requested effects-moved

[Stephen_Scharf]

Unfortunately, I don't have the beta PhotoKit Color all youse guys and gals are testing (I would love to test it, though), but in reading these threads, it occurs to me that if you're going to emulate various types of films (which I think is a great idea), how some that do B&W emulations. I've been working with Greg Gorman's b&w workflow originally posted [on that other site] to get something that looks like Agfa Scala, but no luck....or is this covered in the original Photokit?

-Stephen.

[Martin Evening]

Stephen,

There are no plans to produce film emulations you describe in PhotoKit Color. We are mainly dealing with colour corrections and colour distortions in this particular product. The original PhotoKit plug-in does contain some useful colour to mono conversions. although we don't include specific film type conversions though.

Martin

[Stephen_Scharf]

Stephen,

There are no plans to produce film emulations you describe in PhotoKit Color. We are mainly dealing with colour corrections and colour distortions in this particular product. The original PhotoKit plug-in does contain some useful colour to mono conversions. although we don't include specific film type conversions though.

Martin

Martin,
Thanks for the response. I went back after posting that message and looked through the original PhotoKit, just to see what it would do, and noticed the different types of conversions. I think I can do similar things with my Greg Gorman based workflow now, selecting different colors in the Color Picker or swatches palette to use in the Solid Color layer step that Greg describes. And I've written actions that automate the particular color correction I want. Can you tell me though, why the layer mode "Multiply" is used in this workflow? I have your excellent book "PhotoShop for Photographers" and I know you describe all the different functionalities of the blending modes, but there are so many that unless you use them all the time, it's tough to remember the distinctions and subtleties of each.

[Martin Evening]

Martin,
Thanks for the response. I went back after posting that message and looked through the original PhotoKit, just to see what it would do, and noticed the different types of conversions. I think I can do similar things with my Greg Gorman based workflow now, selecting different colors in the Color Picker or swatches palette to use in the Solid Color layer step that Greg describes. And I've written actions that automate the particular color correction I want. Can you tell me though, why the layer mode "Multiply" is used in this workflow? I have your excellent book "PhotoShop for Photographers" and I know you describe all the different functionalities of the blending modes, but there are so many that unless you use them all the time, it's tough to remember the distinctions and subtleties of each.

Hmm, as far as I can remember, I don't use the Multiply blending mode in any of the final PhotoKit Color layer sets. Although Multiply is perhaps used in the original Photokit plug-in you mentioned. We use the Luminosity blend mode in a lot of instances in PhotoKit Color in order to apply a luminosiity preserving layer. For example, in the case of the cross processing effects, I wanted to include a layer which at 0% allowed the effect to influence the contrast, and if you increased this layer opacity, you could restore the contrast.

PhotoKit Color may lack a preview interface and dynamic controls, but we find the layered approach is very beneficial because you can save the layers and have the option to continually adjust the layers to achieve new variations, which if you experiment with the different layer combinations, are many.

Martin

[Stephen_Scharf]

Okay, Martin, thank you. I have your book with me at work today and I will peruse it at lunch and see if I can come up with an answer as to why Greg uses this in his workflow. Maybe what I will do is recap the workflow in the PS forum and if you get a chance, you can give it a once over; maybe we can figure out what's it's role is in the conversion workflow. I"ve been experimenting with Film Grain as part of this workflow (a step in my color conversion action) for some motorcycle Grand Prix images from the MotoGP at Philip Island a coupla weeks back that I want to convert to B&W to get that kind of Ilford FP4 look...

Cheers,
Stephen.

[Martin Evening]

If I remember rightly, and I don't have the instructions to hand right now, Greg's technique does two things. It converts a colour image to mono using the luminance information and it then applies a tone mapping to boost the blacks only (which is where the multiply blending bit comes in). You have to remember that although Greg shoots a lot digitally these days, the style he is recognised most for has a very traditional black and white feel. A lot of his pictures are also shot against black and Greg likes to see the darkest printed with a rich black. His custom conversion technique therefore works very well at applying a shadow enriching boost which helps him and others obtain this desired print result. It is a great technique to use to obtain this type of black and white print appearance. Just bear in mind that the tone mapping element works well on specific images and is not necessarily intended as a general black and white conversion technique.

Re: film grain in the Grainy Contrast effects in PhotoKit Color. The grain is applied as a separate layer. If you like the grain but not the colour effect, you can apply the effect and simply remove the other layers afterwards. The original PhotoKit plug-in also has some grain effects as well.