Exactly. 97% of communication is nonverbal. Our senses are really good at picking up meaning and when something has been done artificially you can feel it in the pit of your stomach and it just feels unpleasant and wrong.😂😂😂
I would definitely say you should use the second light whenever you can. As long as you would have to buy a second flash (and lets be honest - most photographers doing this level of photography probably have a second flash at hand) it will always give you better results faster. You're only working on one image right now and the time alone that you probably spent in Lightroom for only one image (creating three masks take their time even though AI makes it a lot faster than in previous versions of Lightroom, also figuring out what values look right and so on...) takes more time than adding that fill light. This becomes especially true if you are shooting a whole set of images. Also - when you are working with or for a client not only can you charge more money for using more of your equipment, you're able to show them the final results straight away. And I strongly believe any retoucher will be happy if you are making their lives easier not harder. Added benefits are more shadow details and details in general, no weird banding issues that Lightroom processing might introduce... No way I would ever choose Lightroom over lighting.
THIS. The "extra hassle" of setting up a fill light is nothing compared to the actual extra hassle of having to do additional retouching on every single image in a set.
That being said, for a number of location settings where maybe you can only carry one light, or are otherwise limited in your options, it's good to know that you can fall back on things like this.
True, but in that case you probably wanna introduce some of the ambient light anyway as a fill. Why would you bother being on Location anyway. But I acknowledge, that there might be very few occasions where it would be acceptable to do it in post ;)
@@dmitriwildfong-nishman3844 most of the time it isn’t the extra strobe that is the issue…it’s setting up a huge scrim with c stands and sandbags. The grip used to produce large fill light is the part that is a pain in the ass. You could simplify by using a larger Octabox but that’s not easy either. -P
@@FStoppers both are still easier than a heavier retouching workload in post in my opinion. Once the light is set up you're fine for the whole shoot. But without it you have to make that shadow edit for every single image you intend to keep. If you want consistency throughout that's even more work. I'm just not buying that pulling up the shadows on all your images in post would ever be less work than setting up a softbox, scrim, or bounce fill light. I've never heard of any professional photographer who wouldn't prefer to get the lighting right in camera first, over having to fix it across multiple images after. That's all I'm saying.
There's no way you save more time by doing this in post, especially if you have to do it to more than one image. Even if they looked exactly the same (I don't think they do, the in camera one looks better), you'd save more time doing it on set. That alone ends the argument for me, and I do a ton of post work to my images.
Two ways to do the "same" thing so the cost of labor becomes a factor. Depending upon the shoot; it might be easier and faster in the long run to use a fill to save all that time in post creating masks, and such. It may boil down to which skill level are you better at: lighting or editing? I guess I'd lean towards lighting it the way you want and save post for those times when the situation forces you to use fewer lights that you wanted to (equipment failure, theft, forgetfullness etc.).
It's interesting how in this video adding 1 light is considered a hassle, but hiring a professional retoucher to fix all the problems with your lighting is not.
So many photographers outsource their retouching and bill it to the client. So really the only one taking on the extra fee is the client and not the photographer. I guess you could get it "right" in camera and just save on those retouching fees but I guarantee even the shots with the fill light added on location are still going to need retouching. -P
@@FStoppers That's a good point. I guess it just feels counterintuitive to put in so much time to try to match something that worked better with the fill light. I suppose the point of the video is that if you did not happen to have an extra light, you can probably fix a lot of it in post nowadays, which is of course true.
The biggest time saver is doing it in camera. Nobody ever talks about the storage and RAM that's needed to fix everything in post. Rather spend that money on extra lights.
I think a fill light would make more difference where the ratio of your light to dark side is higher. In your image there's already a lot of fill from the white room. The shadow side isn't really very dark. Take a low key image. Get your main light close and you'll start to lose detail in shadows without a fill light. Adding in lightroom won't help so much
Both. I much prefer to get it right in-camera but even with fill, there are times I still need to bring up the shadows. You and your friends do bring up interesting points.
I'm watching this in windowed mode (a small portion of my screen) and already B looks so much better than A, hands down. I'm sure it would be even better at a larger scale. And as it turns out B is the real fill. Yeah, the difference is very obvious. Any 'pro photographer' who can't tell the difference probably ought to get their eyes checked.
Some of the Pro photographers I asked are on such a higher level in creative thinking that they don't even consider the details like the tones of the shadows. It's much like how the worlds best guitar players don't obsess about all these new guitar pedals or amps. Producers don't always notice which camera a photographer is using but instead are noticing the vibe, mood, tone, or artistic direction of the photoshoot. Some people look at the forest instead of the trees. -P
I love lightroom'new ai masks. They are a godsend. Sped up my workflow and totally changed how I do things. However, I'm slowly getting better and better with flashes. And flashes bring out so much detail and they also cut down so much on post work. A few tweaks and a flash shot can look spectacular. Now spread that over hundreds of photos and it makes a huge difference. I used to be strictly a natural light kind of guy but that was partially because I didn't really know how to use flashes and because I didn't have the equipment. But now that I do have quality lights, sky's the limit.
I prefer real fill (much easier than post, btw), but many like this look, despite it being unnatural. I think people are used to seeing heavily processed shadows, so they don't mind it anymore. Btw I noticed a similar effect on some of the Fuji in-camera post processing if you set shadows to Soft +2 (on the XT-1 for example). It's a pretty exttreme setting, but gives the same fill-light effect.
Yeah, I agree with the SECOND 'mystery' friend; it was SUPER obvious as soon as you put up the comparison, I could instantly see that B was the 'real' fill and the difference was glaring to me. And I was watching this on my PHONE!
I think it's more a matter of time. I'll always try to take the road which leads me to the most productive way. Better spend time doing things I like than worrying about work all day long.
Show me photographers with skills that doesn't focus on having it done right in camera, which means controlling light. There is absolutely zero excuse to be sloppy in the studio. Oh and here is a tip for people that start out in photography. Spend more time taking photos, experiment and learning about light and less time slapping presets on in Photoshop/Lightroom or other software.
Great video! I think production value is one thing to consider but if you are looking to save time in post or if you have a lot of photos to send to the client, getting the lighting right in camera will save lots of time.
I constantly have to go to other locations to go shoot, and I hate carrying multiple lights with me so I often just shoot with one light, but I do bump up the shadows quite often in lightroom. Now, to play devil's advocate here, with this specific image in the example, because the model had on a black dress, you had to do some extra masking in order to get it back down to normal again. That is extra work that you have to do... for EVERY picture that you want to complete. If you just take a handful of photos, okay fine. But how about the merit of being able to just get that fill-light done in camera so that you dont HAVE to add that extra work in post? If you have a studio already, even using a cheap light will save you time. Time is money, my friend. If you did this shoot and had to deliver say, 20 images, how much time are you spending masking, even though Lightroom is good with auto-masking you still have to refine it a bit and thats just additional work put on you.
Personally I like getting the image as close to what I want in the camera and leaving little to post processing. But I have to admit that with the software available you can get the image good enough, as you have shown, just by editing in post. Overall I just feel better about myself if I can get it right in camera, but maybe that's just me. BTW great video and a great topic, it's definitely going to start a fun discussion 👍😎
What you have completely overlooked is the time it takes to add a light vs the time it takes to mask and do all the adjustments. Now multiply this by 10 images and that’s half your day gone compared to the 30 sec it took to add the second light.
In the closeup its more obvious. It depends on what the shoot is for. If someone hired me to shoot some instagram photos for them then I think at that size there would be no way to tell so in that case using just the key let and working the shadows in post would be fine. If I was hired to create a large printed portrait however the difference between using the fill light vs bringing using post for the shadows are more noticeable in a large print or large image and I would lean towards as much right in camera as I can if the final intended use is as a large print or large displayed image. I do use one light on location but that's because I am using ambient as fill so I do set my exposure in camera to allow the right amount of ambient in as fill. The place where I see the post method being useful is if you are in a position where logistically carrying and setting up more than one light is not an option, I can't really see that being the case in a studio or controlled location like you are using for this example but it could happen. In that case knowing that you can do it this way is a nice fallback when you come up against those restrictions.
It is very easy to tell the difference between the 2 images. What's more, it is much easier to do the setup with that extra light and not have to faff around in post-production.
Very true in this simple situation. Now imagine having to setup a 7' Octabox or 8x8' scrim outside on location with a strobe firing through it. That changes things a bit. -P
@@FStoppers not sure in Lightroom since I never use it but I always have to switch from Normal to Luminosity in PS to avoid that issue. I’d be interested to see the difference - especially in that shadow area under her chin.
I think the shot with the fill light looks better. If you didn't compare the two you wouldn't know the difference, BUT side by side the fill light version looks far better.
My ingredient for every shooting to get the job done is 85% on Camera 15% Editing. Cuz if you can make a defferent just a few minute on location, why you have to edit an a hours with a software
The issue with the whole story here is that you could easily see which image was the one with bumped up shadows even without you zooming in... It's just a huge difference (at least on my screen). If your clients have crappy screens (this doesn't go to print) then yeah, it probably wouldn't make a difference to them (especially in times when Samsung phones had red faces with 1st gen AMOLEDs), but as the consumer level screens get better the difference in quality will become more noticeable...
There still is no substitute for having an actual large fill light. Doing it in software can be made to work in a pinch, but in all honesty, it's faster and more cost effective to just have the fill light and do it in camera. At the end of the day, the photographer's or retouchers time is money spent that could be being money made doing another shoot instead of dinking around with an image in PS or LR. Don't get me wrong, software is a great thing and can be used to cover a multitude of sins committed when acquiring the image, but, the the cost of having that second fill light and just using it will pay for itself in time saved later very quickly. The more you can get done in camera, the better.
I'd swap faces, for the augmented lighting. All else is better in the artificial lighting setup. Workflow should be prioritized always, because #efficiency.
I don't know man. I could really tell the difference and you lose so much detail doing something like that in Capture One vs Lightroom. Fill lights are imperative to me for my work, it's something about being able to get as much right on set vs adding an additional step in post-production which takes a lot of time already. It's a neat trick in a pinch, but I don't think I could just use one light when I know better.
It's painfully obvious the real fill sculpts her face far more elegantly than the faux fill. The shadow is far, far smoother along her camera-right cheek. This alone would stop me from trying to 'fix it in post'
this is a fab idea and discussion - for me I will always use a fill light or reflector to achieve this rather than risk bringing up noise in the shadows especially on my budget camera - I would use such techniques though in a situation where someone happened to like the one light version I always start with, and then perhaps in post add just a subtle lifting ot the shadows if it would enhance the shot
The warm highlights on her face are from her hair. Also, the photo already had a decent amount of fill since you were shooting in a white room. It you shot in a room with dark walls and ceiling, I bet there would be more noise in the shadows when trying to open them up..
I think one of the biggest factors is when you are editing 1 photo vs editing more than one. The masking in Lightroom is great, but the masking for the dress to pull the added shadow boost out for each and every image is going to get old real quick. Select subject won't really help you there.
In Lightroom you can batch all the masks now. It's pretty insane how quick it is. Each mask requires a single click that says "Update" and it just does it. It would be great if Lightroom would have an automatic "update" mask option so it's entirely automated...maybe that's coming real soon. -P
@@FStoppers I thought that only worked if you constructed the mask with select sky or select subject, but not if you painted the mask manually as it wouldn’t know which parts to include or not. I would love it if it would, and maybe it it does, but that wasn’t my understanding of it.
11:12 Right again! I come from a film background, so I think I have a good eye (I'm never wrong) when it comes to these things. It's like a semiotic reflex. Even when im watxhing movies, I can immediately tell if it was shot on film or digital. The one on the left just immediately looked artificial to me. The left side of her face is too bright in A and that's what gave it away to me, whereas in B her face has a natural fall off (from left to right). You can add fill digitally: you can just shift the dynamic range, but you can't extend it. And the shift is fixed. It's like if two cars are in traffic and they're 2 metres behind each other, no matter how far along they move in the road, they're always 2 metres apart. But if they started at 2 metres apart and then that distance could extend to say 10 metres apart, then the car behind can make a 3 point turn or speed up etc. So maybe it would be interesting to make 3 masks of the model's skin: the original, the end one and then one on top to tone down the highlights.
If you take 0:32 versus 2:25, then specialy 2:39 it was sadly a easy guess.. she had her mouth open on the other picture. But yeah, the thing i notice more and more on 'professionals' is how easy they say 'oh we can fix that' or 'no need, we can artificially add that'. So they skip maybe 10-20 minutes of on site preparation, so it feels like they do a fast job, but then charge you another 2-3 hours alone 'fixing' all those things they couldve added in those first 10-20minutes on site.
About noise reduction in DSLRs or any camera or post processing. Photographers pretending to be editor's. That's the bottom line. I agree with your magazine editor. 👌🏾 No offense to you guy's but over the year's many photographers never took professional graphic design classes and relied heavily on short cuts like sliders in LR, NX, DxO, Noise Ninja, etc. Prior to LR and Topaz even on old software like Photoshop CS2. From nearly 20yrs ago via "SMART OBJECTS" and stacked layers (Mean). Much easier now in new Photoshop.
Is it not more noise in shadows lifted in post, compared to shadows out of camera? Another camera or post settlement is the flash gel to blue or orange the sky, with a white balance adjustment for the person. Cant this be done more easily in post now? One white balance for the subject and another for the environment. PS autoselect fixes this, right?
The cheek skin on the "pulled" side of the A picture is really gray and flat, that's pretty horrible. I'm pretty sure your client is gonna notice and bash you pretty hard. If you don't want to buy an extra strobe, at least use a 10€ chinese 5-in-1 reflective panel on the other side of the face; if you pull all the shadow you kill your file. Or you spend so much time in LR/PS doing it well that, if it's one or two pics that's fine, but if it's a complete shooting set, maybe for catalogue with plenty of different outfits, it's much cheaper to buy the strobe and save HOURS on the post processing. Time is money.
It seemed quite obvious to me on the initial side by side which was real and which was fake, though it was more of a gestalt thing than any specific detail. I’ve just looked at the effects of light over so many images that fake light stands out. :)
More than one image and the time and money spent on adding a fill is worth it. Plus, who wants to spend more time in front of a computer and less behind a camera?
If time is money, one model would pay for the fill light and you'd have more work the rest of your career. The shadow on he face from the "fake fill" looks awful to me as well. Interesting experiment.
my goal is to spend as little time as possible post processing, which is a funny statement coming from a guy that likes astro and star trails, so id rather spend the few extra minutes on set getting it as close in camera as possible. others may feel the opposite, as long as you and the client are happy then who cares lol
Well to be fair, everything does look "better" in post. I always show my SOOC images in these youtube videos but SO MANY youtubers and photographers are guilty of showing a highly tweaked image and saying something to the effect of "Just one softbox to the left and a rim light from behind" yet those lights would not give the dodged and burned effect you see in the final image. I think a lot of photographers are dishonest about this and unfortunately a ton of newer photographers naively believe that "this parabolic reflector is what's making these images look so great!" It's really not, it's the retouching done in post production which can't be done in camera. -P
You buy the second strobe, so the client looking over your shoulder on set doesn't have to ask fifteen times, "Looks a little dark, can we lighten that?" Only to watch you do nothing and repeat, "I'll fix it in post." "I'll fix it in post." "I'll fix it in post." Wether you deliver quality photos or not, that client will remember working with you and you not doing what they asked. And if you're selling a service using strobe, and you don't have a back up light? What are you doing?
maybe because it took like 30 seconds to add that fill light and you don't have to use 3 different masks and spend a lot of time I'm LR or PS do fake it? And that is on only one photo. How often do you take only one photo?
If you’re a professional, making money, getting paid, you need to use everything at your disposal to get it right in camera. Besides, who wants to sit in front of a computer for hours tweaking?
It doesn't make sense if you are trying to deliver multiple locations either. If you want to shoot say 5 looks in 5 different locations (not necessarily in a studio setting), you'd spend a ton of time setting up a second light and scrim and sand bags, etc etc. My example in this studio setting bouncing a flash off the back wall is the easiest possible solution but if you had to do this out in a city during a location shoot it can be a much bigger pain. -P
It depends. If you are in your own studio, yeah just setup the second light. If you are having to pack up and travel to another studio or have to shoot out on location, setting up a second light with a huge scrim/octabox with sandbags and all the grip can be a huge pain in the ass. -P
Can someone replicate Lightroom shadow slider with other tools, like curves, exact the same way as it bumping up shadows somehow on a specific level? because it is very powerful and I'm interested what is behind that slider.
Not sure I understand your question. The shadow slider is just a level's control like a curve but on a limited bandwidth. It might have a taper on the extreme ends to make sure the transitions are smooth but you could essentially do this with a curve too. -P
I think this video is BS.... its only the studio.... Get OUT of your CLOSET and go outside.... NOW you can can do a real challenge. HOWEVER, Lights and Lightroom are TOOLS, you need to MASTER your tools and not take shortcuts for quality work... i.e. What your CLIENT or STUDIO is paying you for.... Do the BEST with what you got, because you can only FAKE so much.... Back to the Boy Scout Motto... ALWAYS BE PREPARED!
proper
lighting wins over the crutch of retouching every time.
Exactly. 97% of communication is nonverbal. Our senses are really good at picking up meaning and when something has been done artificially you can feel it in the pit of your stomach and it just feels unpleasant and wrong.😂😂😂
I would definitely say you should use the second light whenever you can. As long as you would have to buy a second flash (and lets be honest - most photographers doing this level of photography probably have a second flash at hand) it will always give you better results faster. You're only working on one image right now and the time alone that you probably spent in Lightroom for only one image (creating three masks take their time even though AI makes it a lot faster than in previous versions of Lightroom, also figuring out what values look right and so on...) takes more time than adding that fill light. This becomes especially true if you are shooting a whole set of images. Also - when you are working with or for a client not only can you charge more money for using more of your equipment, you're able to show them the final results straight away. And I strongly believe any retoucher will be happy if you are making their lives easier not harder. Added benefits are more shadow details and details in general, no weird banding issues that Lightroom processing might introduce... No way I would ever choose Lightroom over lighting.
THIS. The "extra hassle" of setting up a fill light is nothing compared to the actual extra hassle of having to do additional retouching on every single image in a set.
That being said, for a number of location settings where maybe you can only carry one light, or are otherwise limited in your options, it's good to know that you can fall back on things like this.
True, but in that case you probably wanna introduce some of the ambient light anyway as a fill. Why would you bother being on Location anyway. But I acknowledge, that there might be very few occasions where it would be acceptable to do it in post ;)
@@dmitriwildfong-nishman3844 most of the time it isn’t the extra strobe that is the issue…it’s setting up a huge scrim with c stands and sandbags. The grip used to produce large fill light is the part that is a pain in the ass. You could simplify by using a larger Octabox but that’s not easy either. -P
@@FStoppers both are still easier than a heavier retouching workload in post in my opinion. Once the light is set up you're fine for the whole shoot. But without it you have to make that shadow edit for every single image you intend to keep. If you want consistency throughout that's even more work. I'm just not buying that pulling up the shadows on all your images in post would ever be less work than setting up a softbox, scrim, or bounce fill light. I've never heard of any professional photographer who wouldn't prefer to get the lighting right in camera first, over having to fix it across multiple images after. That's all I'm saying.
There's no way you save more time by doing this in post, especially if you have to do it to more than one image. Even if they looked exactly the same (I don't think they do, the in camera one looks better), you'd save more time doing it on set. That alone ends the argument for me, and I do a ton of post work to my images.
I was about to comment this exact same thing.
I think this less about time and more about if you actually have additional lighting. Whether that’s for financial reasons or just circumstantial.
Doing it in camera is always best.
Two ways to do the "same" thing so the cost of labor becomes a factor. Depending upon the shoot; it might be easier and faster in the long run to use a fill to save all that time in post creating masks, and such. It may boil down to which skill level are you better at: lighting or editing? I guess I'd lean towards lighting it the way you want and save post for those times when the situation forces you to use fewer lights that you wanted to (equipment failure, theft, forgetfullness etc.).
And you can"t make mistakes (in that area) in retouching b/c physics doesn't make mistakes.
It's interesting how in this video adding 1 light is considered a hassle, but hiring a professional retoucher to fix all the problems with your lighting is not.
So many photographers outsource their retouching and bill it to the client. So really the only one taking on the extra fee is the client and not the photographer. I guess you could get it "right" in camera and just save on those retouching fees but I guarantee even the shots with the fill light added on location are still going to need retouching. -P
@@FStoppers That's a good point. I guess it just feels counterintuitive to put in so much time to try to match something that worked better with the fill light. I suppose the point of the video is that if you did not happen to have an extra light, you can probably fix a lot of it in post nowadays, which is of course true.
@@tom_corremans but if you can charge your clients more then way not save in your post and then bump your own lighting skills.
@@FStoppers you could also save those fees and keep them for yourself.
I prefer getting it right in camera, I’m better at lighting than photoshop.
The biggest time saver is doing it in camera. Nobody ever talks about the storage and RAM that's needed to fix everything in post. Rather spend that money on extra lights.
I usually take photos of models in complete darkness with zero lights and then just bump up everything in photoshop.
lol
This is a very good approach these days! -P
I think a fill light would make more difference where the ratio of your light to dark side is higher.
In your image there's already a lot of fill from the white room. The shadow side isn't really very dark.
Take a low key image. Get your main light close and you'll start to lose detail in shadows without a fill light. Adding in lightroom won't help so much
For a single picture, I guess you could get away with using only one light. Imagine having to correct 10 or 50 pictures now so they all look the same.
Both. I much prefer to get it right in-camera but even with fill, there are times I still need to bring up the shadows. You and your friends do bring up interesting points.
For myself as I progress with photography. To use a fill light to get as close in camera has to be the way to go.
I'm watching this in windowed mode (a small portion of my screen) and already B looks so much better than A, hands down. I'm sure it would be even better at a larger scale. And as it turns out B is the real fill. Yeah, the difference is very obvious. Any 'pro photographer' who can't tell the difference probably ought to get their eyes checked.
Some of the Pro photographers I asked are on such a higher level in creative thinking that they don't even consider the details like the tones of the shadows. It's much like how the worlds best guitar players don't obsess about all these new guitar pedals or amps. Producers don't always notice which camera a photographer is using but instead are noticing the vibe, mood, tone, or artistic direction of the photoshoot. Some people look at the forest instead of the trees. -P
"Architectural friend", the music gave it away, we all know that was Mike Kelley
I love lightroom'new ai masks. They are a godsend. Sped up my workflow and totally changed how I do things. However, I'm slowly getting better and better with flashes. And flashes bring out so much detail and they also cut down so much on post work. A few tweaks and a flash shot can look spectacular. Now spread that over hundreds of photos and it makes a huge difference. I used to be strictly a natural light kind of guy but that was partially because I didn't really know how to use flashes and because I didn't have the equipment. But now that I do have quality lights, sky's the limit.
I prefer real fill (much easier than post, btw), but many like this look, despite it being unnatural. I think people are used to seeing heavily processed shadows, so they don't mind it anymore.
Btw I noticed a similar effect on some of the Fuji in-camera post processing if you set shadows to Soft +2 (on the XT-1 for example). It's a pretty exttreme setting, but gives the same fill-light effect.
Yeah, I agree with the SECOND 'mystery' friend; it was SUPER obvious as soon as you put up the comparison, I could instantly see that B was the 'real' fill and the difference was glaring to me. And I was watching this on my PHONE!
I think it's more a matter of time. I'll always try to take the road which leads me to the most productive way. Better spend time doing things I like than worrying about work all day long.
Show me photographers with skills that doesn't focus on having it done right in camera, which means controlling light. There is absolutely zero excuse to be sloppy in the studio. Oh and here is a tip for people that start out in photography. Spend more time taking photos, experiment and learning about light and less time slapping presets on in Photoshop/Lightroom or other software.
Great video! I think production value is one thing to consider but if you are looking to save time in post or if you have a lot of photos to send to the client, getting the lighting right in camera will save lots of time.
I constantly have to go to other locations to go shoot, and I hate carrying multiple lights with me so I often just shoot with one light, but I do bump up the shadows quite often in lightroom.
Now, to play devil's advocate here, with this specific image in the example, because the model had on a black dress, you had to do some extra masking in order to get it back down to normal again. That is extra work that you have to do... for EVERY picture that you want to complete. If you just take a handful of photos, okay fine. But how about the merit of being able to just get that fill-light done in camera so that you dont HAVE to add that extra work in post? If you have a studio already, even using a cheap light will save you time. Time is money, my friend. If you did this shoot and had to deliver say, 20 images, how much time are you spending masking, even though Lightroom is good with auto-masking you still have to refine it a bit and thats just additional work put on you.
Personally I like getting the image as close to what I want in the camera and leaving little to post processing. But I have to admit that with the software available you can get the image good enough, as you have shown, just by editing in post. Overall I just feel better about myself if I can get it right in camera, but maybe that's just me. BTW great video and a great topic, it's definitely going to start a fun discussion 👍😎
For close up high detail stuff, the fill makes better sense. For everything else, PS does the job.
I’ve never seen anyone do this. Thanks for making this.
What you have completely overlooked is the time it takes to add a light vs the time it takes to mask and do all the adjustments.
Now multiply this by 10 images and that’s half your day gone compared to the 30 sec it took to add the second light.
I don't shoot this style, but now that I know, I can never unsee it. I'll take the real light every time.
In the closeup its more obvious. It depends on what the shoot is for. If someone hired me to shoot some instagram photos for them then I think at that size there would be no way to tell so in that case using just the key let and working the shadows in post would be fine. If I was hired to create a large printed portrait however the difference between using the fill light vs bringing using post for the shadows are more noticeable in a large print or large image and I would lean towards as much right in camera as I can if the final intended use is as a large print or large displayed image. I do use one light on location but that's because I am using ambient as fill so I do set my exposure in camera to allow the right amount of ambient in as fill. The place where I see the post method being useful is if you are in a position where logistically carrying and setting up more than one light is not an option, I can't really see that being the case in a studio or controlled location like you are using for this example but it could happen. In that case knowing that you can do it this way is a nice fallback when you come up against those restrictions.
Great video Patrick--lots of different points of discussion, all of which were well thought out and demonstrated.
It is very easy to tell the difference between the 2 images. What's more, it is much easier to do the setup with that extra light and not have to faff around in post-production.
Very true in this simple situation. Now imagine having to setup a 7' Octabox or 8x8' scrim outside on location with a strobe firing through it. That changes things a bit. -P
You might need to change your fake shadow and fill light layers to the “Luminosity” blend mode so there isn’t any sort of color shift.
Hey James! How do you do this in Lightroom? Is there a blending mode on the masking feature? -P
@@FStoppers not sure in Lightroom since I never use it but I always have to switch from Normal to Luminosity in PS to avoid that issue. I’d be interested to see the difference - especially in that shadow area under her chin.
I think the shot with the fill light looks better. If you didn't compare the two you wouldn't know the difference, BUT side by side the fill light version looks far better.
My ingredient for every shooting to get the job done is 85% on Camera 15% Editing. Cuz if you can make a defferent just a few minute on location, why you have to edit an a hours with a software
Also over the years whether good or bad, you guy's have always used ads/sponsors that make practical sense. 👍🏾
The issue with the whole story here is that you could easily see which image was the one with bumped up shadows even without you zooming in... It's just a huge difference (at least on my screen). If your clients have crappy screens (this doesn't go to print) then yeah, it probably wouldn't make a difference to them (especially in times when Samsung phones had red faces with 1st gen AMOLEDs), but as the consumer level screens get better the difference in quality will become more noticeable...
There still is no substitute for having an actual large fill light. Doing it in software can be made to work in a pinch, but in all honesty, it's faster and more cost effective to just have the fill light and do it in camera. At the end of the day, the photographer's or retouchers time is money spent that could be being money made doing another shoot instead of dinking around with an image in PS or LR. Don't get me wrong, software is a great thing and can be used to cover a multitude of sins committed when acquiring the image, but, the the cost of having that second fill light and just using it will pay for itself in time saved later very quickly. The more you can get done in camera, the better.
really nice points and thanks for your sharing!
I think if you’ve got the light handy, do it in camera. If you don’t, do it on the computer. You cannot beat reality, but you can fake it pretty well.
I'd swap faces, for the augmented lighting. All else is better in the artificial lighting setup.
Workflow should be prioritized always, because #efficiency.
Got it right - seemed pretty obvious.
If you don’t have the lights available it’s great to have the option, but I’d much rather set up a light than have to emulate fill on every select.
I don't know man. I could really tell the difference and you lose so much detail doing something like that in Capture One vs Lightroom. Fill lights are imperative to me for my work, it's something about being able to get as much right on set vs adding an additional step in post-production which takes a lot of time already. It's a neat trick in a pinch, but I don't think I could just use one light when I know better.
It's painfully obvious the real fill sculpts her face far more elegantly than the faux fill. The shadow is far, far smoother along her camera-right cheek. This alone would stop me from trying to 'fix it in post'
this is a fab idea and discussion - for me I will always use a fill light or reflector to achieve this rather than risk bringing up noise in the shadows especially on my budget camera - I would use such techniques though in a situation where someone happened to like the one light version I always start with, and then perhaps in post add just a subtle lifting ot the shadows if it would enhance the shot
The warm highlights on her face are from her hair. Also, the photo already had a decent amount of fill since you were shooting in a white room. It you shot in a room with dark walls and ceiling, I bet there would be more noise in the shadows when trying to open them up..
I think one of the biggest factors is when you are editing 1 photo vs editing more than one. The masking in Lightroom is great, but the masking for the dress to pull the added shadow boost out for each and every image is going to get old real quick. Select subject won't really help you there.
In Lightroom you can batch all the masks now. It's pretty insane how quick it is. Each mask requires a single click that says "Update" and it just does it. It would be great if Lightroom would have an automatic "update" mask option so it's entirely automated...maybe that's coming real soon. -P
@@FStoppers I thought that only worked if you constructed the mask with select sky or select subject, but not if you painted the mask manually as it wouldn’t know which parts to include or not. I would love it if it would, and maybe it it does, but that wasn’t my understanding of it.
I think a mood board is vital for these reasons. I like as little guesswork as possible on the day. #aspergers
2:31 I think B is real fill light and A is the computer one...
11:12 Right again!
I come from a film background, so I think I have a good eye (I'm never wrong) when it comes to these things. It's like a semiotic reflex. Even when im watxhing movies, I can immediately tell if it was shot on film or digital. The one on the left just immediately looked artificial to me. The left side of her face is too bright in A and that's what gave it away to me, whereas in B her face has a natural fall off (from left to right). You can add fill digitally: you can just shift the dynamic range, but you can't extend it. And the shift is fixed. It's like if two cars are in traffic and they're 2 metres behind each other, no matter how far along they move in the road, they're always 2 metres apart. But if they started at 2 metres apart and then that distance could extend to say 10 metres apart, then the car behind can make a 3 point turn or speed up etc. So maybe it would be interesting to make 3 masks of the model's skin: the original, the end one and then one on top to tone down the highlights.
If you take 0:32 versus 2:25, then specialy 2:39 it was sadly a easy guess.. she had her mouth open on the other picture. But yeah, the thing i notice more and more on 'professionals' is how easy they say 'oh we can fix that' or 'no need, we can artificially add that'. So they skip maybe 10-20 minutes of on site preparation, so it feels like they do a fast job, but then charge you another 2-3 hours alone 'fixing' all those things they couldve added in those first 10-20minutes on site.
About noise reduction in DSLRs or any camera or post processing. Photographers pretending to be editor's.
That's the bottom line.
I agree with your magazine editor. 👌🏾
No offense to you guy's but over the year's many photographers never took professional graphic design classes and relied heavily on short cuts like sliders in LR, NX, DxO, Noise Ninja, etc.
Prior to LR and Topaz even on old software like Photoshop CS2. From nearly 20yrs ago via "SMART OBJECTS" and stacked layers (Mean).
Much easier now in new Photoshop.
Is it not more noise in shadows lifted in post, compared to shadows out of camera?
Another camera or post settlement is the flash gel to blue or orange the sky, with a white balance adjustment for the person. Cant this be done more easily in post now? One white balance for the subject and another for the environment. PS autoselect fixes this, right?
The cheek skin on the "pulled" side of the A picture is really gray and flat, that's pretty horrible. I'm pretty sure your client is gonna notice and bash you pretty hard. If you don't want to buy an extra strobe, at least use a 10€ chinese 5-in-1 reflective panel on the other side of the face; if you pull all the shadow you kill your file. Or you spend so much time in LR/PS doing it well that, if it's one or two pics that's fine, but if it's a complete shooting set, maybe for catalogue with plenty of different outfits, it's much cheaper to buy the strobe and save HOURS on the post processing. Time is money.
The fake fill look decent. It was still easy to spot the fake fill. Anyway, I would not want to mask a lot of images in Lightroom.
It's pretty automated. It takes 5 seconds per image max. -P
It seemed quite obvious to me on the initial side by side which was real and which was fake, though it was more of a gestalt thing than any specific detail. I’ve just looked at the effects of light over so many images that fake light stands out. :)
More than one image and the time and money spent on adding a fill is worth it. Plus, who wants to spend more time in front of a computer and less behind a camera?
Always do as much in camera, because #workflow
Great 👍🏽 video 💯 📷
Looks a bit muddy with Lr. Skin looks more even with real fill.
I thought the fill light looked better.
You didn't mention how long it took for you to add all of those masks vs putting a light and be all set for all of your images
My personal belief is to learn how to do it using real physical lights/strobes then you can use the easy way.
If time is money, one model would pay for the fill light and you'd have more work the rest of your career. The shadow on he face from the "fake fill" looks awful to me as well. Interesting experiment.
my goal is to spend as little time as possible post processing, which is a funny statement coming from a guy that likes astro and star trails, so id rather spend the few extra minutes on set getting it as close in camera as possible. others may feel the opposite, as long as you and the client are happy then who cares lol
If you can do it with actual light it's always going to be better
I think lr can do the job but it might introduce noise, and outdoors i think you need flash
In camera is always better. One of the problems with today’s photographers is they think everything can be made better in post.
Well to be fair, everything does look "better" in post. I always show my SOOC images in these youtube videos but SO MANY youtubers and photographers are guilty of showing a highly tweaked image and saying something to the effect of "Just one softbox to the left and a rim light from behind" yet those lights would not give the dodged and burned effect you see in the final image. I think a lot of photographers are dishonest about this and unfortunately a ton of newer photographers naively believe that "this parabolic reflector is what's making these images look so great!" It's really not, it's the retouching done in post production which can't be done in camera. -P
You buy the second strobe, so the client looking over your shoulder on set doesn't have to ask fifteen times, "Looks a little dark, can we lighten that?" Only to watch you do nothing and repeat, "I'll fix it in post." "I'll fix it in post." "I'll fix it in post."
Wether you deliver quality photos or not, that client will remember working with you and you not doing what they asked. And if you're selling a service using strobe, and you don't have a back up light? What are you doing?
This is a very good point. -P
maybe because it took like 30 seconds to add that fill light and you don't have to use 3 different masks and spend a lot of time I'm LR or PS do fake it? And that is on only one photo. How often do you take only one photo?
If you’re a professional, making money, getting paid, you need to use everything at your disposal to get it right in camera. Besides, who wants to sit in front of a computer for hours tweaking?
Twerking in front of a computer?
So if you have 50 images or more to deliver, wouldn’t adding a light save you time? This only makes sense with less images to deliver.
It doesn't make sense if you are trying to deliver multiple locations either. If you want to shoot say 5 looks in 5 different locations (not necessarily in a studio setting), you'd spend a ton of time setting up a second light and scrim and sand bags, etc etc. My example in this studio setting bouncing a flash off the back wall is the easiest possible solution but if you had to do this out in a city during a location shoot it can be a much bigger pain. -P
@@FStoppers that is true
It saves buscvh of time just to set the second light, right? That is for me the value, save time in post.
It depends. If you are in your own studio, yeah just setup the second light. If you are having to pack up and travel to another studio or have to shoot out on location, setting up a second light with a huge scrim/octabox with sandbags and all the grip can be a huge pain in the ass. -P
No argument here seriously, real lightning is always superior.
Can someone replicate Lightroom shadow slider with other tools, like curves, exact the same way as it bumping up shadows somehow on a specific level? because it is very powerful and I'm interested what is behind that slider.
Not sure I understand your question. The shadow slider is just a level's control like a curve but on a limited bandwidth. It might have a taper on the extreme ends to make sure the transitions are smooth but you could essentially do this with a curve too. -P
@@FStoppers I tried with curves, but it wasn't recovered that kind of details as shadow slider does.
I guessed right! Her chin was absolutely fake and not real.
do it in pre
Really not much matters anymore with most views being seen on a tiny phone screen. Sadly.
Fill is 100% better
No, Because #relevancy 🤷🏾♂️
But the model, though.
How could you not talk about the eyelashes in the fake fill?
Umm this is a joke right haha… not saying you could make this closer with some more work but ah. The color in the real fill is much better
No reason to spend all that time editing when you could have gotten it right in camera. I got it right, but the difference was minor.
Better to achieve the shot in camera rather than wasting time on post production on silly things.
I think this video is BS.... its only the studio.... Get OUT of your CLOSET and go outside.... NOW you can can do a real challenge. HOWEVER, Lights and Lightroom are TOOLS, you need to MASTER your tools and not take shortcuts for quality work... i.e. What your CLIENT or STUDIO is paying you for.... Do the BEST with what you got, because you can only FAKE so much.... Back to the Boy Scout Motto... ALWAYS BE PREPARED!
Not sure what this comment means. If you go outside, the amount of effort required to add a strobe fill increase exponentially. -P
☺️
Mallu