Author Topic: work flow for Alamy (Read 10977 times)

ianhlnd · « **on:** January 13, 2007, 22:17 »

I just don't get it. God help me but it just doesn't make sense.

I shoot with a 10+ mp camera, and to get them up to Alamy specs of 54 megabytes

Can somebody give me the work flow working from RAW to get it to their specs. AND, after doing all this, how does it look at 100%. Mine look like a blur?

leaf · « **Reply #1 on:** January 14, 2007, 05:18 »

in photoshop on the bottom left you will either the size in cm, inches, or mb.. if you click on that you can change what it shows. You could change that to MB for starters.

Click on edt>image size
then increase the image by 10% using bicubic smoother.
and click ok
check the size of your image and see if it is big enough
if not do another 10%

and yes, it looks blurry when you are done

some people have increased the size of the image in one swipe and i have done that as well, but my last submission was rejected due to poor uprezzing so i have changed my process a little.

ianhlnd · « **Reply #2 on:** January 14, 2007, 07:13 »

Thanks, that really helps to know that 100% view is blurry, I thought it was me.

eendicott · « **Reply #3 on:** January 15, 2007, 10:14 »

I take a different approach. I shoot in RAW and I uprez in Photoshop's RAW processing software. I shoot with a 8.2mp camera and simply change the setting when processing in RAW to 17.1mp then import into Photoshop and save as a TIFF. Works great for me.

leaf · « **Reply #4 on:** January 15, 2007, 13:05 »

yeah there is probably some value to upsizing while in 16bit mode.

eendicott · « **Reply #5 on:** January 15, 2007, 13:47 »

I do everything I can in RAW - not only upsizing but also converting to 8-bit and RGB 1998 per their requirements. Any sharpening (I know I'm bad - not supposed to sharpen) or adjustments to white balance, contrast, etc. is all done in RAW. Very rarely do I do anything in the main program for Alamy. Once it's opened, I save as TIFF, then I use Neat Image to clean up noise.

About the only weird thing I do (and it's only because the voices in my head tell me to) is rather than save the file at 300dpi, I save at 999dpi. No real reason for Alamy submissions, but I've noticed that it helps with relation to using the clone stamp, healing brush, or blur tool for RF stuff (I don't have any RF images on Alamy).

The bad thing about this process is you have to remember to change the settings back for other sites - the settings remain the same if you close out of the program and re-open it.

ianhlnd · « **Reply #6 on:** January 16, 2007, 09:59 »

Thanks for the advice, I've done what was mentioned above and came out with pretty good results.

It takes a while, even with 4 gig of RAM with 90% dedicated to PS. when I upres to 300 I can go have a cup of tea and it's still working, but it generally comes out eventually.

I'll try the 999dpi, it makes sense that it would work better with some of the tools.

leaf · « **Reply #7 on:** January 16, 2007, 10:05 »

unless i don't understand something..

I can see no reason why changing the dpi would matter to anything.
Wether it is 1 dpi or 100000 dpi, there is still the same amount of pixels across the image. The # of pixels is what matters in an image.

eendicott · « **Reply #8 on:** January 16, 2007, 10:56 »

Leaf, I don't know the ins and outs of technicalities at 100% and sometimes I do things because I'm a little insane (I'm sure I'm completely wrong about this but I refuse to change because of the voices in my head). My theory is that it depends on usage.

Based on what I have read, when you work at 999 dpi (a higher resolution than 300dpi) and you use the clone stamp or the blur tool or the healing brush. You're changing the image at the highest possible way and usually it's while you are zoomed in at an amount greater than 100%.

When that image is printed, at a lower resolution (say 300dpi or 72dpi) my mistakes are less visible because of the printer limitations. Same applies for screen resolution on computers - the image will eventually be downsized in some manner and will improve in quality.

As mentioned though - I have no scientific evidence to back my theory - it's just one of the things I changed in my workflow (specifically at the micros) to get my acceptance level up.

With relation to 1 dpi or 100000 dpi - whether there is still the same amount of pixels or not, the resolution is much different. A 12mp 72dpi image will be of a lower resolution (image quality) than a 12mp image at 300dpi.

leaf · « **Reply #9 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:19 »

well i have to cordially disagree. I forget where we had this argument before, if it was this forum or another.. but dpi has nothing to do with image size. ONLY printing size.

In the last disagreement I think it was phildate and I against however else there was so I hope he chimes in

all dpi says is dots per inch.
a 12 mp image at 300 dpi or 600 dpi still has the same 12 mp.. the image size or quality doesn't change in the least.

You are obviously free to edit how you want, but i think you are giving yourself more work. When you zoom in and use whatever brush you are working on X amount of pixels no matter what the dpi is. The X amount of pixels is independant to the dpi.

Or put another way. you can change an image from 1 dpi to 10000 dpi back and for again and back and forth again and quality will stay the same. Do the test in photoshop.
Change the image resolution to 1 pixel/inch. (UNcheck the box that says resample image) you will now have a crazy amount of inches.
click ok
your image is the same size. zoom into 100%.. still the same as it was before.
change the image to 10000 pixels / inch and look at the image.
still the same.

freefly · « **Reply #10 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:28 »

Stooooop!

Has anyone here ever used Genuine Fractals? I started submitting 50MB images to ALAMY using a Canon 6MP EOS 10D about 4 years ago.

This program is so easy to use. You simply save the JPEG into their format, .STN, re-open in Photoshop at the required MB (i.e. 50) and then re-save as TIFF or Jpeg. Although I think Alamy accept jpegs now as long as they are still 50MB uncompressed.

Have a read, it is a great program and if you upsize a lot of pics, well worth the $$$´s.

newbielink:http://www.ononesoftware.com/detail.php?prodLine_id=2 [nonactive]

Hope this helps,

Nick
newbielink:http://www.all-things-photography.com [nonactive]

leaf · « **Reply #11 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:30 »

yeah i have looked at it a little bit and it seemed to be a bit of a pain when you could just upsize on photoshop.

eendicott · « **Reply #12 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:38 »

Quote from: leaf on January 16, 2007, 11:19

well i have to cordially disagree. I forget where we had this argument before, if it was this forum or another.. but dpi has nothing to do with image size. ONLY printing size.

In the last disagreement I think it was phildate and I against however else there was so I hope he chimes in

all dpi says is dots per inch.
a 12 mp image at 300 dpi or 600 dpi still has the same 12 mp.. the image size or quality doesn't change in the least.

Uh oh - don't want to start a big debate. I agree that dpi is dots per inch, but remember that a 12mp image is (using the Canon 5d as an example) 4,368 x 2,912 pixels. The amount of dots within that space is what we are talking about and we are talking specifically about printing.

"Generally, the higher the DPI, the better the tonality of the image, colours should look better and blends between colours should be smoother"

http://www.tildefrugal.net/photo/dpi.php

Greg Boiarsky · « **Reply #13 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:42 »

I use Qimage to uprez my images. It's not only inexpensive ($50 for the Pro edition, $90 for the Studio edition--compared to $160 for Genuine Fractals), but it does an outstanding job. The advantage is that it is also a full-powered professional printing program that will get the best prints possible, short of a RIP. However, Genuine Fractals is a great product and you can't go wrong with it (full disclosure: I have not used Genuine Fractals, but I hear great things about it).

Qimage: http://www.ddisoftware.com/qimage/

Quote from: freefly on January 16, 2007, 11:28

Stooooop!

Has anyone here ever used Genuine Fractals? I started submitting 50MB images to ALAMY using a Canon 6MP EOS 10D about 4 years ago.

This program is so easy to use. You simply save the JPEG into their format, .STN, re-open in Photoshop at the required MB (i.e. 50) and then re-save as TIFF or Jpeg. Although I think Alamy accept jpegs now as long as they are still 50MB uncompressed.

Have a read, it is a great program and if you upsize a lot of pics, well worth the $$$´s.

http://www.ononesoftware.com/detail.php?prodLine_id=2

Hope this helps,

Nick
www.all-things-photography.com

leaf · « **Reply #14 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:48 »

i agree if you are printing, 600 dpi and 300 dpi for a 12mp image is two different things.

What i was debating however, is if a 600 dpi or 300 dpi image both at 12 mp would look any different on your screen. My point is that they will look the same and act the same in photoshop and on your computer screen and be identical until you print them out. And then really they are still the same, because it is just a matter of difference of what the print is being told.

You could tell the printer to print the 600 dpi image at 300 dpi and get the same results as if you printed the 300 dpi image and didn't change anything.

hmm.. i feel i'm going talking in circles. perhaps we will just have to agree to disagree.

Greg Boiarsky · « **Reply #15 on:** January 16, 2007, 11:51 »

This is correct. DPI is only relevant to the printed image. PPI is the term that is more useful for image resolution and quality, as it describes the pixel density on the sensor.

You don't need to go * about with the dpi in Photoshop. It is much more useful to simply magnify the view to 200-300% and edit. In the end, by altering the dpi and then zooming, that's all you're really doing--zooming in on the image.

I suggest an experiment. In one window, change the dpi to 999 and zoom to your normal magnfication. In a second window, simply magnify the image without changing the dpi. Do the two windows look substantially different? Is there a different amount of detail or smoothness to the image? My guess is that you'll see no difference between the two.

Quote from: leaf on January 16, 2007, 11:19

well i have to cordially disagree. I forget where we had this argument before, if it was this forum or another.. but dpi has nothing to do with image size. ONLY printing size.

tommroch · « **Reply #16 on:** February 16, 2008, 08:16 »

I am now at the stage where I want to try my hand at Alamy, but I am very unclear as to what file format they need. Any suggestions, i.e.

48MB TIFF?

or

Level 12 JPG that has been derived from a 'working copy' 48MB+ TIFF?

or

Ready JPG upsized to 48MB+

Thanks.
Confused and in need of help! $:-\$

ParisEye · « **Reply #17 on:** February 16, 2008, 08:35 »

You must work from a TIFF file which is superior to 48 MB. Then you save it as a JPEG (maximum resolution : level 12) and you upload the JPEG file.

Anyway, when uploading if your file is not big enough there will be a message error.

tommroch · « **Reply #18 on:** February 16, 2008, 09:09 »

Quote from: ParisEye on February 16, 2008, 08:35

You must work from a TIFF file which is superior to 48 MB. Then you save it as a JPEG (maximum resolution : level 12) and you upload the JPEG file.

Anyway, when uploading if your file is not big enough there will be a message error.

Thank you.

Seren · « **Reply #19 on:** February 21, 2008, 08:55 »

If I know a file is destined for Alamy, when I open it in Adobe Camera Raw, I use the drop down box at the bottom to upsize it to the next file size (I use a 5D, so whatever the one is from that).

I find then, that when I've finished messing with the RAW conversion and open it in photoshop, I get a perfect, 50MB file every time.

Doesn't look soft to me (doesn't look as sharp as smaller images obviously). If your images are looking very soft, perhaps there is some underlying issue when you're taking the picture? Incorrect focussing?

DigitumDei · « **Reply #20 on:** February 21, 2008, 09:53 »

+1 more to the RAW method here.

I'm using a 350D and setting the CS3's RAW converter to make the image a 17mp image does the trick.

I did a test between using the RAW method, CS3's bicubic and genuine fractals. Personally I saw little difference between them even at 200-300%, so RAW won based on ease of use.

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Author Topic: work flow for Alamy (Read 10977 times)

ianhlnd

leaf

ianhlnd

eendicott

leaf

eendicott

ianhlnd

leaf

eendicott

leaf

freefly

leaf

eendicott

Greg Boiarsky

leaf

Greg Boiarsky

tommroch

ParisEye

tommroch

Seren

DigitumDei

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