Pic's Pics & Report - Beaches & Snorkeling vol. 2

[Timethief]

Great shots! I am a pro, and I don't like about 99% of what I shoot. I did want to ask you how much you had to clean up the color balance in Photoshop - I have been using a cute little Olympus for my underwater stuff, but it always balances too blue for my tastes - makes me want to use a grey card (if I could find one that was waterproof, and if the camera had custom color balance). I know I can fix it in PS, I just would prefer the camera take the pictures the way I want them to come out!

Thanks for the help!

[dctac]

Thanks, totally enjoyed.............

[dctac]

Thanks, totally enjoyed.............

[Pickle]

Great shots! I am a pro, and I don't like about 99% of what I shoot. I did want to ask you how much you had to clean up the color balance in Photoshop - I have been using a cute little Olympus for my underwater stuff, but it always balances too blue for my tastes - makes me want to use a grey card (if I could find one that was waterproof, and if the camera had custom color balance). I know I can fix it in PS, I just would prefer the camera take the pictures the way I want them to come out!

Peter, I would say... I feel very good about 5% of what I shoot. Probably fine about another 20% with help from Photoshop. Feel not so great but think another 10% might be salvageable. I'm not a pro, so I probably have lower standards than you do!

How deep in the water do you usually take photos? I use the Canon D10. Speaking strictly from my personal experience with that particular camera, the shots taken in the clear shallows (max. about 6 feet deep) in plentiful light come out quite well balanced color-wise and I don't need to fiddle with color-balance. If I need to fix something in those shots, it's most likely the lighting (brightness and such). I really think the D10 captures the colors well in those conditions. As I've mentioned previously, the more I can get close to the subject, the better the color will turn out, so I try my best to do so whenever I can. But that doesn't work with passing fish - I just have to hope for the best in that case.

Of course, the deeper I go, the more bluish the shots will appear even with the underwater setting. I need to take out the excessive blue using Photoshop then. I also need help for the shots taken in less than ideal visibility - they all appear pretty grayish in originals but not necessarily bluish.

I do everything manually with Photoshop. Those "auto" commands often change the photos a bit too drastically for my taste and sometimes even weirdly to my eyes. I wanted to be a marine biologist when I was little but, along the way, somehow went into graphic design... not a bad combination for dealing with underwater shots and Photoshop.

Not sure if I actually answered your question. I'm not familiar with Olympus, so I can only speak about the D10.

[Timethief]

Hey Pickle! Nope, that pretty much answered it! With the Olympus, I find that unless I was shooting in a couple of feetof water, then the blue tinge sets in - call it anything over about 4 feet of distance - including horizontal. It is not too big of a deal, but it would be nice if it did a better job of compensating. If I were using my "real" camera (which I don't usually even bring with me on most trips), I could just set the color temp and be pretty much done with it, or even set a compensation to the auto balance, but that is not an option on the point and shoot.

I know what you mean about the auto settings on Photoshop, though! Have you ever just created a new layer, hit auto balance on the new layer, and then turned the opacity way down to "blend" the two layers? Or even the mask to "paint" in the correction? I do that soemtimes when I am being somewhat lazy, and want a really quick fix. Just a thought...

Thanks for the info! Looks like I might have to try out the D10 (always looking for better gear!).

Keep Smiling!!!

[mrscherry2000]

Totally bookmarking this trip report for my future travels.