Check this image out, why did it turn out so crap?

[steve181]

After i took this photo it looked great and crystal clear on my LCD screen, i came home and loaded it on the computer, and look hows its turned out . The fusealarge is all blothy and certainly not clear white. Admittadly the sun wasn't on my back when i took this shot, so I realise that thats one reason. If the sun was on my back would the aircraft be perfectly clear? Also this was taken with full zoom, did that contribute to it's crapness? I had the setting all on auto, was that a sensible thing to do?

Also whats the best was of capturing a sharp image of a moving aircraft?

cheers very much

[philip]

The light is the problem. Never shoot against the sun, everything will come out dark and with bad colors.

You said you used full zoom....digital or optical zoom? Never use digital zoom - it really affects the quality!

Shoot in highest quality mode and save the picture without jpg compression!


...and...never trust the LCD screen!

[PortColumbus]

Horrible backlit. Shoot with sun behind you.

Never use digital zoom, it's worthless.

[steve181]

no no it was all optical zoom! I would never digitally zoom in on my images.

How do i save without jpg compression, i dont even know if i'm saving with or without it?

I was just looking at some images in the dawn, dusk section, and with almost all where the aircraft is the subject the photographer has positioned himself such that every bit of natural light is beaming on the subject, and the ones where this is not the case the aircraft is not in focus or anything its the sun that is. Until know i didn't realise the sun was basically the number 1 thing to think about when photographing.

cheers

[philip]

That depends on what editing software you use. In photoshop there is a quality slider when you save the image. Just put the slider to the max before you save the image and there wont be compression.

Sunset/Sunrise pictures are an exception - you can get cool effects and sky colors. But never shoot against the sun during the day.

[steve181]

thats really helpful thankyou

[steve181]

Hey philip i have photoshop elements. I couldent find the quality slider. Do you mean go under "filter" then to "sharpen"?

[philip]

Hey

After all your editing click "File - Save as - (Choose jpeg and file name) - click save" - and then the following window turns up. You can see the quality slider there - move it to 12 (maximum quality) and save it then. I know this image is german but you get the idea:



If you need further help, drop me a pm and I will try to help or prepare a photo for you.

[steve181]

thats awsome i set the slider onto maximum, thanks for your help with that. When i get the opportunity to snap some new images, i would be really greatful if you could help me prepare them for an attempt at a sucessful upload onto jetphotos, that way i can learn the process of tweaking an image up in photoshop.

I'll pm you once i have some shots worth working on. Thanks

[tsentsan]

u dont need to set it to max to get acceptable quality, around 9 or 10 would do the trick, plus its about 1/2 the size too...

[steve181]

really, so moving the slider changes the size as well as the quality? I'm not sure if i understand it entirley but if moving it to maximum improves the quality, woulden't it be better to have it on maximum so the quality is highest and even though the image is bigger it just involves a bit more cropping? Am i on the right track with that?

[tsentsan]

Moving the slides changes the quality of the image saved. This quality actually refers to the amount of JPG compression.

At the lowest quality (quality 0 or 1), the most amount of JPG compression is used, resulting in horribly compressed images. The images however, are highly compressed which gives you a small file size.

At the highest quality (quality 12), the least amount of or no JPG compression is used. As such, the quality of the images are extremely high, but the file sizes are exorbitantly high.

Let me give you an example.

[photoid=273543]
This image was saved as 1024x681 at Quality 10 with a file size of 186KB.
The same image, saved at Quality 1, has a file size of 48kb, and can be viewed here: http://www.tsung.per.sg/ttt/ra-1.jpg
The same image, saved at Quality 12, has a file size of 572kb, and can be viewed here: http://www.tsung.per.sg/ttt/ra-2.jpg

Note that these images are saved at 300DPI regardless of quality.

After looking at these 3 images, you will find that it is no doubt quality 12 may produce the best image with almost 0 compression.

IMHO I see no difference viewing at Quality 10 or Quality 12, as I find both images of acceptable quality. So, if you can get an acceptably good image at Quality 10, why use Quality 12?

[steve181]

yeah i understand exactly what you mean now. Thanks for the links the differences are really obvious. When i uploaded my first two images (rejected) I didn't know about the slider, so i must have saved them at about 4-6, one reason the screaner gave was to much compression. So now i can tick of that reason, and say i understand it, only 15 more reasons for rejection to be figured out! J/K abut 5 more things.

[FlyingPhotog]

I usually have to set the quality slider to 10-11 to keep it under the required 500K max.