Underwater photography, first steps

[Rose]

Sometimes people enter images which they do not regard highly as their third entry in a competition, maybe even to tease the judge, only to find that it is their highest ranked of the evening.

How true ! This has happened to me a few times. Most recently at the monochrome comp where the abstract sculpture scored a 12

[davidc]

I have plenty of images which I like, but my enthusiasm does not seem to be shared by anyone else in the club, even if those images have done well elsewhere. The whole thing is so subjective and no image ever taken will please everyone, but you are right that there is a camera club style which often seems to be favoured. As I have commented previously, there is definitely a divide between club photography and the type of image that does well at higher levels. Sometimes people enter images which they do not regard highly as their third entry in a competition, maybe even to tease the judge, only to find that it is their highest ranked of the evening.

Very curious, which images do you mean? I'd probably agree not many members will have the same enthusiasm as you, but think that's always the way. But I'd not go so far as to say people don't LIKE the images, certainly not!

Camera club style is probably worthy of a topic on it's own though! I definitely subscribe to the occasionally jokey third image though... I remember my first ever entry into a competition and the astrophotography image and the jokey macro shot both scored 10+. Still stands as my most successful night!

The anenome - from memory, there could possibly have been a better viewpoint, this was stuck on the side of a coral wall 30m down (incidentally overhanging the ocean where the bottom was nearly 4 *miles* below me ). I'm not sure whether or not I'd have been able to get rid of that intruding piece of coral though, it's a bit of a jumble down there with everything living closely together! Also from an objective viewpoint, I'm not sure that it detracts from the scene - if it had been another diver's fin, or a fish head, I'd agree, but this was part of the scene.

The sea anemone is not a bad shot, but for me the tentacle is intrusive. Sometimes, no make that often, it is not possible to get a shot that ticks all the aesthetic boxes. I have a hard drive full of images which did not make the grade and if my hit rate were to be 1%, I would consider that an excellent ratio!

I understood that you were conveying the impression of the stingray swimming off and you have a pleasing diagonal at bottom right, but there is too much space at the right which is not adding anything and the fish is getting rather lost in the corner. I would crop around a third of a way in and probably lose some of the sea above as well. The problem with the other shot is that it is little more than a record so whilst you might get the "whole animal" comment, I would not expect it to score highly. If you had been able to get underneath it, for example, and get a more dramatic angle with a shot showing its mouth, that might have had more impact.

How about this -


Into the Blue (crop test) by cedarsphoto, on Flickr

Personally I think it loses the whole mood of the image and its narrative and as you say turns it into a poor record shot. My feeling was the empty space was useful as it showed the mystery of the "deep blue".

I am definitely thinking about submitting this as the "third image" for the DPI One of those ones that divides opinion

The slug is very small in the image, the Flamingo Tongue is going out of focus at top and bottom, and there are blurred areas at top left and bottom right which do not add anything. In this instance, it really needs a tight crop to concentrate the viewer's attention on the animal.

Flamingo Tongue crop test by cedarsphoto, on Flickr

Cropped in Aviary so a "quick test" only.
I don't see what you mean by the flamingo tongue being out of focus top/bottom though, to me it looks perfectly sharp and was shot at f8, so plenty of DOF?

[Rose]

That's got a lot more impact and shows off the slug really well. I think I'd tone down the brightness at top left

[davidc]

Yep now you mention it that's all I can see. I'll have a go at a better effort at home, this is just flickr's freebie tools

[Mike Farley]

I have plenty of images which I like, but my enthusiasm does not seem to be shared by anyone else in the club, even if those images have done well elsewhere. The whole thing is so subjective and no image ever taken will please everyone, but you are right that there is a camera club style which often seems to be favoured. As I have commented previously, there is definitely a divide between club photography and the type of image that does well at higher levels. Sometimes people enter images which they do not regard highly as their third entry in a competition, maybe even to tease the judge, only to find that it is their highest ranked of the evening.

Very curious, which images do you mean? I'd probably agree not many members will have the same enthusiasm as you, but think that's always the way. But I'd not go so far as to say people don't LIKE the images, certainly not!

It would probably be best to answer this question by starting a new thread with an image which I like and has been almost universally panned.

Camera club style is probably worthy of a topic on it's own though! I definitely subscribe to the occasionally jokey third image though... I remember my first ever entry into a competition and the astrophotography image and the jokey macro shot both scored 10+. Still stands as my most successful night!

That undoubtedly proves that you should not be trying so hard!

How about this -


Into the Blue (crop test) by cedarsphoto, on Flickr

Personally I think it loses the whole mood of the image and its narrative and as you say turns it into a poor record shot. My feeling was the empty space was useful as it showed the mystery of the "deep blue".

I am definitely thinking about submitting this as the "third image" for the DPI One of those ones that divides opinion

I think that you have cropped a bit too much and there is not quite enough space for the stingray to move into. My suggested crop is attached, which makes more of the fish at top left and has a bit more of the sea to hold in the top of the image. This does not take into account that it might still be necessary to resolve the issue of the cropped tail.

DCSting.JPG (127.82 KiB) Viewed 10096 times

The slug is very small in the image, the Flamingo Tongue is going out of focus at top and bottom, and there are blurred areas at top left and bottom right which do not add anything. In this instance, it really needs a tight crop to concentrate the viewer's attention on the animal.

Flamingo Tongue crop test by cedarsphoto, on Flickr

Cropped in Aviary so a "quick test" only.
I don't see what you mean by the flamingo tongue being out of focus top/bottom though, to me it looks perfectly sharp and was shot at f8, so plenty of DOF?

I was referring to the parts of the image beyond the Flamingo Tongue, which are uninteresting and out of focus rocks. I agree with Rose that your new crop is an improvement.

[sgillate]

Just got back from my fab holidays in the Maldives including a total of 10 dives.

The conversation about the judging of pictures is a very interesting one, especially when they are being taken in an alien environment like underwater. There are so many things underwater that make the task of taking a photo so much more tricky than on terra firma. I think to enter pictures of underwater scenes the only fair comparison is to compare like with like. A judge who has never been underwater cannot really have any comprehension of the difficulty and cost of getting a truly eye-catching picture underwater. But I suppose the judge can only judge what he sees in front of him at the end of the day.

I went out on my dives with my son-in-laws Canon Ixus 75 with a housing. A stunningly cheap form of entry level SCUBA photography. No strobes or anything just the built in-flash of the compact camera. The camera has an underwater setting which I set it to at the start of each dive. The flash rarely went off and I ended up taking lots of photos with the inevitable blue haze where all the red light has been absorbed by the sea water.

On getting home I have been researching on the internet options for trying to correct for this and have found one or to excellent descriptions of how to go about it in Photoshop, unfortunately the Elements version does not have the sophisticated tools so I have downloaded a trial version of the complete CS6 to try it out.

I followed a long series of tasks which have been posted on the internet and have come up with the following transformation. Obviously there are a number of minor tweaks I could still do to the array of manipulation tools that are offered but I would be interested to hear any comments you may have on this manipulation. I think there are are some details especially around the edge of the turtle where if you look carefully I could have spent more time and care but I think the overall colour change has been quite educational to me from going from a blue lifeless picture to at least seeing something striking.

[Mike Farley]

One of the things which I am enjoying about the forum is seeing the variety of photography which people are doing, the results of which might not necessarily be seen at the club. Until now, I had no idea how many people are taking cameras underwater, adding a whole heap of difficulties to the problems of getting a good image.

I am intrigued by the transformation of the turtle. Is that how it would have appeared underwater?

Photoshop CSx is not the only fully featured image editor out there, although it is undoubtedly the best albeit at an eye watering price. Paint Shop Pro might have all the functions required at around a tenth of the cost of CS. Admittedly it is not as good as Adobe's finest and has a number of shortcomings, but at a similar price to PS Elements it might prove worthwhile for occasional use where that application is lacking in its capabilities.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corel-PaintShop-Pro-X5-Ultimate/dp/B008TI5Y4C/ref=sr_1_2?s=software&ie=UTF8&qid=1352635662&sr=1-2

Then again, it is not necessary to pay anything at all. The GIMP does not have the most intuitive interface (most open source software is lacking in that regard), but it does have a lot of functionality and might be all that is needed, especially for a one off purpose which does not justify shelling out for a commercial product. It is definitely worthwhile giving it a go and, best of all, it is totally free to download and install. The trial period will never expire.

http://www.gimp.org/

[davidc]

If you can link to the steps you followed I'd appreciate it, that's a great pic!

Mike, you would see the turtle nearer the second pic (albeit not quite as lovely as that) but colours disappear quickly (reds in particular), depending on visibility. Which can be anything from zero (barely seeing your hand in front of your face) and upto 100ft/30m or so. The deeper you go the worse it gets (for photography) and unless you were shallower (like most of my photos, no more than 60ft) - strobes are near essential really hence the modest results I got