Most of the new DSLRs give great photos with little or no effort on the part of the photographer; stunning colors and perfect exposures. But almost everything else we emulate, from our rifles to our calibers, takes us back to a different time. I played with some software options to make a couple of photos look like I took them on an outing with Bob Ruark.



In the above photo I added some vignetting to make it look some of the crappy lenses of the fifties and added some contrast to make it look like the developer heated up the tanks too much.

In the next two I went for that old fashioned cameo portrait look, which was a frequent printing technique back then.







In the last one below I take it a little too far, just to show what excessive vignetting looks like.




I still have a bias towards "real photography" being black & white.

I especially love the old B&W hunting photos.

I hunt mostly with old firearms and may start taking the pics in B&W from now on.



Cal30

Those look great!

quote:

I still have a bias towards "real photography" being black & white

Viva la Tri-X! I love that stuff (and Tmax too...) I think that B & W's effectiveness is evidenced by how hard manufacturers of digital cameras and software have gone to replicate an 'old' and 'obsolete' medium.

To me B & W removes everything superfluous from a picture and leaves only the essence of what was being photographed. It is my preferred medium still.

I have an old Brownie from the 20's and that little meniscus disc lens can still make some excellent shots on Tri-X after 90 years!

Wink, Have you seen the new Leica M9-P? It is monochrome only, no color pics at all. Quite interesting.

Wink, those were really well done. Didn't hurt the photos were good to begin with. BaxterB's comment about Tri-X brought a tear, and memories of debates about the merits of developing in Microdol vs. D-76.

I'm reading a book on my iPad called "In Africa" by John T. McCutcheon about a 1910 hunt. He was hunting with Carl Akeley and Carl's wife. Quite a few photos in it, interesting enough but they could have used you as a photographer!

He mentions another party outfitting out of Nairobi for a photo safari, the party had two hot-air balloons (capable of carrying a person) for aerial photos, box kites to send up unmanned cameras, and 29 still and motion picture cameras.

Ah yes, the Microdol versus D-76 debate. I shared a darkroom with some other photographers in the 60s and the debate didn't last long since D-76 took too long when someone was waiting in line to use the darkroom. We didn't give a hoot about tonal ranges in the shadows. In fact, I don't think I even knew what they were. We'd have used instant film if it existed in 35mm, as long as we could get it under the Beseler and make contact prints.

Wink - I know this thread is 3 months old but if you are willing, can you explain/provide your processing steps?

Thanks!!

Scott

P.S. Those are simply stunning images!!

Scott,

I've been away from the computer for several days, but will get around to it.

Thank you so much, Wink, and no rush. I just love the look and would like to give it a shot on some of my photos.

I did have PS but now only have PS Elements (stripped down version of PS) but I can still do layers, masking, etc

Scott

I use DxO Optic Pro and DxO Film Plugin to get the B&W look. Sometimes I save the treated file as a TIF file and resize and convert to JPEG with Capture NX2. I'm afraid I have no experience with Photoshop, in any of its versions.

If I use only Capture NX2 I can still do a monochrome conversion of course, but as you can see below, I can't add the vignetting effect.




Unless you use DxO software, any of the steps I could describe would be useless. The above photo was taken with a Nikon D700, a full-frame DSLR. The shallow depth of field is one of the advantages (or disadvantages depending on your point of view) of full-frame. I like it since it allows one to have the subject in focus with the rest of the scene slightly out of focus.

So, if I crank up the contrast, simulate a B&W film with DxO and add some vignetting I can get this:

Awesome photos! Thanks for sharing

Wink, bring your camera and leave the rifle at home when we head to Burkina Faso. And to think I thought your only usefulness was speaking French...

quote:

Originally posted by BaxterB:
Wink, Have you seen the new Leica M9-P? It is monochrome only, no color pics at all. Quite interesting.

M-Monochrome - MAGIC BULLET!

http://us.leica-camera.com/pho..._system/m_monochrom/

quote:

Originally posted by ForrestB:
Wink, bring your camera and leave the rifle at home when we head to Burkina Faso. And to think I thought your only usefulness was speaking French...

I'll probably bring two or three cameras, just to be on the safe side. It's a pain lugging the stuff around, but nice to have since there's always something worth a pic.

You never know, I might get all creative or somefin.

Great Caeser's Ghost, Wink, did you kill that monster buffalo? These are wonderful photos, evocative of just the era you were aiming for. I cheated and used FG7 in the old weekly newspaper darkroom many years ago. Can remember bulk loading the Tri-X into cassettes, and the smell of stop bath on my fingers.
What are we imagining you shot these with Wink? A Rolleiflex? A Speed Graphic???

Bill,

Yeah, that's my only buffalo, which I shot in the Selous last July hunting with Clinton van Tonder. In fact, Clinton probably took the picture. I suppose imagination is whatever we want it to be, but the reality is that the camera is a no-longer-made Nikon D700 with a 28-300mm zoom at 45mm. Software by DxO and Nikon Capture NX2 allowed me to accidentally create this. Doubt if I could do it again, since I can't remember all the different settings I used. Seems like there are dozens of incomprehensible terms and sliders and buttons to push before the picture looks any good.

A pic from collor to B/W.
photoshop - cannal mixer.





hunt safe wisent

The only problem with these new cameras, as I see it, is that they have no perspective control. I wish I could find a reasonably priced digital back for my Sinar P2.

quote:

Originally posted by silvertip1:
The only problem with these new cameras, as I see it, is that they have no perspective control. I wish I could find a reasonably priced digital back for my Sinar P2.

Most perspective control can now be done with software. If you haven't tried DxO Optics Pro you might want to get it for a trial period and see if it meets your needs.

http://www.dxo.com/intl/photo/dxo_optics_pro/features

For instance, here's a photo of the Chateau de Rambouillet as shot with the lens on a wide-angle setting:



The vertical lines slant towards the middle as you go up the vertical scale.

In the same picture below I have modified the perspective with DxO software to get the sides of the building to look more parallel, less slanted toward the middle. I also lightened the shadows under the balcony, but another software called Capture NX2.