Before I Sleep Week Cont'd

[em_kellesvig]

Just to give you all an idea of how SGA's lighting director(s) help and hinder with the screencaps, I thought I'd show you one of the more extreme examples from this episode. Yes, they wanted to give us the whole "alien atmosphere" concept but it's a real pain in the ass sometimes, especially when you run across a terrific cap of the characters but it's wrecked by the lighting.



So here's the cap in its raw state, resized for LJ. (I resize most of them; the full-size caps eat up my storage space.)

Even full-sized, it looks dark and dull on my monitor. Add in the funky lighting, and it masks the characters' expressions quite a bit.


The best I can do with this one is lighten it and add some contrast. Yes, there are folks out there who are very, very good with Photoshop, and they can color correct like it's magic. I'm not one of them. But I can see where the problems are.

First, there's the red/orange light coming from the top. (And it is a light, not a filter. The MGM set photos have the same light to them. They used a cyan filter for "Aurora"; the set photos have "normal" lighting.)

Second, there's that yellow/white prop light just behind McKay that's throwing a "glow" to backlight the characters.

Third, there's a blue light coming from the lower left; the naked eye "reads" it as blue -- Photoshop picks it up as both blue and magenta. Gah!



Remember the color wheel? Red, yellow, and blue are primary colors. As I showed you, all three are at play in this cap. Just one color can be easily corrected in Photoshop through a variety of means. All three? This is what I managed.

Yes, it's atrocious. I followed several tutorials from professionals and still couldn't get it right. So why did I bother?


I wanted you to see this. There's an intimacy between the characters that shows in these "micro-expressions", these fleeting moments lost in the motion of film but captured in stills.

We "see" these moments whether we realize it or not. We see them on TV and in films, and we see them in real life as well. We process them in such a way that they form impressions of that person, that couple, that scene, and those impressions stay with us as we form opinions, likes and dislikes, preferences, concepts. Some moments are more obvious than others. Some, like this one, are errant gems only seen when caught and placed in stark contrast.


This is where fandom comes into play. Once caught, we can do almost anything with these moments: meta, fiction, art, icons. These moments speak to us; we speak of and about these moments, extrapolate, re-imagine, create. Within that process, we learn, we teach, we share. We not only build new ideas from these fractions in time, we build fandom, timeless in itself.


No, SGA, I'm not done with you yet. Not by a long shot.


"Before I Sleep" 1x15

(Apologies for the break; real life gave me a real cold. *sniffles*)

Comments

[hilde.livejournal.com]

Thank you for doing this! It's so interesting to see what you've actually done with a photo. I love the moment you've chosen and we can finally see it after you've done your magic :)

[em_kellesvig]

You're welcome! Normally, I'd avoid a cap like this for this comm. I just don't have the skills to do it justice. But it makes for an interesting entry on the show, the techniques they used, the techniques I use, and how those two intersect.

And it's about fandom, my favorite thing. \o/

[patk.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow! What a literally enlightening post! I've never understood how much lighting affects a picture. Yes, I knew it, intellectually, but this post showed it in a way that made me understand as opposed to just know. Thank you so much for this entry.

>>No, SGA, I'm not done with you yet. Not by a long shot.<<

*draws hearts all around that statement*

:-)

[em_kellesvig]

Yay! I'm glad it was helpful. And glad I'm not the only one who's not done yet. :)

[danceswithgary]

Lovely meta!

[em_kellesvig]

Thank you! (And if you have any suggestions about color correction, I'm all ears! *grin*)

[that-which.livejournal.com]

I love Channel Mixer for this kind of thing. It lets you keep details while you're making sweeping color changes.

[em_kellesvig]

Yes! Channel Mixer works wonders, doesn't it? Except... I used it twice on this cap and still couldn't get it right. *sigh*

Obviously, the fault is mine. I can get it to work with one color, sometimes two. But all three? If you happen to know of a tutorial for that, I'd love to have a link.

Of course, the other option is to leave the cap alone. I would (and do) do that for most of the wild lighting SGA graces us with: Wraith blues and greens, Ancient cyans and the occasional orange/reds.

But this cap didn't even want to be lightened, as you can tell. Oh, well. A nice icon came out of it and I learned a few things from the tuts I had. Practice, practice, practice!

[that-which.livejournal.com]

I don't know that this could have been fixed better than this. The colors were never there to begin with. Unfotunately, I can't help much, because I work in print, so I'm most comfortable swapping 4C channels, which I understand is unbelievably wrong, but I'm useless in RGB.

[helenkacan.livejournal.com]

Done???

Ha! Not by a long shot. The pot may have been moved off the front burner but it's there at the back, at a gentle simmer, needing just a bit of occasional stirring to bring out the extra flavours of its most loved characters.

[em_kellesvig]

Nope, ain't had enough of this yet, not nearly enough! Yum!

[neevebrody.livejournal.com]

There's an intimacy between the characters that shows in these "micro-expressions", these fleeting moments lost in the motion of film but captured in stills.

And captured at the moment we see them. I believe this statement sums up my entire experience with SGA. Maybe because I've always stared endlessly at screencaps or that thing I have for inference from the barest of sources - whatever, I watched every episode with that "sense" of seeing something more than the obvious.

No, SGA, I'm not done with you yet. Not by a long shot.


AMEN!

[em_kellesvig]

I think fans, regardless of fandom, are very observant people. Add creativity to that and we'll take "our" characters just about anywhere. And yes, we can make whole worlds out of one little inference. Ain't it grand?

[popkin16]

No wonder your caps always look so fantastic! I know how to lighten a photo, but I've not messed with contrast, so I'm all *____* by what you've done. And I totally want that icon XD I love it so much.

[em_kellesvig]

You may certainly adopt that icon, if you wish!

What program do you use?

There are about ten ways to do contrast in Photoshop; I use whatever the cap needs, sometimes two or three types. If you'd like to chat about it sometime, let me know. I'd be glad to give you some tips or point you to some tutorials. :)

[popkin16]

YAY I am not done with SGA/McShep either, and that icon says it so well XD

I have portable photoshop cs4.

[melagan.livejournal.com]

Knowing nothing about photoshop I find posts like this fascinating.

(the subject doesn't hurt)

Really lovely black & white at the end.

[em_kellesvig]

The subject makes the whole thing so much fun! \o/ (And some things look much better in black and white.)

[ladysorka]

I was procrastinating so I decided to play with it, and this was about the best I could do:



And now the light behind Rodney is over-saturated, the wall behind John is weirdly green, they look like they have blue paint on their faces, and apparently Atlantis has a new barber, because they both have auburn highlights.

...yeah, definitely best in black and white.

[em_kellesvig]

Yeah, this cap just doesn't want to cooperate, does it? I still want to think if I just knew more about PS, I could fix it, but that may not be the case.

I used Channel Mixer, selective color, Hue/Saturation, and color balance but still couldn't get there. *grrr*

Black and white it is! :)

[rissabby.livejournal.com]

This isn't related to lighting -- but, I've been thinking lately that people who post stills are creating a whole new kind of art in fandom.

What you wrote about ..."micro-expressions", these fleeting moments lost in the motion of film but captured in stills.
We "see" these moments whether we realize it or not. We see them on TV and in films, and we see them in real life as well. We process them in such a way that they form impressions... is at the heart of it.

Often, when I see stills or short clips from fandom I am really struck by the beauty and emotion. And usually, unless someone tells me, I have no idea where the scene is from. Yet, they tell their own story. And, the fandom "scene still-ers" are doing something cool and interesting by noticing special moments and freezing them to share with us.

[em_kellesvig]

I've noticed this too! I love quite a few comms for just this reason. daily_mcshep, mcshep_monday, sgateam_tuesday, and daily_flan to name a few.

As neevebrody said, it allows us to move beyond the obvious and that's priceless.

[selenic76.livejournal.com]

Interesting thoughts, and interesting to see the process :)

This is where fandom comes into play. Once caught, we can do almost anything with these moments: meta, fiction, art, icons.

This so true. Each moment can be built upon, expanded, opened like windows into other realities. And that's why, in all its creativity, the fandom is awesome ^_^ Like you! Love the greyscale version, and the icon!

And I'm totally with you, we're so not done with SGA yet! ^_^

[em_kellesvig]

Fandom is such an awesome place to be! SGA fandom? Totally cool, even though it's not as active as it once was. Still, there's a lot of us here having fun. \o/

[hoktauri]

So that's where that icon came from! I totally thought it was a manip! They stand so close together on a regular basis, don't they? *g*

And I love your mini-tutorial here, and the bit about fandom and how we perceive things. So spot on.

[em_kellesvig]

Yes, they do stand close, don't they? See, the McShep isn't made from thin air; they gave us plenty to build on.

Glad you liked the tutorial; just goes to show how something a bit meh can become a bit yay! :)