Update 25 October

I have now completed Assignment 3 and will shortly publish and inform tutor.

Last two months have been very busy; training for a Marathon, busy at the schools (as FD of two Academies with 31 August year-ends this is the busiest time of year) and it is the start of the football season. The fruition of the marathon training is 4 November in Manhattan, following which I shall have more time for OCA.

I decided to concentrate on exercises and Assignment rather than worry about reading. This can follow in due course, but explains why log is rather thin.

I have been developing post processing skills. Upgraded Silver Efex Pro 2 and have experimented with some black and white conversions. Here are a couple of examples:

The first has been used by my wife as a cover for her latest publishing enterprise: a book of poetry entitled Through a Child's Eyes; the second is a good use of the structural properties of Silver Efex Pro. Compare the conversions to the originals:

The second in particular is a drab uninteresting picture before post processing; the first leaves us guessing at what the child is looking and in practical terms leaves the upper space for the book's title and author.

I have sensed since commencing OCA that there is a slightly uneasy relationship between the photography world, or, more correctly, the art photography world, and post processing. I am not talking here of a bit of cropping, some saturation and using Unsharp Mask, but more the complete rework of an image, such as the boy above, and even the cliffs image, or using HDR for example. Post processing is the elephant in the room - it is there, it is large, but is rather ignored. We just don't quite know what to do with it.

I had some correspondence on this with previous tutor; his view was as follows:

"......one thing I would mention, is the use of special effects filters, and specialized techniques.  It’s very easy to be seduced by these things, and initially their impact on an image can be gratifying, but it’s essential to use them in moderation, and for an appropriate purpose....explore their use and impact by all means, but then focus on the core approach to the craft."

This seems fair to a point, but I do disgree with the implication in the last clause, that somehow filters etc are not core approach. Obviously, they don't help with choice of subject or even some technical aspaects like focussing or depth of field. But they can change the image not just to be more striking (as with the cliffs) but to send a different message. Take the boy above. In the original, it is obvious he is looking out of a window high up; in the converted image we do not know what he is looking at (in the context of the book cover, that was the point).

I recall seeing about a year ago some images that a tutor was raving about on the OCA site: a girl standing near a window but taken through glass so she appeared partially distorted. This was viewed as imaginative partly no doubt because taken through glass, but a similar effect could easily have been obtained using one of the standard PS filters. Would this have induced the same reaction?

For me, THE most important photographic book is Scott Kelby's Book for Digital Photographers. Currently on CS5, it is updated when new versions of PS are released. It is my photographic bible. His message chimes with me: we do not want to spend ages on post processing so do what works simply and quickly and effectively.