Saving a shot

Often you will find yourself in situations with bad lighting.  Noonday sun, for example, that over exposes everything and simultaneously creates impenetrable shadows.  Or night time scenes (which we will focus on specifically later).  Or building interiors.  Or dusk.  There are innumerable situations where your eye sees everything just fine, but the camera sensor, not so much.

But have heart, many of these situations are salvageable.  Take this shot for example.  It's a crop from a larger image, and although it is not in finished form, you can see possibilities.  But can you see the possibilities in the original image?

Hmmm.  It's a stretch.  This was an offhand street shot where the camera chose to meter on the sky, leaving everything else in almost total darkness.  Or so it seems.

But I have shot a lot with this camera (Olympus OMD EM5-II) and I know it has the ability to pull up useable images from the mud.  So when I looked at the viewfinder, I saw a nice sky and some illumination in the foreground, and I felt like I could save it.

The first thing I did was to adjust the exposure, which I could do pretty well since I shot the original in raw format.  Here is the result:

By adjusting the exposure in the foreground, I was able to save the sky and bring up details.

Next, I adjusted the crop.

That's pretty good.  Yeah, I know things are all angle-y, but she is pretty straight and because she is looking up to the right of the frame, you don't mind the tilt of the background so much.  Next, I brightened her up a little:

So, this seems ok, and maybe better than ok.  And I am thinking this is a keeper, but it does have some issues.  First of all, since it was getting dark, when I pulled up the exposure I pulled up a lot of noise with it.  At this size, you can't really see that, but if you blew up the image on the screen, it is obvious. Filtering out the noise softened the image so much that it was very noticeably smoothed, and the texture on the background structures was lost altogether.  So I scrapped that idea.

Instead, I used my patented trick for saving bad photos: IMTDT (I Meant To Do That).  I used this technique three ways, just to see what would happen.  Never be afraid to experiment with digital photos, just make sure you save your work early and often.

First, I altered the color grade and introduced MORE noise.

You probably don't notice the extra noise I introduced in this version, but on a larger scale it is definitely there.  It was designed to give a fashion treatment, but I thought it would work here.  And it does.  The addition of the noise provides a little magazine/print subtlety.  Not for everyone, but it works.

Next, I intentionally increased the contrast.

This treatment gives a very different, more dramatic effect.  But you lose the clouds.  Eh, can't have everything I suppose.  I like this version too, because of the increased contrast. It actually takes your mind off any noise issues.

And finally, I did my patented (just kidding) black and white conversion to see how that would work out.

This one, too, has extra noise thrown in to simulate film grain.  I can't say I like this one better than the others, but I do like it.  Notice how the addition of a little film grain has actually pulled up detail in her hair, which was blowing slightly in the evening breeze.  Makes it feel like there is a little motion in the image that I didn't feel in the other versions.

So, did I do anything worthwhile?  You decide.  Keep in mind that she was just standing there, overlooking the ruins of the Forum in Rome, and taking in all the historical significance.  And thinking, and wondering.  Which of the images conveys that emotion the best?