LCE (Local Contrast Enhancement) will add the oomph that I suggested.
It is done using unsharp mask with what are rather oddball parameters
relative to normal sharpening. The size of the parameters are rather
reversed... one uses a small amount and a large radius.
See this link at Luminous Landscape:
<http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/contrast-enhancement.shtml>
I noticed what looked like blown highlights in your image but didn't
actually measure it. If the highlights are blown adding LCE will not
worsen the situation... you can't get brighter than pure white. If
you'll send me the raw image I'll see if I can recover any more of the
highlights using PS5 than you were able with Raw Therapee.
Yes, I do remember your "grouching about the inability of digital to
cope with highlights." But one might just as well complain about slide
film's inability to cope with highlights. It's not digital that's at
fault, it's the photographer who's at fault for neglecting the proper
use of a new tool. Digital behaves much more like slide film than
negative film and even gives you much more dynamic range than slide film
ever did... so it's actually better at shadows/highlights than slide
film. It also gives you an easily viewed histogram that tells you if
the highlights will be blown or not. In fact, the info display on the
E-510 will also show you blinking underexposed shadow areas and blinking
overexposed highlight areas. See page 67 of your manual.
All of the tools you require are easily accessible. Your only problem
is to convince yourself that digital is different, not inferior, and
learn to use the tools provided.
Chuck Norcutt
On 8/23/2011 7:33 AM, Brian Swale wrote:
> Chuck wrote
>> Are these those you thought you had lost? If so, where did you find them?
>> All look good but, until I saw the comments on the first indicating it was
>> taken on the E-510 I thought perhaps it was a scan from faded film. It can
>> use a bit of LCE to add a bit of oooph.
>
> The shot taken in the urban park "was" one of a set that I can't find now.
> Because of the manner in which I store them, there should be an
> alphanumerical sequence, broken only when the camera decides ( different
> month or whatever). So it is very clear when any are missing, and there
> were several.
> I seldom discard, so that would not be the reason.
>
> I don't know how I would add oomph to that shot. You might recall the time a
> couple of years ago when I was grouching about the inability of digital to
> cope with highlights. This was one taken during that period. I think I
> actually
> (surprise, surprise) shot this one in RAW, and tried processing it in Raw
> Therapee. One major objective was to recover detail in the highlights and/or
> tone them down a lot without losing other detail.
>
> If adding oomph would worsen the blown highlights - I'll save it for another
> day.
>
>> From memory I used (couple of days ago) relatively new features in
> FastStone Image Viewer to do that. It now has curves control etc and I
> played around with them
>
> The view taken into the last of the autumn sunlight for the day was very
> attractive, but a challenge. Unfortunately, it is no longer just half an
> hour's
> drive away from my abode; it's 300 miles away now. And 300 miles back.
>
> Thanks for the comments, all.
>
> Brian Swale.
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