Snowy Owl Photo Improvement

I took these images recently very close to sunset which seems to be the norm for the snowies in our area as during the day they are down low on a fenced piece of private land. Very close to the end of the day the emerge and the time for taking photos is limited. The orange glow on these seems a little funky and I was wondering if their is any setting in the field I can try to lessen it. I shot in Auto WB not sure if this has anything to do with it. My equipment is the Nikon D7200 with AF-S Nikkor 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6G ED VR handheld. Thanks for any tips or suggestions.

Paul

After reading the posts and taking in all the good information I tried my hand at making some adjustments just using my Photos App on my Macbook Pro and here is the result. Slightly different with less organge glow on it.

AWB only affects the JPEG and can be changed in PP.

https://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/pdfs/ps_workflow_sec3.pdf

My only suggestion would be to give them a bit of light, maybe  1/2 stop increase.

Joe

They look underexposed. Generally if you are shooting up into the sky, especially with a lightly colored or small in the frame subject, the camera's meter and auto exposure system will significantly underexpose. These are at least a stop underexposed which will also make the birds look very red. Try this - put your camera in manual exposure mode and adjust the exposure so that you get a +1 to +1 1/3 reading on the meter when pointed up at the sky with only the sky in the frame. Shoot with that exposure in manual exposure mode. If the light levels start to drop, repeat. You will know that the light levels are dropping if you point it up at the sky and it is no longer at +1 to +1 1/3 on the meter. As for WB, I don't generally like AWB because the white balance will change from shot to shot based on many factors. I would just put it in daylight mode and then correct it in the RAW processing flow if it even needs to be corrected. That way every shot will be consistent in color.

Not sure if Nikon allows this but with Sony A mount cameras, you can tie metering to focus point...don't have to mess with adjusting.

E.J. Peiker wrote:As for WB, I don't generally like AWB because the white balance will change from shot to shot based on many factors.  I would just put it in daylight mode and then correct it in the RAW processing flow if it even needs to be corrected.  That way every shot will be consistent in color.

Hey E. J.
I still don’t know why you say to “correct it in the RAW processing flow” when RAW is not affected by the WB settings. We discussed this previously here:

https://www.naturescapes.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=266935

Many people who responded there also adjust WB, but it seems that no one acknowledges that the WB is only applied to JPEG. It will affect the histogram which is based on the JPEG, but not the RAW.
It would guess that none of these images are to be stitched and are only individual images where they don’t need to be matched.

Another related article on effects of camera settings on RAW:

https://photographylife.com/which-camera-settings-affect-raw-photos

Joe

06Honda

I took these images recently very close to sunset which seems to be the norm for the snowies in our area as during the day they are down low on a fenced piece of private land. Very close to the end of the day the emerge and the time for taking photos is limited. The orange glow on these seems a little funky

I've seen sunset light kind of orange like that in real life. If it's what it was like when you shot it, I would not make any big change in color in post processing.

and I was wondering if their is any setting in the field I can try to lessen it.

Whatever setting you use if it still needs you to do WB in post processing, then to me any setting will do.

I shot in Auto WB not sure if this has anything to do with it.

I shoot in auto WB all the time. Most of the time it works just fine. I check the WB in post processing and if it needs some fine tuning, I do it.

I think there's no correct WB for sunset shots. If the orange color seems too much to you, de-saturate it in post processing.

SantaFeJoe wrote:

E.J. Peiker wrote:As for WB, I don't generally like AWB because the white balance will change from shot to shot based on many factors.  I would just put it in daylight mode and then correct it in the RAW processing flow if it even needs to be corrected.  That way every shot will be consistent in color.

Hey E. J.
I still don’t know why you say to “correct it in the RAW processing flow” when RAW is not affected by the WB settings. We discussed this previously here:

https://www.naturescapes.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=266935

Many people who responded there also adjust WB, but it seems that no one acknowledges that the WB is only applied to JPEG. [snip]

Joe

I've only read about it but never actually tested it or pay attention to it. So I went take some shots with my Olympus EM 1 Mk II using different WB settings and viewed the raw files in both PhotoLab 2 and Capture One Pro 12. The images of different WB settings do not look the same - color-wise - on my monitor (a BenQ 27something).

As far as color correctness is concerned, the one with auto WB is the winner.

DChan
If you read the article here under #10, you will see that many PP software programs default to in-camera settings. The previews you may see are already adjusted from RAW and not the true RAW image. I will try to find more for you.

If you take each of those RAW images and apply the exact same color balance to each one, they should all look the same. 

Joe

SantaFeJoe wrote:DChan
If you read the article here under #10, you will see that many PP software programs default to in-camera settings. The previews you may see are already adjusted from RAW and not the true RAW image. I will try to find more for you.

Joe

Thank you Joe !

Still, what's the significance of arguing if WB settings affect the raw files or not when in all practicality, to mortals like many of us, we have to deal with the effect of the settings in our post processing anyway since we will not be dealing with the "original" "true" raw files, which we cannot access it even if we turn off all the settings of the raw processing software (which I thought I did in PhotoLab 2)? Seem to me it's all academic. And to the original poster, adjusting the WB settings in the field does change the look of his shots on his monitor. Therefore, the answer to his question seems to be: "Yes, there're settings that would mitigate the orangy look of the owls in your photos."

DChan wrote:06Honda

I took these images recently very close to sunset which seems to be the norm for the snowies in our area as during the day they are down low on a fenced piece of private land. Very close to the end of the day the emerge and the time for taking photos is limited. The orange glow on these seems a little funky

I've seen sunset light kind of orange like that in real life. If it's what it was like when you shot it, I would not make any big change in color in post processing.

Would you not still try to shoot it brighter and then adjust it (darker) to your liking in post?  It may help to lighten the shadows as well?

DChan wrote:

SantaFeJoe wrote:DChan
If you read the article here under #10, you will see that many PP software programs default to in-camera settings. The previews you may see are already adjusted from RAW and not the true RAW image. I will try to find more for you.

Joe

...........
And to the original poster, adjusting the WB settings in the field does change the look of his shots on his monitor. Therefore, the answer to his question seems to be: "Yes, there're settings that would mitigate the orangy look of the owls in your photos."

Still, the settings won’t change the RAW file, but, yes, they will affect the image as presented on the monitor preview. Here’s another thread about the subject:

https://www.photo.net/discuss/threads/is-white-balance-in-camera-important-while-shooting-raw.438029/

And this one has some good info:

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/forums/thread4893.htm

And one more:

https://www.fastrawviewer.com/white-balance-as-per-channel-exposure-correction

Joe

The RAW files are potentially changed based on the decisions the photographer makes from what he/she sees on the rear LCD and RGB histogram.  These can often trick you into underexposing the shot just as a picture profile selection like Vivid will.  It will show you clipping when there isn't any in the RAW file.  This is due to the histogram, clipping warnings, etc being based on the embedded JPEG which has all of those things applied to them.

There is some interesting reading on the subject here:

https://www.fastrawviewer.com/blog/most ... ook-at-RAW

And for DChan here:

https://www.fastrawviewer.com/viewing-r ... impossible

Granted, a product is being promoted there.

Joe

06Honda wrote:

After reading the posts and taking in all the good information I tried my hand at making some adjustments just using my Photos App on my Macbook Pro and here is the result. Slightly different with less organge glow on it.

Hey Paul
Mind telling us what you did to bring it to this look?

Joe

On these owls they are in the red zone and a application of green or a good amount of WB adjustment. When I shot a white Owl last Thursday I at first I just grabbed the camera and shot away. At 9:00 am my white balance was set to sunlight and every shot was deeply in the blue range. A simple change to cloudy WB corrected the problem even when I downloaded them later. Nikon has confirmed to me that the raw file will use all the presets and apply them to the shot. I have seen this personally while shooting my D810/600mmF:4 G VR. I shot for 2 days with WB on cloudy and on Friday afternoon the sky changed to pure blue I change back to sunny WB and the shots look great on my screen. I got 2,173 really good shots of a snowy that was my first close siting.

Larry Shuman wrote:..... Nikon has confirmed to me that the raw file will use all the presets and apply them to the shot. I have seen this personally while shooting my D810/600mmF:4 G VR. .....

Not according to this:


https://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-and-explore/a/products-and-innovation/nikon-electronic-format-nef.html

Joe

Larry Shuman wrote:..... Nikon has confirmed to me that the raw file will use all the presets and apply them to the shot. I have seen this personally while shooting my D810/600mmF:4 G VR. .....

That isn't actually true UNLESS you are using Nikon's own software for RAW conversion.  Nikon is probably the most myopic company you will ever run across.  The thought that somebody would use software other than their own RAW converter doesn't even occur to them.  The Nikon converter reads the picture style preset and applies it automatically; however, in the software, you can turn that off and get back to the RAW file that the actual sensor captured without the in-camera "cooking" of the image.

Joe
I saw this happen last spring while I was shooting a eagles nest. I have my D810 set to #9 in sharpening and I saw extremely sharp shots on my preview. When I download the camera I saw the same exact same sharpening in the shot on my 20" screen. Saturday a friend just received his new D500 and was setting up the menus. He set the sharpening to #9. After he shot a flying Ring-billed Gull I heard him exclaim WOW when looked at his shot. He saw the same perfect sharpness when he downloaded the shots. I don't know what you call this but it sure looks like the raw file is reading the presets..

E.J. Peiker wrote:

Larry Shuman wrote:..... Nikon has confirmed to me that the raw file will use all the presets and apply them to the shot. I have seen this personally while shooting my D810/600mmF:4 G VR. .....

That isn't actually true UNLESS you are using Nikon's own software for RAW conversion.  Nikon is probably the most myopic company you will ever run across.  The thought that somebody would use software other than their own RAW converter doesn't even occur to them.  The Nikon converter reads the picture style preset and applies it automatically; however, in the software, you can turn that off and get back to the RAW file that the actual sensor captured without the in-camera "cooking" of the image.

I am using Nikon Transfer 2 to download the camera and CS6 standalone for PP

two keystrokes in PS