There’s been a lot in the press about this recently, so it’s a topical subject to write a blog post about. We see it on just about every fashion magazine cover in the high street these days, and nobody is safe from it. Tennis star Andy Roddick had his biceps ballooned so that the image would go with the ‘Big Arms’ headline on the cover of Mens Fitness, Kate Winslet was airbrushed on the cover of GQ to appear slimmer, and Keira Knightley had her bust enhanced for the promo shots used on the King Arthur film.

So what is airbrushing? What steps are generally involved in manipulating an image? I’ve been meaning to write a post on this subject for a while, but thought it grossly unfair to pick on one of my previous portrait or boudoir shoots and show how it’s done. I’m sure that the subject would have something to say about that! I needed to find somebody with imperfections and who isn’t bothered about them, and who doesn’t mind being the subject of a post about making their old features look younger.

After a couple of days of thought I realised I knew the perfect candidate. And here we are, the result is my first venture in front of the camera rather than behind it!

The camera (a Fuji S5 Pro with Nikon 85mm lens) was tripod mounted, a softbox placed close to my head on the left and a reflector on the right. The self timer was set to two seconds, and the exposure underexposed by two stops.

Right then, let’s get down to business! Any of the images in this post can be clicked on to show a higher resolution version. The original image straight off the camera was this one below. The softbox provides a fairly soft light, but if you click on this image you’ll see all the imperfections in the skin, lines in the forehead, bags under the eyes, spots, moles, in fact everything!

The first step in airbrushing is a bit like the first step in makeup – and that’s dealing with the base layer. Many imaging software packages have a skin softening tool built in. This effectively allows you to select the skin colour using an eye dropper tool and then apply an amount of blur, and then allow an amount of detail to show through. This adjustment only applies to the skin colour, so hair, eyes, and lips remain sharp and unaffected. The image below shows our test image after this step has been applied.

This has taken a lot of the texture and blemishes of the skin out, the difficulty is doing this without making the skin look plastic. So, now we have smoothed the skin the next step is to make me look a few years younger. The lines in the forehead need to go, and this is done by using a cloning tool in Photoshop. Basically, we paint over the lines in the forehead with a texture sampled from another part of the skin. We can also remove some of the larger spots or moles. The result is shown below:

The next step is where the fine line in airbrushing is often crossed, and that’s by physically adjusting the appearance. In the glossy fashion magazines this is where waistlines are slimmed and other parts enhanced, but with my photograph I think I’ll fix the nose I broke when I was six, remove the bags from under my eyes (it’s been a tough week!) and slim my face slightly. And while we’re at it lets whiten the eyes! The result follows:

The last step is purely a choice of style, and that’s converting the image to a toned black and white version. A little film grain effect is added – this also helps cover any over enthusiastic smoothing of the skin. We’ll bring out the eyes a little, and finally add a soft focus effect. The final version is shown below along with the original.

If you would like to view each image in sequence to see step by step results then click on the colour image above and then click the arrow that appears when you mouse over the right side of it. Continue until you get to the final black and white image.

And there we have it. So, is airbrushing a useful tool that an art director can use to make a model look his or her absolute best, or does it set a dangerous precedent, where impossibly perfect models appear every day on the front cover of magazines in full view of impressionable youngsters who feel that they can never live up to an image that society expects of them?

It’s a difficult question to answer, and I’m still not 100% sure where I stand on it. I think ultimately it depends on the purpose of the image. For example, if on one of our boudoir shoots I was asked to retouch an image then I probably would without feeling too guilty about it. These are private images, usually between a couple in a relationship, and they aren’t going to be seen by anybody else. If the subject wants a little help to look their absolute best then why not, but within reason.

I think it’s a different question when we’re talking about images in the public domain though. A little bit of skin softening here and there isn’t a bad thing, and if a customer turns up to a portrait shoot with a big spot then it’s easily removed. In fact it’s not too different to what most ladies do with their make-up anyway. When it comes to physically altering a body to conform to what’s seen in society as being ‘beautiful’ it’s a worrying trend though. Nobody should grow up believing that they are not normal based on an opinion formed from an airbrushed image in a magazine, especially when the person portrayed in that image is a role model to the viewer.

So what do I think of the images now that I have been airbrushed? Well, I’m not too offended by the end result, but I can’t help but feel that it isn’t really me. I think I could comfortably take it as far as step two where a little bit of skin softening has been applied but features and lines are still visible. After all, it’s these ‘imperfections’ that make us who we are.

We’re well into Spring now, this week in particular is turning out to be a blinder. Let’s hope the Summer turns out for once to be all that we wish for.

To celebrate Spring arriving in such style I’ve decided to give away nine of my Spring images for free to use as desktop wallpaper, or whatever you want for that matter. The preview images are below, just click on them to get to the higher resolution versions. The full size files are 1920 x 1200 pixels at 72 dpi so are ready to go for most widescreen displays.

Enjoy . . .

Everyone likes to win, but second place isn’t that bad is it?

We’ve just found out that we came second in the Warehouse Express photography competition. It’s bitter sweet to us – we’re delighted to have done so well but came oh-so-close to the top spot. Next time maybe! The image we entered was the one below of the Tour of Britain cycle race:

Taken on an ultra wide angle lens, the riders were around three feet away from the camera as they zoomed around the corner at break neck speed. A shutter speed of 1/40 sec meant that by holding the camera still the riders would blur, whilst an aperture of f11 made sure that the background was in focus and sharp.

The image was converted to black and white but the vivid colours of the riders were brought back in using Photoshop masking techniques.

I can hear you all sigh reading this title. Here comes another ‘film vs digital’ debate, but that’s not really what this post is about. Not all of it anyway.

We’ve probably seen the biggest single advance in photography in recent years with the relatively low cost availability of good quality digital cameras. We all talk about how many megapixels our cameras have, and enjoy playing around in image manipulation software like Photoshop to produce work of different styles. We replicate the old darkroom techniques digitally, and it’s cleaner, easier and much quicker.

But, in my opinion we shouldn’t write film off just yet. There’s something about an image taken on film – it has that quality that digital can’t yet reproduce. Digital is certainly catching up, there’s no question of that, but it will never match film. It will always be different in one way or another. I’m not saying that one is better than the other, I’m simply saying that they have different qualities.

When I refer to film here I’m not speaking purely of the standard 35mm film that we used to buy from Boots years ago. I’m talking about a range of formats, from 35mm through to large format. If we compare a cheap compact film camera to a modern digital equivalent then I think digital will win every time. Compare a modern digital compact with a Leica IIIf (35mm film) from 1955 and you’ll probably find the opposite.

There’s still a general consensus that if you spend over five grand on a new Canon EOS1Ds Mk III you’re going to get the best possible results – far better than film anyway. This is true up to a point, but even a camera of this cost can’t quite compete with a well taken medium / large format film image that has been properly exposed, developed and hand printed. If you’re a purist looking for the best possible quality then you need film. You need to take a perfectly exposed image, develop it correctly and produce the print yourself. Provided you have the skill, expertise and experience to be able to do this then the results will speak for themselves – though not many photographers have this skill now.

The best way to get the ultimate quality digital file isn’t to use the best quality digital camera. It’s to use medium or large format film and scan it, but get it scanned properly. From here you can use Photoshop rather than a darkroom to carry out your post processing, but your original digital negative has all the characteristics of the film source, like grain (or lack of), sharpness, and exposure latitude. One of the biggest problems with digital at the moment is the way that it handles highlights. With film you tend to find that highlights are handled much more naturally, similar to the human eye. Digital has a tendency to clip highlights quite severely. In colour you find that one of the colours tends to clip first (either red, green or blue) producing unnatural results. The best camera we’ve seen so far for handling highlights has been the Fuji S5 Pro – that’s why we use this for our ‘people’ photography. As good as it is though, it’s not as good as film.

All things considered though, I’m sticking to digital. The reasons for this are many, but ultimately it’s a trade off between the absolute image quality of scanned medium / large format against the convenience of the digital workflow. I find that the results I get from digital are certainly good enough for my purposes as I don’t produce 5 metre billboard images, and don’t think I ever will. I can use a number of plug-ins in Photoshop which do a pretty good job of replicating the properties of film I have enjoyed using in the past, like Ilfords beautiful FP4 for black and white or Kodaks classic Kodachrome 64 colour tranparency film. I don’t really have the time to develop my own prints because as much as I would like to I can’t pass on the labour charge to my customers. I’d be priced out of the market in weeks.

What I can do though is carry over the principles of film photography into my digital workflow, especially at the capture stage. There’s a discipline that’s missing in many photographers today, and I find that more and more tend to work in a ‘smash and grab’ fashion. Holding down the shutter in machine gun fashion hoping that one of the shots you take is ‘the one’ just misses the point. For our ‘people’ photography we always, always remember that there is a person on the other side of the lens, and taking a good image depends on engaging with them, and taking a little time to make sure we get everything right, not just firing off a blast of shots.

Jerry Avenaim is a well respected professional photographer who has had his images used on covers of all the leading fashion magazines. He says:

“A photographer can’t simply accept what is in front of them and take a  picture, that’s not being a photographer, that’s not even being a photo journalist, that’s paparazzi at best.”

He suggests carrying out your own experiment. Cover the back of your LCD panel on your digital camera with paper and sticky tape, then find a subject and spend as much time as you like photographing it. However, you are only allowed 15 shots. Compare this with your attitude to your photography if you allow yourself only 10 minutes of time but unlimited shots. You’ll probably find that following the first route will make you think more. Each shot is now more valuable than the last, and patience and discipline will ultimately give you a far more pleasing result than the alternative.

My conclusion? For ultimate quality you still can’t beat film, but digital is a pretty good compromise, and in 2010 is certainly good enough for most applications. However, to me the way we worked with film at the capture stage is something we should remember and try to include in our digital routine.

I learnt my photography the old fashioned way. I remember evenings spent in dark rooms under an orange glow from the safelight, with toxic chemicals, papers, a 30 year old Durst enlarger, developing tanks, trays and numerous prints hanging from makeshift washing lines slowly drying.

I reminisce quite fondly about those days, but digital has changed everything. Today, nearly all production in photography is digital, and whilst I still see my darkroom days through rose tinted glasses, I have to admit that digital is a very good thing. It’s quicker, cleaner, safer and far more flexible.

Photoshop is without question the industry leader in imaging software. It’s the daddy of them all, and it’s incredible what you can do with it if you have a couple of years free to study it in detail. But there’s a problem with Photoshop. And that is when do you stop!

For some once the image is up there on the screen it’s time to start making decisions. Does it stay in colour or should it be converted to mono? How about cross processing? Perhaps a vignette? Or maybe we’ll throw in a bit of film grain. How about a soft focus effect, or some diffusion? Maybe we should increase that colour saturation, or add a glow? Maybe it would benefit from increased contrast, or should we whiten the eyes? Converting it to black and white with some selective colouring might be the way forward, or maybe we’ll go for an old fashioned sepia tone. The choice is bewildering!

Each of these different techniques certainly has a place when used properly. The problem arises when we use too many of them without thought, and don’t know when to stop. At elmphoto we approach our photography in a similar way to web design is approached at our sister company elmnet. At elmnet, when we design websites we start with a wireframe. This is a black and white illustration showing the layout of a website. It shows where logos will go, where the menu will be, where images will be placed and what size they are. It contains no colour, and no shading. If you get your wireframe right the rest tends to fall into place, so once we have this approved we then go on to add colours and images. You can see an example of this above.

Applying this to photography is a simple step. We make sure that at the moment we press the shutter we first of all have a plan, and have our ‘wireframe’ in place. The subject is in the right position, and in the right pose. The elements around the subject have all been thought out, and the flash heads are in the right position, at the right output levels and with the right modifiers attached. It’s important to get these basics right at the very beginning of the shoot. You don’t necessarily have to spend a lot of time thinking about this. Sometimes it takes an hour, sometimes a minute, but the principle is the same. Some photographers take fantastic candid shots, others do a magnificent job of paparazzi style images where reaction is more important than composition, but for most of us good planning takes some beating.

Without the basics being right there is little point in pressing the shutter release. You can’t make a poorly thought out image a good one by using Photoshop, as if it doesn’t work at the time of capture then it never will. We like to get it right in camera. We’re not huge fans of Photoshop filters and plug-ins, we prefer to spend a little more time getting our lighting right with properly calibrated equipment, and we find that more often that not when we open up the image for the first time on our Macs we pretty much have it nailed.

From there we can digitally apply a style to that image. Again, we usually find that when actually taking the shot we know what we’re looking for. If we want to take a grainy black and white image then we’ll adjust the studio lighting accordingly and we’ll go for that style from the outset, just as if we were shooting on black and white film. If we wish to cross process then we’ll do the same. Each treatment requires a slightly different approach to do properly, and the choice of lighting, clothing, colours and texture makes a huge difference to the final image. Each image on an elmphoto shoot has generally been thought out, and we have a plan for how we are going to approach it. We won’t go wild though, and we won’t add Photoshop filter upon filter afterwards just because we can, as that’s not part of the plan!

Here’s a few examples of what we mean. In all cases the original, untouched RAW file is on the left, and the processed version on the right. All were taken on a Fuji S5 Pro, using Nikon prime lenses.

Cross Processing.

Cross processing is a technique traditionally applied to film stock, where the negatives (or transparencies) would be processed in the ‘wrong’ chemicals. Film usually requiring a C41 process would be developed in E6, and vice versa. This gives a shift in colour and usually (depending on development times) increased contrast.

Digitally this is easy to reproduce, but thanks partly to Photoshop plugins it has become rather cliched and abused, typically by some (but by no means all) wedding photographers. With this image we wanted to go for a gentle, cross processed look where the skin slightly bleaches but still maintains it’s natural colour. The original RAW file was shot and lit with this look in mind, and you can see that there hasn’t had to be much done to it to get the effect we wanted. Both shots are perfectly acceptable, but we wanted a more ‘fashion’ style look, which we think the second one gives us.

Cross processing doesn’t suit all images, and you have to be very careful with it when shooting people as usually it shifts the skin tones to the yellow end of the spectrum, which is far from flattering.

Black and White Conversion

Most imaging software has a ‘convert to black and white’ feature, in fact a lot of compact cameras do too, but this still requires some thought. We were looking for a light, airy, slightly toned mono image, and from the first instance we planned for this look by lighting the subject and exposing accordingly. We metered off the skin and overexposed very slightly to make sure we got all the shadow detail. We evenly lit the face, with a little less light appearing on the right of the head. We then used Adobe Lightroom to convert the image to black and white and apply a little sepia toning.

Again, forward planning was the key. If we had just taken the image without thinking about it and then unleashed Photoshop on it we don’t think we would have got as pleasing a result.

Vignettes

Perhaps the biggest cliche of them all – vignettes have been abused terribly over the last 10 years, and we’ve seen them used in several images when they quite simply shouldn’t have. A vignette added in Photoshop can work brilliantly, but not in all cases. Used unwisely you find that they can darken parts of the skin, which can lead to unflattering results for all without perfect complexion. If you can see the vignette and it is obvious then we think it has failed.

The image above was always intended to be darkened in the corners by a vignette after being taken. We planned for this by not shooting the image with light areas on the edge of the frame, and by choosing clothing carefully. The background was a neutral colour that wouldn’t distract. The clothing used suited the vignette effect as the natural curve of the collar is about the same as the vignette. Likewise, the curve of the top of the head matches the top part of the vignette. In this instance we thing it works beautifully, but adding vignettes to images just because you can isn’t generally a good idea.

I think what we’re trying to say is that it’s best to have a plan. The problem with Photoshop is that it can make us lazy. We can just take shot after shot without really thinking about what we want to achieve, and then open up our software and only then decide what we want to do. This seems to me to be working the wrong way around. We find that often we can look at a bunch of images on the web or in magazines, and tell which plug-in has been used to produce the effect. It doesn’t mean that it’s a poor image, but it does mean that it isn’t as unique, as lots of photographers are using those same plug-ins. Over use of this means that the photographer’s style is dictated by their software, rather than their imaginations. We’re fortunate in that we have complete control over how we want our image to look right from the very beginning, and we should take that control and use it well.

The examples you’ve seen are based on a studio or location shoot, where we have plenty of time to think about our images. Some would argue that those on a deadline don’t have this luxury, and I would perhaps agree with this, but only to a point. It takes a skilled photographer who, under pressure, can still visualise a shot, mentally organise his or her ‘wireframe’, compose and expose accordingly and still capture a moment. But then this is what separates a good photographer from a mediocre one.

At elmphoto we don’t shoot and ask questions later, we plan from the beginning what we want to achieve, and we don’t rely on Photoshop to make a mediocre image a good one.

We’re delighted to have our first guest writer make an appearance on the elmphoto blog.

Katherine Wildman specialises in photographing babies, children and families, but in a unique way. At elmphoto we’re huge fans of making a photograph interesting, whether by location, situation or by activity. We try to steer away from static background studio shots whenever we can, as we think that although these images are often ok, it’s simply not what we strive for.

Katherine follows exactly the same ethos as us. Read on to find out more about what she does, and hopefully here’s to the first of many posts from her:

I officially studied photography while I was living in Singapore between 2006 and 2008 and it was a project I did inside an International School there that really opened my eyes to what is involved in photographing children

While my fellow students would report back each week with the challenges that their individual projects posed, cancelled travel plans, bad weather, faulty battery packs, I would come into class with tales of framing the perfect shot – only to be sat upon by a four year old Taiwanese girl who wanted to do a jigsaw with me or being thumped on the head by a stuffed snake or – in most cases – laughing so hard that I couldn’t physically avoid camera shake and blurred images.

The completed school project now hangs on the wall of one of the school’s classrooms, which gives me enormous pleasure, and I also gave the parents of each child a CD containing all the images that their child was a part of. The feedback was overwhelming. One Japanese father stopped me in the school playground to tell me how amazed he was to see his child looking so grown up. “It is Manaka, we know, but not the Manaka we see  – as her parents I mean.” He was right.

The children were busy as I photographed them, they were engrossed in puzzles, busy listening to their teacher, singing songs and enjoying their time spent among their peers. They were being who they were in the big wide world and the photographs show that. That I spent two weeks crawling on the floor with them, eating lunch with them and – yes – doing jigsaws with them helped enormously. The photographs I came away with are as far from the conventional school picture as you could imagine.

Connor, from New Zealand, usually fell asleep after lunch and so I photographed him, curled up in the foetal position under a table. On the day when Nello from Switzerland curled up and fell asleep next to him, I photographed that too – one brown head next to one white-blond head.

I think that the secret to photographing both babies and children is time – and I say time as opposed to timing. Children are beautiful, their skin is beautiful, their faces are beautiful, they look great more or less all the time and so timing the perfect shot is less of an issue with children than it is with adults. As I photograph more and more children and babies I am finding that it’s the time I put in as a person on the shoot itself that makes or breaks the photographs. Children’s faces do not lie and any discomfort or uneasiness will show up on screen in full 12MP effect if something has unsettled them and so most of my efforts on a shoot go in to making sure that my subjects (and their parents) are having fun.

The subject of parents brings me to talk about babies and their sleep deprived but smiling parents. It is very important to me that new parents feel completely at ease with me as I enter their home and I think it’s vital to remember that the position I hold as someone who has been invited in to photograph a new baby is an absolute privilege. Time also plays a vital role here as new babies bring with them a whirlwind of feeding times, changing times and naps and I feel that it is important and respectful to fit in with those times rather than trying to control them to suit a shooting schedule (my children are ten and five but I remember the whirlwind very clearly!)

With older children time plays a role in that they usually need a little while to get used to me being around and also to the size and sounds of my cameras. Camera phones have meant that nearly all children these days are used to being photographed regularly but changing lenses and loud clicks can be off-putting to small people so, if I can, I offer to let them take a picture too and show them the results in the viewfinder.

• You can read more about what I do on my website at http://www.kewildman.com.
• You can follow me on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/skinnycap
• And you can become a fan of my Words and Pictures Facebook page.

A new personalised photoshoot combined with a luxury day out at a top country house spa. Sound appealing?

It’s a modern, contemporary portrait service put together to give you something that little bit special whilst having a great, relaxing day out. We’re not looking at photographing you in front of a dated mottled background, and we’re not the least bit interested in the bleached, high fashion studio style of image that other companies produce. So how does it work, and how is it different?

Firstly, we don’t base the session in a studio, and we won’t come to your house either. We source interesting, photogenic locations in the highest rated country house hotels in the region, and use their lavish facilities as a base for your images. We include a hairdresser to get you sorted on arrival, and a makeup artist too if you need one. You bring an assortment of your favourite outfits and we then spend the next three hours having a laugh and taking some great images.

Photographs can be viewed as they are shot via a monitor screen, so you can see for yourself that we are getting great results as we progress through the session.

After that you take lunch, have a swim in the hotel’s pool and take advantage of the spa facilities for the rest of the day. The package is based on photographing two people, so either you and your partner or maybe a friend. At the end of a great day the images are all yours. We don’t show you a selection for you to choose from, you take the lot and do with them as you please. If you want some prints or canvases made then of course we can help, but only if you want us to, and there’s no hard sell.

Want to know more? Visit the new elmphoto site – click here.

The new generation Nikons and Canons are now available to buy, and they are literally brimming with features – the list is almost endless as to what these technological wonders will do for you.

But, I’m not really interested in a lot of this. A while back I thought to myself “Why do cameras need to be so complex?”. The new breed of digital SLR cameras now include HD movie capture, 51 point autofocus, 35 zone metering, auto exposure modes for portraits, landscapes, action and groups, predictive autofocus, wireless flash sync, etc, etc, etc. The Canon EOS1DS MkIII now costs £4699 for just the body, and I’m not convinced that any professional really uses all the features that it has.

I remember when all I wanted was a Nikon FM2. Manual exposure only, but beautiful quality. What I’m interested in is quality for my money. I don’t want to pay an extra £500 for an HD movie capture that I’ll never use, and I don’t want to be subject to a premium for millions of exposure modes when all I want is manual, aperture priority and shutter priority. I want genuinely useful features such as a depth of field preview and would rather spend the money I save on the best quality lenses I can. So, why can’t a manufacturer see this and produce a digital camera that takes fantastic high quality images, still has the build quality that a professional needs, but is more affordable as it removes the features that many professionals simply won’t use.

One manufacturer has done this, and that’s why at the moment my favourite camera is my Fuji S5 Pro. For my photography it’s perfect. The money has gone into developing the most amazing sensor with incredible exposure latitude rather than extra features that I simply won’t use. It seems however that market forces are the ultimate reason, and I don’t believe that Fuji will ever make an S6 Pro. They will more than likely be forced to sell the technology to one of the big players (like Nikon or Canon) as producing SLR’s like this simply isn’t profitable enough for Fuji, and I find this quite sad.

The last time I used the camera (just a couple of days ago) I paused for a second as I realised I was shooting in manual, with an electronic flash (also in manual) and balancing the flash with daylight. I was doing this all the old fashioned way where my brain was doing the calculations through experience rather than the camera through technology.

I think that every now and then it’s good to go back to this way of working. It stops me getting too lazy, gives me back full control and helps me remember why I love taking pictures in the first place.