More Pre-Grouping Wagons in 4mm - the D299 appreciation thread.

[magmouse]

43 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

All my photos throughout this topic are taken with a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FS62

 

As a paid-up member of the Campaign for Real Cameras, I approve.

 

The manual is available online: https://www.panasonic.com/au/support/manual-download/imaging/lumix-cameras/dmc-fs62.html

 

Set the exposure compensation like this:

 

 

It looks like you can only change the exposure by 2 EV (2 stops in old terminology), so you might still need to do some tweaking of the image afterwards, but it should get you a lot closer. Otherwise you can go into full manual mode.

 

HTH

 

Nick.

 

[Compound2632]

Further experimentation will wait until we've a bit more natural light here - tomorrow!

[wagonman]

15 hours ago, magmouse said:

 

As a paid-up member of the Campaign for Real Cameras, I approve.

 

The manual is available online: https://www.panasonic.com/au/support/manual-download/imaging/lumix-cameras/dmc-fs62.html

 

 

Call that a real camera? This is a real camera...

[Compound2632]

Well, before I bought the Lumix I was using film...

[Dave Hunt]

Things haven’t been the same since the daguerreotype went out of fashion.

 

Dave

[Nick C]

18 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

Things haven’t been the same since the daguerreotype went out of fashion.

 

Dave

These people with their fancy newfangled technology. What's wrong with painting on the wall of caves?

[Andy Hayter]

31 minutes ago, Nick C said:

These people with their fancy newfangled technology. What's wrong with painting on the wall of caves?

 

Eh You.  Stop defacing the walls of my home.  That's vandalism that is.

[magmouse]

2 hours ago, wagonman said:

 

Call that a real camera? This is a real camera...

 

Well, that’s tempting! However, I already have more hobbies than I can fit into one lifetime (including digital photography). It would be interesting though to try model photography with traditional methods, to see how close to the look of late 19th and early 20th century photos you could get. Digital black and white conversions rarely get even close to the right tonality.

 

Nick.

[wagonman]

Back in the '70s I did quite a lot of work with architects which included photographing their models. Sometimes I borrowed a sort of reverse periscope thing which, attached to an SLR, could get right inside the structures. Nowadays it's easier to use a mobile phone...

 

PS: I certainly wouldn't fancy using a 10x8 !

 

 

Edited July 24, 2023 by wagonman

[wagonman]

2 hours ago, magmouse said:

It would be interesting though to try model photography with traditional methods, to see how close to the look of late 19th and early 20th century photos you could get. Digital black and white conversions rarely get even close to the right tonality.

 

 

How do you convert to monochrome? The default is pretty rubbish but if you do it in photoshop you can vary the tonality quite a lot. You could probably even replicate ortho film. -ish.

 

 

Richard

 

 

Edited July 24, 2023 by wagonman
autouncorrect

[Compound2632]

Just messing around, I tried the "Auto Correct" function in the editor I'm using, Microsoft Office 2010 Picture Manager, which produced this:

 

 

from my original, unadulterated (other than compressed and cropped) image:

 

Edited July 24, 2023 by Compound2632

[WFPettigrew]

5 hours ago, Nick C said:

These people with their fancy newfangled technology. What's wrong with painting on the wall of caves?

 

Very pre-grouping....

[magmouse]

2 hours ago, wagonman said:

 

How do you convert to monochrome? The default is pretty rubbish but if you do it in photoshop you can vary the tonality quite a lot. You could probably even replicate ortho film. -ish.

 

 

Richard

 

 

I’ve never got to grips with Photoshop, but I am reasonably handy with DarkTable. I usually start with one of the B&W film simulations in my Fujifilm cameras, and make adjustments - tone curves, etc. - from there. Getting to something like a modern (as in 1970 onwards) B&W film look is reasonably possible, but getting to the look of older emulsions seems really hard. It’s probably to do with lenses as well.

 

Nick.

[magmouse]

2 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

Just messing around, I tried the "Auto Correct" function in the editor I'm using, Microsoft Office 2010 Picture Manager, which produced this:

 

 

from my original, unadulterated (other than compressed and cropped) image:

 

Well, the auto-correct does a half-decent job of it. The colour casts are bit of a shame, and difficult to correct since the background has gone pink and the wagon green. The original also has a green cast - what is the light source? Fluorescents often tend to be green. If it is daylight, then (unless you have green walls reflecting the light) it is a camera issue.

 

Getting there!

 

Nick.

[corneliuslundie]

The advice is always to build and paint models under the same light source as is used for the layout. Colour temperatures can vary from 2700 K (traditional incandescent lamps) to over 6000 K (or higher for daylight) and that can make an enormous difference. 

Jonathan

[kitpw]

21 minutes ago, magmouse said:

I’ve never got to grips with Photoshop, but I am reasonably handy with DarkTable.

I've used Photoshop extensively and mainly for combining 3D models (drawn/rendered images) with photos.  Where Photoshop is a raster graphics editor, Darktable allows non-destructive post-processing of photos. It has the advantage of being free open source software (Photoshop is now an annual subscription based program) and available for Windows, Linux and MAC. Darktable is an alternative to Lightroom: both have a management capability  for organising and archiving large numbers of images. I can't say that I've got to grips with Darktable but there will come a point when I don't want to cough up the annual Photoshop sub and so I've been looking at Darktable as a workable alternative. First though, I need some half-decent photos to work on - something which Nick has kindly helped me with very recently!

 

 

[Compound2632]

4 minutes ago, magmouse said:

The original also has a green cast - what is the light source?

 

Daylight supplemented by a small fluorescent lamp. 

[Compound2632]

On 23/07/2023 at 21:01, magmouse said:

 

Set to the maximum exposure of +2 EV, same lighting conditions as before:

 

 

For comparison, same setting on a couple of other frequently photographed colours:

 

 

 

There is, I think, a slight green cast to the horizontal part of the white paper background.

 

[Compound2632]

Same as above, +2 EV, but natural light only:

 

 

No green cast.

[Compound2632]

Right. I'm happy with this set! (For potential monochrome magazine publication.) Camera set to BW, +2 EV, natural and fluorescent lighting:

 

 

 

 

Perhaps now I can get on and build the kits!

Edited July 25, 2023 by Compound2632

[magmouse]

1 hour ago, Compound2632 said:

Perhaps now I can get on and build the kits!

 

Are you not enjoying my rabbit hole?

 

The B&W versions are certainly OK to show what the 3D print looks like - the detail is clearly visible now. A touch more contrast helps:

 

 

The colour ones are also fixable with a little tweak to the colour balance and contrast. The green cast is not just on the white background (though it is most obvious there) - it is across the whole image, which makes it easier to fix:

 

 

I'll let you get on with modelling now!

 

Nick.

 

 

[Compound2632]

2 hours ago, magmouse said:

Are you not enjoying my rabbit hole?

 

Certainly learning fast!

 

It also informs my view of the great yellow O debate. I may have to experiment there too.

[Chas Levin]

On 24/07/2023 at 13:09, Dave Hunt said:

Things haven’t been the same since the daguerreotype went out of fashion.

 

Dave

 

I take all my photos on an Apple iDaguerreo 14 Pro Plus: dual camera, facial recognition, mercury-vapored silver-plated copper - the whole 9 yards!

[Compound2632]

Coming soon-ish to a Society Magazine near you: the decline of D299:

 

[Northroader]

Spoiler alert!!!