Hi List,

I was just looking in national geographic, the gallery of Steve Mc Curry, DAH and others. How do they make these intense colors, which films are used, Are they maybe under exposing a little bit? I am really interested,

Thanks for advice,

-- Joop Mes (joopmes@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001

Answers

A lot of the National Geographic photogs use Kodak slide film esp. Kodachrome 64 which provides vibrant and high-contrast images. Which is the main reason why you can see the utter beauty of their classic look.

The same goes for Kodak Gold/Royal Gold/Max films. If you prefer a "softer" look, use Fuji slide (Velvia/Sensia) or color films. Those are nice for a more "artistic" look.

sincerely, Alfie

-- Albert Wang (albert.wang@ibx.com), November 15, 2001.

It seems their blue and red in particular are always very intense and contrasting, much more than I ever managed to get.

Joop

-- Joop Mes (joopmes@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

From what I understand, National Geographic has mostly gone digital in the past 2 years. You want those colours? Photoshop's the answer.

-- Joel (joel_low@pacific.net.sg), November 15, 2001.

I disagree with Alfred. Personally I'll say Fuji films have more contrast and particularly the Velvia should give you very satuated and vibrant color if skilly exposed (i.e. 1/3 stop under). I find Kodak Gold is a bit softer than Fuji Reala too.

-- Fred Lee (leefred@cadvision.com), November 15, 2001.

Go the National Geographic site: Apparently, it's no digital and Fuji...

National Geographic photo QA

-- Xavier (xcolmant@powerir.com), November 15, 2001.

Yes, no longer Kodachrome: Fuji and E100 seem to be favorites these days (sometime K200) - easier to scan I think and faster speed.

-- Robin Smith (smith_robin@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

Good point. I will shoot some Kodachrome and Fuji Velvia during my engagement and see whether or not one brand will provide greater contrast. I doubt that the Kodachrome is less contrasty based on my friends' experience but perhaps I need to see whether Kodachrome 25 differs from Kodachrome 64 now.

sincerely, Alfie

-- Albert Wang (leica_phile@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

Albert, try the Velvia and you will see what intense colors mean - Not too good for shooting portraits though.

-- Xavier (xcolmant@powerir.com), November 15, 2001.

Should I try the Sensia for shooting portraits then?

-- Albert Wang (leica_phile@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

Albert,

do not try to take portraits with velvia if the subject is important and you have never done this before. Rather try sensia ot provia (which provide faster speeds for indoor shootings as well). Or try Velvia and see if you like it. It is great for landscapes, no doubt, but too saturated to do important / serious portrait work. Look at some pictures on photo.net to see what kind of films is used there and make your own decisions, but I doubt you'll find a natural looking portrait shot with velvia.

I'm speaking here of my own experience and I really do like Velvia, but not for portrait stuff.

Kai

-- Kai Blanke (kai.blanke@iname.com), November 15, 2001.

Trying velvia of course meant that you should try it before you shoot anything important ... I dumped a whole evening portrait shooting with fantastic lightning by only having velvia available for portraits. Now I know better and always have some Agfa CT 100 with my (my film of choice right now).

Kai

-- Kai Blanke (kai.blanke@iname.com), November 15, 2001.

Albert,

My standard for people photography with slide film is Kodak E100S rated at EI 80 with incident metering. It renders skin tones well, and the colors are nicely saturated without being garish. You should shoot a test roll of whichever film you choose under varying conditions before using it for important stuff. Figuring out the behavior of a particular slide film can be almost as challenging as figuring out the behavior of a woman. : )

And congratulations on your upcoming engagement!

-- Mike Dixon (mike@mikedixonphotography.com), November 15, 2001.

my God, Mike, thatīs the kind of exposition doctors recomend me, how Iīve been wasting my time out in the steets.

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

Looks like I will try to use Ektachrome 100 to shoot pictures of my princess Sarah next week then :)... of course I don't have too much dough to test out the Sensia vs. Ektachrome experiment, at least not yet. :)

Alfie

-- Albert Wang (leica_phile@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

In one of his recent interview Steve Mc Curry said he works on Kodachrome only, BUT afterwards the developed slides are copied on internegative film and finally printed on color paper. That's the secret.

-- J.Major (jmajor@login.cz), November 15, 2001.

E100S is indeed nice too for portraits, but if underexposed at all you do get the red-nose/red face syndrome asa poer Velvia. I do not see this with Sensia/Astia 100.

-- Robin Smith (smith_robin@hotmail.com), November 15, 2001.

Robin makes a good point about E100S when underexposed--the extra saturation then makes any coloration or unevenness in skin tone jump out. At EI 100, it does a good job of producing very bright colors with skin tones that may be a little too accurate (rather than flattering).

I used to use Astia (usually at EI 80), and while I liked the controlled contrast, it always had a magenta tint to it that bugged me. I've found that E100S has more accurate color that, if anything, leans toward red. (E100SW leans very hard toward red.) Haven't used Sensia.

And Alfie, if you can't afford a simple film test, how are you going to afford a fiancee/wife? ; )

Getting back to the original topic a bit, here's an example of E100S used at EI 100 for documentary photography.

-- Mike Dixon (mike@mikedixonphotography.com), November 15, 2001.

Streuth! Mike, your making my eyes fall out! I might even leave the black & White for a while just to give a roll of Velvia or K64 a try! Great Stuff!

-- Paul Nelson (clrfarm@comswest.net.au), November 15, 2001.

Mike, WOW - nice photos. Color, detail, composition. I think I should sell my cameras.

-- mark (mramra@qwest.net), November 15, 2001.

Thanks! If it's any consolation, my lifetime ratio of good:bad photos is around 1:100 (and it was in the 1:1,000 neighborhood for quite a while). Thank god for bulk film . . .

-- Mike Dixon (mike@mikedixonphotography.com), November 15, 2001.

1) The Geographic photographers really shoot a mix, as the magazines web site noted. The proportion of Velvia has increased over the years. All of Dave Harvey's Cuba pictures up through 2000 were Velvia, but I think he's shooting more Provia 100F now.

2) Mike Dixon's documentary shot shows off the aspect of Kodak's E6 films that I dislike most (NOT to criticize the picture itself) - a slightly muddy purple/brown quality in the shadows - noticeable here in the shirt folds right where they transition from light to dark; also in the dark building right behind the main subject. Velvia tends towards a cyan tone in the shadows. That's just personal taste, though.

It also depends a lot on lighting - it isn't visible at all in Mike's studio shot where he had more control of the shadow tones through lighting. That's just plain beautiful.

I've shot a lot of successful portraits with Velvia - but it DOES work better with non-caucasian skin, which is more 'saturated' to begin with. 8^) It also makes rosy cheeks rosier and freckles more freckly - good for northern european children - bad for most glamour/fashion usage.

I must also say that one of the main reasons I switched to Leica was how well the lenses 'meshed' with Velvia - the color and contrast gave me much better results than Contax/Nikon stuff I'd used since Velvia came out in 1991. But I do use 1980s lenses. The 90s redesigns (e.g 90 EM, 90SAA) are VERY contrasty on Velvia and probably match better with Provia/Astia/E100S etc. etc. except in very soft light. IMHO, of course.

3) exposure: someone pointed out in a post several months ago that Velvia tends to block shadows but has a long highlight curve, while Kodachrome has open shadows but blows out highlights quickly. Therefore underexposing K'chrome (which people have done since the 40's) saturates the colors and holds highlight detail without too much damage to the shadows. Velvia works just the opposite - it's SO saturated that you can shoot it at 32/40 and open up the shadows without losing too much highlight detail or intense midtone colors.

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), November 15, 2001.

"2) Mike Dixon's documentary shot shows off the aspect of Kodak's E6 films that I dislike most (NOT to criticize the picture itself) - a slightly muddy purple/brown quality in the shadows - noticeable here in the shirt folds right where they transition from light to dark; also in the dark building right behind the main subject. Velvia tends towards a cyan tone in the shadows. That's just personal taste, though. "

IME, E100SW does a slightly better job, or at least use a skylight filter with E100.

I think one way to get intense colours is to shoot in the shade a lot. This gives a slightly dull but saturated look. Of course, fill flash also brings up the colours in harsh lighting. Personally I'm trying to do without flash these days as natural diffused light gives wonderful smooth soft and rich colour, but sometimes it seems to be necessary. One place you won't get rich colours is in bright sunlight. A bit like kite flying: very light winds are the best, and overcast or shade is best for photography. Too much of either ruins the experience.

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), November 15, 2001.

I have occasionally used EPN in very contrasty lighting for portraits. Fabulous film under those conditions. The colors, are, well not just true, but the skin tones are to cry for, as are the details in what would otherwise be blocked up color saturated areas.

And the prints from a Fuji Frontier are absolutely top-notch, the equal of any print film, but for Reala.

In flat plain light, its kind of boring.

Oh, National Geographic. RDPIII, K64 and Velvia. You'll have the look. McCurry underexposes. DAH uses Velvia all the time. But who knows what William Albert Allard and Sam Abell do? They have a much different, less saturated Pastel look to their pictures.

Velvia works well for portraits, as stated above, as long as its not Caucasians, who look pinkish.

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), November 15, 2001.

Thanks everybody for the response! What i do not understand from your answers is if you rate a 100 iso film at e.g. EI 80, do you also have it pushed/pulled-processed? Or just at 100?

Joop

-- Joop (Joopmes@hotmail.com), November 16, 2001.

Joop,

there are two ways of rating a film: Pushing/pulling is treating the film as if it had another speed and then processing it according to the relative real speed to get 'normal' exposure. You use this technique mostly because of adjusting the film speed to your needs, but it also has effects on contrast and grain as well.

The other one is intended over- or underexposure i.e. exposing Velvia at 40 instead of 50 ASA for more color saturation. Development is normal this way. This principle is used to achive adjust color saturation and shadow details. There is a great shot of Tony Dummet (of policemen and motorcycles, but cannot find it right now) on photo.net where he explains why he rates his 400 ASA b&w films at 100 ASA (I think he uses Ilford Delta or XP2) to get more shadow detail. Within the comments of this picture you find a lot of information of intended 'misrating' of films.

Kai

-- Kai Blanke (kai.blanke@iname.com), November 16, 2001.

Okay, thanks for explaining; that's very clear, but in fact the pictures i was looking at

http://www.pablocorral.com/gallery/exhibits/steve_mccurry/index.html

I don't know how to attach one of the pictures :-( They seem to be a bit on the dark side; -> so under exposed; in fact Velvia 50 iso rated at ~ 60 iso, if 40 was used it would give an over exposure (with more saturated colors if I understood well) but also the pictures would look much lighter, I would think? Or am I misunderstanding something?

Joop

-- Joop (Joopmes@hotmail.com), November 16, 2001.

Joop,

Just shoot at the nominal 50 iso speed. Later adjust if you feel it's needed. Some photogs uprate the speed slighlty to lighten the shadows.

-- Xavier (xcolmant@powerir.com), November 16, 2001.

Gee, Mike, I've never seen pictures like the first one in Nat. Geo. More's the pity...

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), November 17, 2001.

National Geographic has its own lab and I'm sure that helps with color quality. I've gotten good results using 200 or lower ASA Kodak color film, by supplementing my M6 meter with my hand-held meter to ensure accurate exposure, and by shopping around for a good lab. Believe it or not, I've found a particular King Sooper's grocery store lab that produces consistently good color quality for about $6 or $7 per 24 exposure roll. The photos may not be National Geographic quality, but then I don't go through as much film on a regular basis as a National Geographic photographer. :)

-- Peter B. Goldstein (peter.goldstein@us.cgeyc.com), November 19, 2001.

http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=451270

I don't know whether these would qualify as "National Geographic colors," but I was pleased with the results. Not bad for King Sooper's one-hour processing, eh?. I'm new to Leica equipment, but I'm sure enjoying mine. Criticism welcome.

-- Peter B. Goldstein (peter.goldstein@us.cgeyc.com), November 26, 2001.

And if you really want to, you can use their lab, I understand.

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), November 26, 2001.