NixAvianPix
Well-known member
This post really has two parts to it, firstly do I really need Photoshop to complete my post processing (considering its high cost) and secondly if it were beneficial, what tools or operations would be used on a regular basis?
A bit of background first: I have been the proud owner of a 7D now for about 6 months and shooting in raw format, having moved up after many years of shooting with a super zoom compact straight to jpeg with little post processing.
I have developed a workflow using just Canon’s DPP that gets me reasonably good results. I start off adjusting white balance, then noise reduction (which seems to give as good a result as my stand-alone copy of NI on low noise images), then adjustments to tone and colour, followed by sharpening via the new USM and finally cropping and conversion from raw to jpeg.
However, I’m just wondering if I am missing something here. I know maybe two tasks that I could use PS for on occasions, firstly to select out the bird and its perch and superimpose back onto a less cluttered neutral background and secondly the use of the clone (stamp) tool to remove offending twigs, leaves etc. However, at around £400 that seems a lot of money for “tarting up” an image. I have downloaded a 30-day trial of PS but as I have never used it before it’s a steep learning curve to try and assess its potential. Reading reviews about Topaz Denoise this might give me better results on NR than DPP which I find worsens sharpness of detail on 3200 ISO images to the point that I’d rather keep a little noise to retain the detail. Also I’m not sure how good the sharpening in DPP is compared to other products either.
I think what I am trying to ask here to people with far more post processing experience than me is how can my workflow be improved/tweaked and are there any alternatives to full-blown PS that can get the best out of my images.
Cheers,
Nick
A bit of background first: I have been the proud owner of a 7D now for about 6 months and shooting in raw format, having moved up after many years of shooting with a super zoom compact straight to jpeg with little post processing.
I have developed a workflow using just Canon’s DPP that gets me reasonably good results. I start off adjusting white balance, then noise reduction (which seems to give as good a result as my stand-alone copy of NI on low noise images), then adjustments to tone and colour, followed by sharpening via the new USM and finally cropping and conversion from raw to jpeg.
However, I’m just wondering if I am missing something here. I know maybe two tasks that I could use PS for on occasions, firstly to select out the bird and its perch and superimpose back onto a less cluttered neutral background and secondly the use of the clone (stamp) tool to remove offending twigs, leaves etc. However, at around £400 that seems a lot of money for “tarting up” an image. I have downloaded a 30-day trial of PS but as I have never used it before it’s a steep learning curve to try and assess its potential. Reading reviews about Topaz Denoise this might give me better results on NR than DPP which I find worsens sharpness of detail on 3200 ISO images to the point that I’d rather keep a little noise to retain the detail. Also I’m not sure how good the sharpening in DPP is compared to other products either.
I think what I am trying to ask here to people with far more post processing experience than me is how can my workflow be improved/tweaked and are there any alternatives to full-blown PS that can get the best out of my images.
Cheers,
Nick