Aer Lingus From Ireland, joined May 2000, 1417 posts, RR: 0 Posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 5 hours ago) and read 347 times:
Hello,
By no means a big uploader just -10 this time- I got my first rejection in months and also my first warnings in months.
3 rejections - 2 to wrong category (thats no prob I'll just reupload) and 1 to bad quality
5 warnings which I am rather confused about
Oh forgot to mention.
Film = Fuji Superia 100
Time = 8:30 nearing sunset
Camera settings = Shutter between 1/250 & 1/350 with apertures between f5.6 &6.7
Developing = to CD with my local developer who does a so so job but which I have to put up with until December until I get a scanner
Screener2 From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 3, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 3 hours ago) and read 291 times:
First of all, just for info, screeners do not have the option of giving warnings - they come from Johan alone.
Secondly, the number of pictures recieved by A.net every day is tremendous. Unfortunately the screeners do not get to see any reports stating how many are recieved, but I would not be surprised if it was averaging close to 500 (maybe more on weekends) per day. In response, Johan appears to be making his criteria even more strict - with so many uploads, he can afford to select only the caviar and filet mignon. Our target as screeners is to minimize the number of shots that get past us and that are subsequently rejected by Johan. But he has a tendancy to surprise us on that fairly often - a shot that may have been acceptable a month ago may now be unacceptable. This is in keeping with Airliners.net's aim of being the repository of the best pictures available.
About your pictures, you said yourself that your local developer does a so-so job. So at least you are ahead of some people who simply cannot see any fault (or refuse to see them).
I think the reason for the warnings is that the lighting in the pictures appears over-corrected - i.e. unnatural. You mention that the pictures were taken near sunset. The placement of the shadows and the low lighting angles confirm this. But the luminosity is so bright as to be in the middle of the day. Shots taken at this time of year in England should be quite cool, like this:
The problem with prints is that the developer will often "correct" away the sunset lighting effect. And if you do have an uncorrected scan, selecting the automatic color adjustment which every photo processing software seems to have will also wipe out the nice sunset lighting, and turn it into "daylight". I don't know if your developer did it on the CD (I don't know if they usually do that, like for prits), or if you did it, but at some point your pictures got hit with this automatic color adjustment.
Also the pictures appear to have been brightened too much. It's as if in addition to broad daylight (caused by the color correction), you had also brought along some huge 1000 MW flashbulbs!
The overbrightening, along with the color correction, leads to the unnatural lighting effect, which tends to wash out detail. Not quite enough to cause rejection for the pics you posted, but enough to be clearly not as good as it could have been - hence the warning.
On other notes, your pics look good. The Hertz plane in particular is just about perfect in terms of sharpness without getting jagged (slight hints onder the rear of the fuselage, but not a big deal). The hazy sky could be better, but you can't do much about that.
You might ask your developer to transfer your pictures to CD without any color or light processing at all (which is what I recommend to anyone using print film anyway). You might also consider switching to slide film, for which CD scans are also available, and those that I have seen do not have any such "corrections", since I suppose they know that slide shooters are generally not interested in that part of the process.
Gerardo From Switzerland, joined May 2000, 3479 posts, RR: 48 Reply 5, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 3 hours ago) and read 267 times:
After a closer look to the BAe 146, I would also add, that in my opinion the picture has too much grain, has been too much sharpened and the contrast is too high. But that's perhaps a personal preference.
The Hertz B732 has shows also some vignetting, or am I wrong?
Rgds
Gerardo
dominguez(dash)online(dot)ch ... Pushing the limits of my equipment
Cfalk From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 6, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 3 hours ago) and read 262 times:
Gerardo,
While vignetting is unattractive, the without an expensive lens, it's hard to make all your pictures without vignetting, especially when there is not enough light to shoot at f/8.0 or higher. I don't think it would be very fair to reject based on that.
Aer Lingus From Ireland, joined May 2000, 1417 posts, RR: 0 Reply 7, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 2 hours ago) and read 256 times:
S2 - Some great advice there, thank you very much
Gerardo - The "grain" you see is actually compression that Johan adds. I think its something like a setting 95 (ie 5% compression). My own original has virtually no huge visible amounts of grain
Gerardo From Switzerland, joined May 2000, 3479 posts, RR: 48 Reply 8, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 249 times:
Charles, you are absolutely right, it would not be very fair to reject pics based on vignetting. But perhaps it's only a small piece of the puzzle: add some contrast, mix it with a little bit of "too much sharpened", and perhaps a teaspoon full of something else, and you get y picture, which doesn't meet the criteria, although none of the reasons alone could be enough for a rejection. I hope, I could explain myself.
Martin, the grain is not really a problem. It's perhaps more in combination with what I say is too much contrast.
However, how much compression did you add? The filesize (BAe 146) is something about 150kb. How big was the file you uploaded?
I usually give a little bit of JPG-compression (~5%). That way, the filesize of the original file is something around 500kb.
Regards
Gerardo
dominguez(dash)online(dot)ch ... Pushing the limits of my equipment
Aer Lingus From Ireland, joined May 2000, 1417 posts, RR: 0 Reply 9, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 241 times:
Hi Gerardo,
I think this is a developer problem so when I get a filmscanner soon, we may see a huge difference.
I use 0% JPEG compression, nothing and its usually about 500K
Da fwog From United Kingdom, joined Aug 1999, 867 posts, RR: 12 Reply 10, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 241 times:
I wonder if that is indeed what it is (a bit of everything)? I often find myself not bothering to upload particular shots, because I'm just not happy with the overall quality. But if you asked me to actually say exactly what was wrong with them, it comes down to several little faults - all of which together make me unhappy with the overall result.
Incidentally, if we're talking about compression and file sizes, the largest file I've uploaded in the last 3 months was 287K, and the average size is nearer 160-200k, so it's not necessary to reduce compression to the level where your files are half a meg each in order for them to be accepted. And for shots of a/c on finals where they are against a blue (or grey) sky, I have plenty of pics in the database that are less than 100k!
Gerardo From Switzerland, joined May 2000, 3479 posts, RR: 48 Reply 11, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 240 times:
Martin
For sure you will notice a huge difference when you first try your new filmscanner. I remember my reaction: I was happy as a little child on x-mas .
Before that I also got scans with my flatbed scanner, or via CD-ROM directly scanned on the film lab (which, BTW, wasn't better than my flatbed-scans).
A tip: scan a print and compare it with the scan of the respective negative. And when you're already happy, try shooting slides and scan those slides. You will feel great!! (assuming the pic is already good enough, but I don't doubt this, looking at the pics on this topic).
Regards
Gerardo
dominguez(dash)online(dot)ch ... Pushing the limits of my equipment
Gerardo From Switzerland, joined May 2000, 3479 posts, RR: 48 Reply 13, posted (8 years 3 months 3 weeks 4 days 23 hours ago) and read 232 times:
I have the Minolta Scan Dual II and can only recommend it. And again: give slides a try.
I also bought Vuescan, which is a bit more difficult to use, than the standard scanning software, which comes with the Dual Scan, but the results are just breathtaking.
So, good luck. We will perhaps see some more pics of you, and this time without any warnings.
Regards
Gerardo
dominguez(dash)online(dot)ch ... Pushing the limits of my equipment
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