When you get to your photo editor, adjust the white balance of your subject from the known color of the target.
It’s easy as pie to get accurate color, but you have to remember when you’re outdoors to photograph the whibal each time that the light changes, e.g. each time you point the camera in a different direction or when clouds pass overhead.
Keep up the good work, and don’t strain any photogenic muscles or camera trigger muscles.
Alfie: We like the top photo too. It may be a bit too dark; but the bottom one is washed out comparatively. And thanks for the compliment!
Mountain Girl: Her tan lines are starting to fade. But you can still see them if you look.. And I look every day.
Nolens Volens: Unfortunately, I’m an unskilled operator. Our best photographs are usually by accident. We’d like to have some photos professionally done one of these days preferably with a nice dSLR with everything properly set.
Michelle: Thanks. Every time that we get a new camera; we notice how much better the photographs look.
Carolina Jim and Wife: We need to have a better source image. Unfortunately, that means that we need a better cameraman too. And glad that you like the hotel series.
DownUnder: Thanks. Everyone seems to prefer the top image which was taken with the new camera. Glad that you like our blog.
Tony Tanse: Thanks for the tip. I used jHead to strip off the EXIF header of both photos as well as some older ones. I usually remove the header when editing photographs; but I must have inadvertently unchecked the box.
I just let the cameras do their thing. I probably will get the item you are talking about. I’m not the best at making visual adjustments; but something is better than nothing; and it certainly wouldn’t hurt.
And, not to worry, California Girl checks my muscles very frequently.
MCB said:
Carolina Jim and Wife: We need to have a better source image. Unfortunately, that means that we need a better cameraman too. And glad that you like the hotel series.
Before you get a better cameraman, get a better camera.
Your cameras don’t deliver better images because they produce JPEGs which the camera generates by taking data from its sensors and compressing it with an algorithm that loses details by design.
Right in the camera, before you ever get to see any photos, the JPEG compression algorithm tosses away wonderful details that you will never see. You’re in luck because that’s not all that the world has to offer.
Various cameras, notably Nikon and Canon dSLRs as well as some others, are also able to produce images in their own RAW formats as well as well known JPEG format. RAW format means no format. It’s just the way that some engineer chose to represent the data bits from his camera’s light sensors; consequently, all manufacturers’ RAW formats are different. The good part about RAW images is that they pack much more data than one is used to seeing in JPEGs, and editing RAW images allows you to do very slick things with light which are very hard to do with JPEGs.
Thanks for the photos.
Tony Tanse: In our case, it probably is the cameraman. The 750Z takes uncompressed TIFFs in addition to JPEGs which is one of the reasons that we got it. Admittedly, that’s not as good as RAW; but it’s good enough so that we can identify where the problem is. It’s hard to compose an image when that’s the only thing that you are doing. We’ve got some great pictures of us doing other (tamer) things. Unfortunately (or not, depending on your perspective) it’s hard to take pictures when you’ve got “distractions”. That’s why we think a real cameraperson would be better.