There’ll Be Nobody Home
There’ll Be Nobody Home – Albion, Michigan
vsco
VSCO Film 07: Eclectic Films
VSCO Film 07 Fuji Sensia 100 Alt
Neff with his Sony – VSCO Film 07 Kodak Ektar 25
Me on a fallen tree – VSCO Film 07 Agfa Optima 100 II ++
VSCO Film 07 Fuji 160S
VSCO Film 07 Kodak Ektachrome 64
VSCO Film 07 Ilford Plan F Plus 50
VSCO Film 07 Kodak Elite 50 II
VSCO has been on a tear lately, it seems, with new film packs coming out every few months, and tons of updates on their mobile app ecosystem.
Now we have film pack 07, “Eclectic Films.”
I took the new pack for a spin using some photos from last Friday’s trip to the Liberty Mill Pond, with my photo pal John Neff (here with his Sony A7), where Michigan’s Grand River begins – about two miles from my house.
This is a fun pack because the film emulations are so subtle. Looking through the photos, you won’t spot huge differences in the look and feel – but when you’re actually using them, it’s refreshing to see the small differences in contrast, saturation, and mood.
I particularly like the Kodak stuff, like Ektachrome and Ektar 25. The Ektar 25 takes the saturation down a notch from Film 05′s version of Ektar (my current go-to emulation). The Agfa stuff is nice, too, because of how gentle it is.
You can try VSCO Film 00 for free (a great idea), and then pony up for a full pack. This Film 07 pack will be fun to play with.
Film 07 emulations are in the captions of each photo.
On Processing Photos
I did this a while back on portraits, but here’s a little behind-the-scenes on how I process my photos in Lightroom.
Let’s take a photo from the Heidelberg Project in Detroit – blending a few favorite subjects of mine: an abandoned house, public art in an urban setting, good mix of light and deep shadows.
Here’s a before and after. The photo was captured with a Canon 7D and 24-70mm f/2.8 Sigma lens. The framing of the brick pillar and the burned black ceiling, with the shaft of light streaming down the stairs, made for an interesting scene.
I start with exposure. Is the frame too dark? Too bright? How about white balance. After adjusting those in Lightroom, I pick my VSCO present. These days, it’s Film 05′s Kodak Ektar 100. That particular film setting has a lot of options, but I usually stick with the default, or play with the Contrast+ setting.
I like Ektar because of its high-contrast, green-tinted-shadows look. It’s not afraid to let the shadows go completely to black, and it’s a warmer film tone. But that’s just the start.
From there I’ll probably add a bit more punch in the contrast setting, drop the highlights a bit to let more detail in the bright spots, and drop the blacks down to give it that really contrasty look. Shadows are my friend.
Depending on the image, I’ll also reduce the saturation a bit. Adding contrast makes the colors pop a bit too much for my liking (those shoes might be a bit too blue for my taste).
Increase the sharpening a tad (usually to the 30 mark, with some masking to only sharpen the edges), maybe bump the clarity (only for non-people photos), and increase the color noise reduction if I have to. Peeking at the shadows and dark spots in the photos lets me know if there is color noise.
Hit the “Remove Chromatic Aberration” toggle if I need to, and do any kind of lens or perspective corrections if I have to. And then I’ll add a bit of a vignette and, especially for VSCO film packs, reduce the grain level. My settings rarely have grain going anywhere above 20-30.
As a last touch, I’ll sharpen little details with the adjustment brush, spot remove anything that seems out of place, and crop a bit.
That’s it. Nothing complicated or fussy. I’ll spend a very short amount of time on a photo, and bring it into Photoshop to do any kind of heavy lifting. Getting it most of the way there in camera is the important part, allowing me to make the styling adjustments as needed.
Questions? Give me a shout.
