My Interior / Cathedral Work-flow

General Camera Settings

My camera setting are typically as Canon’s default set. These below are what I make sure is set at the time of the shoot.

I shoot my photos in RAW format.

As I am inside a church I ensure that ‘the beep’ is off. This is actually my normal setting; I don’t like electronic devices beeping at me – personal preference

Adobe RGB colour space

Set the viewfinder Grid display to 3x3. This helps with assessing the level of my camera and the composition

Enable Live View Exposure Simulation

1/3 Stop Exposure Level Increments

Lens Settings

I typically use a Canon 24-105 L-series lens  for most of my Cathedral shots. The settings below relate this lens. I also have in my bag a 15mm Canon Fish-eye and a 70-200mm L-Series Zoom.

·         Image stabilisation off

·         Set lens to  manual focus

·         I do not use a front filter in general

·         Lens hood attached

Camera Settings

·         Set Manual Exposure

·         AWB

·         Evaluative Metering

·         One-shot AF

·         Self-timer: 2 sec / Remote control

·         200 ISO

Menu Settings

·         Enable mirror lock-up

Taking the photo

For most of my shots I want create a HDR image because of the possible lighting conditions in the Cathedral. My current HDR work-flow involves taking 5 shots from 2 stops under to 2 stops over.

·         At this point I will put my camera on a tripod

·         Assess the apature I need for the shot. As a starting point I will set aperture to f/11 – f/16

·         Enable Live-view

·         Adjust shutter speed to get the desired ‘nominal exposure’ on live view

·         This is the 'centre' exposure

·         Assess the composition and adjust tripod / zoom as necessary

·         Manually focus on x10 live view

·         Turn Live view off

·         Move the shutter wheel exposure compensation wheel clockwise 6 clicks (i.e. 2-stops underexposed),

·         Take shot (1)

·         Move 3 clicks Anti-clockwise

·         Take shot (2)

·         Move 3 clicks Anti-clockwise

·         Take shot (3) – This is the nominal centre exposure.

·         Move 3 clicks Anti-clockwise

·         Take shot (4)

·         Move 3 clicks Anti-clockwise

·         Take shot (5)

·         You now have 5 shots

I sometimes work hand held and use the cameras HDR capability. On the Canon 5DMkiii this function allows you to shoot three images at plus or minus 1, 2 or 3 stops AND keep the individual images. It produces a composite jpeg file for assessment. The noise performance on the Mkiii is superb so I sometimes wind the ISO up quite high to enable reasonably fast shutter speeds. All the tricks about bracing yourself and keeping your legs apart to stabilise yourself apply. I would turn back on the image stabilisation.

Post Production

·         Import into Adobe Lightroom

·         Noise Reduction: On the tripod taken photos I typically do not apply any noise reduction to the images. If I have hand-held a shot at high ISO then I will apply noise reduction on each image in the sequence. Noise is more visible on the underexposed shots.

·         Select all 5 (3) photos

·         Open in the HDR Package. I Export to NIK HDR Efex 2

·         Composite image comes up in the initial screen. I only use ghost reduction if necessary

·         Press Open in NIK HDR Efex 2

·         Adjust the settings to your preference

·         Save

·         At this point I may perform some Lightroom adjustments like crop and lens correction.

·         Open in Photoshop

This next stage is all done on separate layers and is my typical thought process and uses the NIK filter Set in places.

·         Transform to correct for converging verticals etc.

·         Crop to the frame you want

·         Clone / heal any distractions / unwanted elements

·         At this point I create a new layer by Merge visible

·         If the image has come from a high ISO shot then I would consider using NIK Dfine 2.

·         NIK Viveza 2 – General adjustments plus control point adjustments on, in particular, the highlights and shadows. Increase the structure slider carefully.

·         Save and return to Photoshop

·         NIK Silver Efex 2. General adjustments, Dynamic brightness, Contrast, Structure

·         I always have a play with the colour filters. For Cathedral I find the blue filter with very little strength works well with stonework images

·         Save and return to Photoshop

·         At this point I save Photoshop mono version

·         Change blending mode on this monochrome layer to Luminosity. This gives an improvement to the tonal effect of the photo, in my opinion. I will sometimes change the blending mode to Soft Light. The colour in this instance comes through a bit too strong so I reduce the opacity to the blending layer.

·         At this point I save Colour version

·         I would then consider different effects by using the NIK Colour Efex Pro 4 or the new Analog Efex Pro 2. Or other Photoshop changes

·         NOTE:

o   On all the NIK filter steps above (except the Silver Efex layer) they could be applied using a smart filter on the layer which has the advantage in that you can go back and readjust the NIK filter.

o   I do not have the Silver Efex layer as a smart filter as it does not allow me to do the blending change to bring back the colour.

·         Save any versions you need to in the development of your image.

·         Back into Lightroom. Sometimes you have to synchronise the folder to bring some / all of the Photoshop creations into Lightroom.

I have developed the above work-flow over a number of Cathedrals over the last 18-months. Plus I attended a seminar given by Experience Seminars on Interior Photography. This was a superb seminar which consisted of a morning in the classroom and the afternoon practical session in Ely Cathedral. Unfortunately Experience Seminars had to close in April.