Lighting a subject correctly can be a hard task. Too much light and your images will be over exposed, too little and you will end up with the opposite problem. But if you manage to get the balance just right then you can create a perfect and sometimes magical photograph. A photographer who knows a thing or two about lighting is Rarindra, a photographer from Indonesia who because of his unique approach to lighting has gained recognition across the globe."The light is real, it's natural and can be found in my country," said Rarindra.
Born in Jakarta where he now lives with his wife and two children, Rarindra thanks his home for giving him the inspiration and opportunities to take images of romanticised places and perfect children.
"My country is unique, its very diverse. There are over 13,000 islands to explore each with a unique landscape, culture and language."
Many locations are yet to be explored and each time Rarindra ventures out he always finds a new place or object to photograph every time. However, he does have his favourite places and these are the areas that have got so many people talking about his work. Serpong and Banten are two places many of his magical images were taken in and they are locations that have caused somewhat of a controversy. Many photographers and people living there claim the grand rays of light featured in Rarindra's work actually come from and around the great trees."You have to get up early to see and feel the light. Beautiful light is my obsession, I always search for this as I feel the objects I photograph will look more special if the light does too."
Every time Rarindra has been asked to give up his secrets to creating light and imagery the way he does his advice for photographers is to visit his beautiful country and take pictures in the places he does.
"People judge and ask for proof to show the rays of light are not fake, I say come visit. There isn't any more proof than that."
He trained at a Polytechnic University in Indonesia, studying graphic art and photography and now he works as both a graphics designer and a photographer, a little more understandable now why many people think his images have a lot of post production work carried out on them. As when your career revolves around editing and adjusting images it has to be easy to apply such great post-production work to an image in no time at all.
"I have never said I don't do any Photoshop. I manage dark/light areas and I use the burn,
brushing and mask tools. It's also about knowing how to manage tones, you're the only one who knows this as you know what mood you want to set in your work."
brushing and mask tools. It's also about knowing how to manage tones, you're the only one who knows this as you know what mood you want to set in your work."Rarindra doesn't want this to be known as instant art however. He still stands by the fact that you need good raws and you need to know where the light comes from and what it can do for your picture, that way you can create the dream like quality visible in his work.
Comments on websites have suggested some people think his work is over processed and appears to look almost plastic and too unreal to be real. They certainly have a theatrical look to them with a background, foreground and subject all so easily defined. Which some would say make the photographs obviously staged but Rarindra disagrees.
"I don't often plan as I like everything to look natural. I like people to have expression and to gesture in the photographs and by doing so I hope everything looks logical and natural."
Rarindra believes you can produce work like he does, you only have to believe in and love what you to. Inspiration can come from anywhere and knowing your tools and using your imagination can help you create work as creative as his.His style is described as fairytale, magical and dream like but to Rarindra it's just something that's natural. He photographs nature and his style was created naturally. He sometimes calls it surreal life as he always wants his photographs to look dramatic and impressive but most of the time Rarindra simply gives it no title, it's just what he does.
His dimensional photography with it's unique tones finds influence in paintings by Walter Spies, a Dutch painter who lived in Bali during the 30's and 40's and the film trilogy, Lord of the rings.
"Walter's work showed me how to use light and composition. His work also demonstrated ways to use rural buildings and villages. Artistic cinematography also impresses me and the Lord of the Rings managed light and colour particularly impressively."
His kit bag contains a Canon 400D and 20D and five lenses of which the Tamron 28-75 F2.8 is his favourite but he chooses to venture out with only one DSLR and one lens at a time as he believes 
the experience is always more enjoyable that way.
the experience is always more enjoyable that way."Shoot on one camera, edit the pictures and share your work with the world, it's very easy."
His unique style is appreciated world wide and it has brought him work from many countries across the globe. But many of the contacts wouldn't have been made if it wasn't for the internet. 90% of Rarindra's business comes from the internet and he finds it's a great place to meet friends, fellow photographers and buyers. It's a tool he uses for buying and selling, for networking and sharing his work. It's almost certain without it we wouldn't be talking about him today. His work leaves much to the observers imagination, it's up to us to fill in the blanks. His work has a dream like quality and a sense of mystery about it and for as long as he refuses to give up his secrets his techniques will stay that way too.
from:
http://www.ephotozine.com
There are many things going on in Rarindra's images. It's a lot of labor intensive, detail work. That's probably why you don't see him put out a new work every week : )
There are some noticeable characteristics to his work. He separates the image into foreground/subject/background elements. Almost like a theatrical stage or a diorama. In this particular image, I would guess he has extracted the kids/tree foreground and placed it onto the background image. How do I know? The sun is very bright. It's so bright it's almost blowing out the backs of the boys. Yet the background is receiving a completely different quality of light. If the background light were the same, there would be blown out branches, leaves, and trunks of trees all over the bg.
He also uses contrast, sharpness, and color to further separate fg from bg. In the same image, for example, the bg is slightly blurred and lower contrast. This puts the bg on a completely different plane. It looks almost like a theatrical backdrop.
For the backgrounds, he basically uses colored gradients in normal mode and multiply modes and lowers the opacity. These modes are important because they don't affect the contrast, they simply tone down the brightness while keeping the contrast low.
I used some of these techniques on this image to illustrate:
The original image:
After adding a little more drama:
First, start with an image that has strong backlighting or sidelighting. The work will be easier and the result more natural.
Second, masking is very important to separate the foreground from the background. On this image, you really only need to fuss with creating one mask for the little girl:
I think gradients are key to getting the look of Rarindra's images. The gradations in his work are very smooth, they don't have the look of brush work. So I've used only gradients, not brushes on this image, including the masks.
When you use gradients on a mask, be sure to set your colors to the default of black foreground/white background (hit the "D" key to set them). Also, be sure your gradient is set to "foreground to transparent". To set the gradient, click on the gradient in the options bar and choose these settings:
I used linear gradients to work on larger areas:
And radial gradients to work on smaller areas and switched between the 2:
OK, on to the image. First, we'll start adding some "haze" to separate the foreground from the background. Here's the original image as a comparsion:
A little more for depth. This was added in multiply mode at a lower opacity:
Increasing the contrast a little using levels:
Now to construct some rays. I have written a tut on making rays earlier. I tried something new this time because I wanted thicker rays but still have them be somewhat random. Here's how I did these rays:
First, I made a selection of an area of the tree (at full resolution). Then I copied and pasted it as a new image. I converted it to b+w, then ran levels to get some whites and dark grays. Then I ran motion blur on it.
Here's the previous tut that will explain the settings a bit more clearly:
I then pasted the rays image onto a new layer, and transformed them to shape using the transform tool. After you've shaped them and moved them into position, set the blend mode to "Overlay" (or whatever mode you prefer). Now run gaussian blur to taste and adjust the opacity:
I get a more natural result by adding a second rays layer, and moving it slightly out of the previous rays position. Then try different blend modes and blur amounts. Sometimes a soft light ray layer works well with another ray layer in overlay mode. Experiment to get the best results for your image:
The final image:
credit to--
Pam r
http://www.pbase.com/pam_r
'art is working on something 'til you like it...then leaving it that way'
Pam r
http://www.pbase.com/pam_r
'art is working on something 'til you like it...then leaving it that way'
1 comment:
yes... that the one i'm trying to do... i did some googling and i came with this result...
(from: kulyadi girish pai)
1) If you're converting from RAW, choose a warm toned WB before heading into Photoshop.
2) Use your favorite selection method to select your subjects, and save your selection to be used later. With the figures selected, make a new levels adjustment layer. don't adjust it-just click OK, then switch the blend mode to soft light, and lower the opacity to 50%
3) Make a new solid color fill layer. Choose Color: None, and click OK. In the color-chooser, fill in the values R84, G66, B4. Click OK, then switch the blend mode to Hue.
4) Make a selective color adjustment layer. Choose Colors: Neutrals, and set yellow at 39% and cyan to -8%.
5) Make a new color balance adjustment layer. Set midtones to 0 -7 and -13. Then select the highlights and set them to 0, 0, and -3.
6) Make another levels adjustment layer. choose the blue channel, and change the output level to 200 from 255.
7) Make a new blank layer and load the selections of your figures. Fill the selections with black, change the blend mode to Coor, and dial your opacity down to 50%. This will let your figures pop out from the golden background.
8) If the intensity of the gold tone is overpowering, just lower the opacity of your adjustment layers until your picture seems natural enough.
but as a newbie in photoshop, i can't seem to understand some of this... would anyone care to elaborate?
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