Lightroom 3

Image: 5D Mk II, EF 300 f4 L IS, f 7.1, ISO 3200, 1/250 sec.

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Lightroom 3, on the surface you wont see a lot of change, where Adobe worked their magic is under the hood.

The new engine for processing noise and sharpening has improved immensely, one of its biggest draw backs since Lightroom was first released, I prefer to do my noise reduction and a small amount of sharpening in RAW format and then complete it in 16 bit TIFF format in PS.

I went back to this image I took in Costa Rica of the of a Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan in the rain forest near Vulcan Areal, I could not believe the improvement in noise reduction that Lightroom was able to do on this ISO 3200 image, detail is maintained while almost completely removing all traces of noise, the image was cropped to about 60% of its original size.

One other big improvement is the lens correction, LR now has lens profiles that can fix distortion and fix it well. I have heard more profiles are coming, so soon you will be able to fix most lens aberrations, a nice feature.

I have always liked LR, but now it really is a great tool to have.

If you have been waiting for an improved Lightroom, now is the time.

Ross Murphy Images In Light

Vulcan Arenal, Costa Rica

Image: Margay, 5D MK II, 300 F4 IS L.F 7.1, ISO 400.

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Image:Chestnut-mandibled Toucan. 5d Mk II 300 F4 IS L. ISO 3200.

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Arenal is located in central Costa Rica 90km NW of the capital of San Jose in the Arenal Tilaran Conservation district and is home to many of Costa Rica's diverse animals and birds, it is a bird lovers paradise and a volcanologists dream, the volcano is close to La Fortuna which is every one's kick off point to explore the area, we stayed on our last trip at the Arenal Observatory Lodge which is a very nice place to stay, its clean and well equipped and as close to the volcano as you can get, as a matter of fact most rooms have a view of the volcano and the extensive grounds include acres of land and trails to explore, bird watching is supperb here. Lago Arenal is also excellent for fishing, I managed to pull a 10 lb Wapote out of the lake on one of my trips, use the local guide ,Gato Negro from the Lake Arenal Lodge. I saw 2 species of Toucan and also Toucanets while visiting for just a few days and I am not a big birder, we also saw Kinkajou and a Margay as shot above. The area is home to monkeys, Red Eyed Tree frogs, Pizotes, Sloth, Hummingbirds, Poison Dart Frogs and a large variety of exotic animals. I have visited here 4 times and still not come away with a good image of the volcano, weather usually being the part that kills it, maybe next time.

More info: Arenal.net.
Ross Murphy Images In Light

Crop Power with the 5D Mk II

Who needs a crop camera when you can get perfectly good shots and crop them later, the top image was taken with a 5D Mk II and an EF 300 F4 IS L in Costa Rica last March, the bottom image was a 100% crop at 2808 x 1872 or approximately a 5.2 mp image that will print at 12 x 18 when carefully up scaled, both have been down scaled here to 800 x 533 for web viewing. Well a 50D would have probably come away with a better image as far as pixels on the bird, however this was taken at ISO 1250 and no noise reduction was used in camera or PP. DPP was used for post production, it was shot at such a high ISO because it was cloudy and raining, the 50D would have a hard time doing that and coming away with an image this clean. I would like to have a 1.3 crop camera like the 1D Mk III but more mega pixels and better noise levels than the 5D Mk II and we may see that very soon.

Ross Murphy Images In Light

Work Flow

Image: Eyelash Viper, Costa Rica, 5D2, 70-200 f4 L IS, f7.1,1/200s ,ISO 1600,-.2/3 ev. Digital photo Pro and CS3

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The Darkroom, or rather Lightroom as its referred to today, now consists of electronics instead of chemicals, but we still do the same basic things we did in the film days, we adjust saturation, we dodge and burn, we try to get every last thing out of our RAW files that we used to try to do with our film in the dark room. "RAW" this is the equivalent of what used to be the negative, so remember if you shoot in jpg only, you are throwing away the negative.

Every camera's work flow will be a little different, maybe by a small amount, but always in my experience at least a little. The 5D Mk II is no exception, Digital Photo Pro, the software that comes with your camera, if you use a Canon, actually works very well in a lot of cases, the software of choice for me is Lightroom (currently at V 2.3) see Killer Tips, followed by CS3 (now CS4) for local adjustments, final color, size, sharpening and print.

I will always adjust curves, white balance if needed, noise and sharpen in RAW, whether I use DPP or LR and save as a 16 bit TIFF file, the only time I use jpg is when saving for use on the web. Next step is to open in CS3 and adjust curves, levels and color, I always use layers with CS3 as you have the ability to turn them on or off. Next I do local adjustments and dodge and burn if needed. Now I size using bicubic and sharpen for print using Smart sharpen and save as a 16 bit TIFF, a 100 meg file is not unusual at this point. I do all of this on an external LaCie 1 tb drive, all my best work is burned to CD at this point for back up, the rest is put on a 2 nd back up drive for later use as stock. I have found I will use DPP for animal, city and people and Lightroom for landscape or seascape. This of course is only an overall look at workflow, I could write pages about it, mostly it takes practice to develope your own workflow, but these are the basic steps I use.

I use ACDsee Pro for viewing and selecting work, you can drag and drop images into CS3 for printing and re-sizing, it is ultra fast when viewing large amounts of photo files.

Shadow and highlights where just added to the latest release of DPP 3.6.1 and I look forward to trying this new version out, Canon is constantly updating DPP and you should try the newer versions. Update DPP 3.6.1 Get it here

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Ross Murphy Images In Light
coming soon: sharpening and sizing for the web.

Monteverde

Image: Monteverde, 5D MkII, 70-200 f4 L IS, iso 400, f11

Image: 5D Mk II, 300mm f4 IS L

Monteverde :

High up in the mountains of the Cordillera de Tilarán in north central Costa Rica lies a magical place called Monteverde. What is it you may ask ? its a cloud forest reserve of 10,500 hectares.
The bio-diversity is stunning, with: 878 species of epiphyte, over 500 species of Orchid (largest in the world), The mammals include six species of marsupials, three muskrats, at least 58 bats, three primates, seven edentates, two rabbits, one ground hog, three species of squirrels, one species of spiny mouse, at least 15 species of long-tailed rats and mice (Muridae family); one species of porcupine, one species of agouti, one of pacca, two canides, five mustelides, four species of procionides, six species of felines, two species of wild pigs, two species of deer, and one species. of tapir. (Ref) over 400 species of bird including the elusive Resplendent Quetzal and seven species of Hummingbird like this one Visiting this park in the clouds is like walking through an emerald green cathedral, a hush falls over you as you listen to the exotic calls of the jungle, keeping your eyes peeled for what animal or plant turns up next, towering tree ferns 20 feet high or the buzz and neon flash of a hummingbird, if your very lucky a wild cat or the Resplendent Quetzal may appear. This was the first time in my visits to Costa Rica that I actually got cold, most of the time this forest is shrouded in clouds and rain, but this last trip included wind and cold air rushing up the slopes with temperatures that felt like the low F 50's. Waterproof gear is essential here for photography, along with a poncho for yourself.

Ross Murphy Images in Light

Costa Rica and Aviarios Del Caribe

Picture: Two Fingered Sloth young, taken with 5D2 and 24-105 f4 L, ISO 3200 f7.1, 105mm.
El Perezoso or as we know them in English The Sloth:

One of my favorite places to visit when in Cost Rica is the Sloth sanctuary, run by Luis and Judy, it is located on the Caribbean side just north of Cahuita National Park about a 3 1\2 hour drive from the Capital of San Jose. They have a small hotel here that is a nice place to stay, they conduct educational tours of there facility and also run birding tours on their extensive property. If you need some where to stay on the way south, I highly recommend it. They rescue orphaned and injured Sloth and rehabilitate them and release them back to the wild when possible, when we where there a couple of weeks ago they had about thirty Sloth, ranging in age from new born to adult, including both species, the Two fingered and the Three fingered. These animals are incredible and a joy to see up close, especially the young, they have a very alien appearance and are probably the most good natured of all wild animal's. They can be seen in the wild through out most of Costa Rica, including nearby Cahuita N.P. (watch out, the White Face Capuchins may steal your food) which is a must see when in the area.
Puerto Viejo is the last major stop on the way south past Cahuita and the beaches at Manzanillo are to die for, with lots of interesting and eclectic jungle lodges and hotels to stay in. One I can highly recommend in Cahuita is Coral Hill Bungalows. Be sure to stop in Manzanillo and eat at Maxi's (pic) or play a game of soccer with Ricky (the owner of Maxi's) and the gang on the beach out front, they play every night, your sure to have a good time.

Ross Murphy Images In Light