D3 Raw Shoot

As usual, click on images to show bigger. The image above shows a before/after view of this Raw processed image.

Details below.

I used Lightroom to manipulate this Nikon D3 Raw image. It certainly looked flat before I started the post processing. The jpeg equivalent was much better until I played with the image. I ended up reducing the exposure by 1/2 a stop (I tend to shoot bright to get as much detail as possible into the image). I then recovered a slight highlight blowout on Cait's life vest. 10 worked well. Next was a fill light of 20 to gain detail back in shadows under Baden's arm, and finally I increased the Blacks to 6 to give the image some overall punch. Brightness was reduced to 33 and contrast was left as is at the default of 25.

I then wanted to increase the local contrast/sharpness in the midtones (faces) so increased clarity to 16. Vibrance was increased to 18 to richen the colours in the skin of Cait and Baden and increase the blues in the water.

The strong contrast preset worked well here using the tone curve as the image was a flat. Typical of a Raw image.

I then applied the portrait sharpening preset which resulted in keeping the skin smooth but sharpening edges in the image.

A Lens Vignetting followed to keep the viewer in the image. Settings were Amount -80, Midpoint 6.

The whole process took around 2 minutes, followed by a jpeg export which converts the res to 72 dpi and changes the colour space from Pro Photo to sRGB (suitable for the web).

Job Done!

Nikon D3 - straight out of the camera.

Here's my first shoot, and yes it's jpeg straight out of the camera... but I did apply a bit of vignetting. No other post processing. I had the camera set to shoot vivid jpegs, hence the high colour. It's possible to manipulate the setting (in camera) to achieve any look you want. I'd rather have the flexibility to process after the shoot but the jpeg route is still a real option. I wouldn't have considered it in the past but now I'm thinking, well I'll see.

Nikon D3 at 11 frames/sec in DX mode

I've just charged the huge battery on my new Nikon D3 and immediately switched it to continuous high speed mode. Held down the shutter release button for 1 1/2 seconds and then looked at the number of shots the camera had released. 16! Hell, I won't be doing that again unless I'm looking at capturing a fleeting moment. It's super fast but sounds like the shutter can handle the punishment.

I then used the default setting of jpeg (fine) and changed the settings to ISO 800 on manual at 1/200 sec f/2.8 for an inside shot. I normally wouldn't use jpeg as I'm a RAW shooter through and through but I want to know how this camera processes jpeg images. I'll have to see how they turn out in Lightroom. By all accounts while viewing the 3 inch LCD, image colour, saturation, hue and contrast are very impressive! At this point I would be comfortable heading outside and shooting in jpeg mode. And that's a biggy for me. I'll post some images early next week when I get back from Melbourne.

Moving from a Nikon D200 to a D3 appears to be a fairly easy transition but I'm sure it'll take me a while to understand what this unit can do.

Off to Melbourne for an Advanced Studio Lighting Course

I'm heading to Melbourne for an Advanced Studio Lighting Course later this week at Glow Studios. Will be back Monday. I hope to bring back some interesting techniques for a future lighting course.