Tag Archive for: camera

That setting that drives you nuts during the calibration process on Mac (and windows)

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Calibration is important

I think most of us will agree on this. If you want proper colors and happy customers (depending on the assignment of course) it’s very smart to calibrate your monitor at least once a month, but preferably before every important retouching job. But what are the important settings during calibration?

Calibrating your monitor is super easy.

I’ve been using Calibrite (X-rite) products for years. They are easy to use and compatible with the hardware calibration options inside my BenQ monitor. This is a big plus because although the software from Calibrite is great, hardware solutions are always better, of course. Most professional and semi-professional monitors support hardware calibration.

By the way, if you are in the market for a new monitor and you live in the EU drop me an email, I have a few 10% discount codes from BenQ
They have been supporting my work with Digital Classroom for years and love to give you guys a nice discount.

Anyway back to the story.
Even with easy software, it’s sometimes easy to get an error that… well you can’t fix.
You checked everything, and although you know your brand new monitor should really be perfect, it’s far from.
Or maybe you don’t know how to read the rapports and just wonder why there is so much fuzz about professional monitors.

Step 1

This one is for all systems.
When you are using the HDMI connection make sure your monitor is set for 0-255 or FULL RGB.
If it’s set up for 16-235 (video) you will get all kinds of weird behaviors, very noticeable in the dark and bright areas, but in essence, your whole image looks way off.

When you are using USBc, TB, or Display port you don’t have to check this.
Those connections automatically select the right output.

So is HDMI bad… absolutely not, it’s just as perfect for what we do as USBc and Displayport, you just have to check that one setting.

Step 2

And that’s the nasty one.
In the Mac, there is one setting that will almost certainly have you scratching your head and probably a little bit in panic mode.

If whatever you do, you can’t pass the final certification from your calibration and the errors are constantly changing per calibration, there is probably one setting you forgot the turn off. You can find it under “Displays” in Mac OS.

important setting during calibration

This one will give you A LOT of issues when you want a stable and trusted display.
So turn it OFF.
This goes for all settings with labels like “auto”, “Enhancement”, “Super”, “Real”, “natural” etc.

Just turn everything off and run the calibration software.
You will see that you will pass the certification without any problems now 😀

Don’t forget this important setting during calibration!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below, or reach out via our social media.

Read more about colors in this blog about Working with Colors 

 

A Harley Davidson and a beautiful model and you get to see it all….

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Frank Doorhof’s Digital Classroom, model shoot with a motor

Have you ever wondered how they got those shots?

Well, you’re going to love the Frank Doorhof’s Digital Classroom series.
In these broadcasts, we show you complete setups and tell you about the technique but most of all, we also talk about choosing the right angle, styling, adding elements in the set or for example, smoke, working with lens flares, colors, etc.

And this time we had a very special prop, a Harley Davidson.

In two completely different setups, I show you how to light the set and pose the model, but also how to light in zones and understand feathering and light placement for reflections and covering up light sources.

And the coolest part?
I did it all with the Geekoto strobes, the FlashBender in striplight configuration, and the Rogue Magnetic system.
A complete setup everyone can afford and still gives you awesome results both on location and in the studio.
See frankdoorhof.com/shop for the gear I use.

Here is the episode of the digital classroom.

Digital Classroom results

And of course, you also want to see the results.
Do realize these were all shot during a live broadcast, so not the perfect circumstances to get everything 100% right 😀

Frank Doorhof’s Digital Classroom supporters

We have to thank our sponsors for making Frank Doorhof’s Digital Classroom possible.

Frank Doorhof’s Digital Classroom is sponsored by BenQ Photographic Monitors & Rogue Expo Imaging; Photographic Design (FlashBenders & Magnetic modifiers, color, correction, and reflection)

Also powered by Calibrite (calibration done right, the best solutions for photographers, filmmakers, designers, and content creators who love color and demand the very best tools for their color-critical workflow) and Cascable (tethering software for the iPad),

Furthermore, we thank YOU! the viewers and fans of our Digital Classroom from all over the world. We like your questions and remarks in the chat live or below our videos.

Special thanks to our friend Martin, who drove his precious Harley in our studio, and friend and model Claudia for being creative.
You might have seen our little mascot Chewie the Labradoodle, who doesn’t like smoke but was brave enough to be watching from below the desk.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel for more live streams and other videos. 

Frank Doorhof's Digital Classroom, model shoot with a motor Frank Doorhof's Digital Classroom, model shoot with a motor Frank Doorhof's Digital Classroom, model shoot with a motor Frank Doorhof's Digital Classroom, model shoot with a motor

 

Sometimes 15 minutes is enough for a commercial photo shoot

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Planning is everything in a photo shoot

Sometimes it doesn’t go as planned. Our planning for this commercial photo shoot was good, but it ended in only 15 minutes shooting.
Recently we did a photoshoot for the new Sparks sunglasses collection.
The idea was to shoot the series in Amsterdam, but due to the weather, we decided at the last minute to change the location to Emmeloord so we would have the studio as a backup. and once again we found out that planning a for commercial photoshoot can go differently than you thought.

Rescheduling was impossible because the tickets were already bought from the UK to the Netherlands and back. So we decided to go for it.

Oops… planning for a shoot can go wrong

When the client arrived we started by planning the whole shoot, and to our horror, we found out they had to be back in Amsterdam in….. 2 hours.
This meant we had to drive to the location (Urk), do the photo shoot, and drive the client back to Lelystad, and from there to Amsterdam. In the car to Urk I, actually for the first time, realized I had exactly 15 minutes to do the whole shoot.

Seeing our client was here all the way from the UK I wanted to give them more than they asked for, but 15 minutes… would be a new record 😀

Flash and natural light, ETTL rocks

I’m not a big fan of ETTL but luckily our Geekoto strobes support both HSS and ETTL. So I decided to shoot almost everything in 3 fold. One time natural light, immediately after that with strobes as a fill-in light, and then the final shot with a more day-to-night look.

When you set this up correctly it’s possible to shoot 3 different looks in one setup. Just move your body a little bit or change positions. And it almost looks like you did a lot, while in essence, it was a short session.

For the location, I chose the harbor of Urk. Because we only had 15 minutes I knew that from a low angle, I could get a nice sky. But with just changing my own position I can shoot Urk in the background or all the boats in the harbor. And when walking back the killer-whale and some other nice locations where you can just stand and shoot.

Annewiek was functioning as my VAL *(Voice Activated Lightstand) and held the GT200 with the S26 softbox under different angles during the shoot, again to maximize the amount of different “looks”.

In this case, I shot the whole series with ETTL and HSS. This meant I could work very fast on location. But the downside is that all photos needed slight adjustments in Lightroom. Not a big deal but personally I’m a lightmeter guy 😀

Anyway, enough talk. Although our planning for this commercial photo shoot was different, we got great results, and the client is satisfied.

Here are some images from the session. It’s not everything I shot, but it is a nice overview.

Planning for a commercial photo shoot Planning for a commercial photo shoot Planning for a commercial photo shoot Planning for a commercial photo shoot Planning for a commercial photo shoot

 

Sparks Sunglasses Website 

See the video of the workshop outside, where we also used the Geekoto.

check this post of the shoot with Nadine with Sparks Sunglasses 

Samsung s22 ultra camera review part II

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Before reading this part make sure you read the previous post
You can find that one here.

Ok so now that you are up to date let’s continue.

a new day a new try
As mentioned in the previous part loads of manufacturers claim to have killed the pro camera many times over and every generation it’s that time….. yeah just like this is our best phone ever…. Imagine someone going on stage and saying “yeah, we had to release something so we decided to make it less fast, take away some ports and it’s also slower…. Oh and one more thing… it’s more expensive “ no one would ever buy that one right?

so always take such claims with a huge mountain of salt because it’s never true in my experience. This is also how I approach the review of the camera system of the ultra 22.

For a huge chunk of money you get an awesome and fast phone (although the iPhone is faster) with a gorgeous screen and the s-pen. When I ordered I also got the Samsung galaxy buds pro which have become my favorite buds in just a few days. So the total package is very expensive but for a device I work on every day it’s worth it for me, but if you don’t use it like a sort of offline office it’s horrendously expensive.

Now in my case I always upgrade for one reason only… the camera system
Although I know it will never replace a real camera I do use the cameras a lot, during MTB rides, walking the dog, or simply when I don’t want to bring a normal camera, so my demands for the camera system are pretty high,  but I do know where to put my expectations 🙂 and that’s important for the next part.

108MP is rubbish
One of the main attractions is of course the 108MP sensor, insane details, crop till you drop etc. I’ve read all these claims, now let’s be clear if you zoom in on your phone the 108MP censor looks pretty good, you can see some problems but it’s more than decent. When looking at a properly calibrated monitor it’s really really bad. Now I have to be honest that I am not holding back when testing a camera, so also today I chose a situation with loads of small details, and man the Samsung really falls flat down on its face there with the 108MP sensor. It doesn’t matter if you use detail enhancer (seems to be a sort of slight HDR) or not the images look great without zooming in but as soon as you zoom in to 100% images can look pretty good when the subject is close by like a shot of my bike but as soon as the focus falls off the image changes from ok sharp to almost a painting and in detail mode anything that just moves a little bit in the wind gets a very obvious ghosting effect.

I’ll try some more 108MP shots in the coming weeks but for now I think the label “only in certain situations” is a good one, or just don’t use it if you’re in doubt.

12/10MP a different story
Now when we look at the binned options and other sensors the story does change A LOT

when you disarm the 108MP option the story really clears up to the positive side. Now don’t expect results anywhere near a modern or few years old budget SRL but that being said for a phone…. Wow I’m really impressed.

detail is clear, colors are not completely off the board (can be corrected with a colorchecker passport for example) and dynamic range is adéquate for most situations. And indeed lens flare on the main sensor is a lot less than on other cameras. I can actually say with confidence that from what I have worked with the Samsung does set a new standard in quality for the photos.

I still prefer the whole layout from my sony camera with the UI and shutterbutton but on 12MP it’s clear that as soon the light gets a bit more difficult the ultra 22 does win pretty easily. But…. It does come at a cost. The sony files are pretty clean and I would label them as RAW. Somehow I feel that the Samsung files are still processed. There is some ringing in small details and sometimes paintery areas can be found.  But hey it’s a phone.

This time I included a gallery with processed images like I normally post them on social media and I think it’s pretty clear that for social media the ultra 22 is just insane, four usable censors and I love the 3 and 10x zoom.

Also the software Samsung delivers is impressive with loads of extra options in portrait mode, Resampler etc. It’s not a replacement for Lightroom but it’s very clear Samsung is covering all the bases for social media posters. Add to this the impressive video performance and options to use a generous amount of external microphones and audio level meters and Samsung (like sony) knows what we need to create everything from text, photos to 8K video all on one device.

conclusion
I strongly feel Samsung hit the nail on the head for influencers and social media enthousiasts and delivered an all in package that is very hard to beat. It’s a far cry from professional results but for what it is I never saw something that comes close. (Do remember I’m incredibly picky with images and shoot with both medium format as the a7riv from sony so my reference level is pretty extreme)

for walk around this is an amazing camera that can also make phone calls and more, the addition of the s-pen is genius and is used here almost daily to sign documents, assist with photo reviews and of course editing images quickly.

I do want to add some things
First of all its a bit of a let down that none of our chargers supports ultra fast charging on the ultra22. Even when connecting a MacBookpro powersupply the phone charges at fast which takes a long time, even my older phones always switched to max charging when using the more powerful chargers. Meaning my phone takes 2 hours to go from 15% to 100%. Also battery life is promised to be a full day but for me that means that at around 15:00 I’m already ready for the first top up. Which does last me the rest of the day. We did order the 45W Samsung charger and that one (as expected) does immediately switch on the super fast charging, we did order this charger because I wanted to make sure the phone wasn’t defective seeing we tried every charger in our house hold and none activated the max charging speed.

Also I’m seeing stripes when using the fingerprint sensor when starting the phone on all resolutions, luckily it’s only there so I hope it will be solved soon.

And finally
I love high resolution shots but prefer a good shot to a messy one. This is also why I was eager to test the 108mp censor. I do most editing on a 4K screen and 10/12 mp doesn’t really give you enough data to zoom in to see details. I would love to have 20-24MP on next generations (raw). Also not including the option for an extra SD card is a mistake I think. The cameras are capable of a lot but also eat up room. I opted for the 256GB version while I only need 128GB and use Lightroom all the time for storage. So I can imagine going away a week it will probably run into serious storage issues. I did see Samsung created some small USBc memory sticks but I don’t have one of those to test. But I think they would be a nice fit.

If you like to play with the originals you can download them here.