Help to Photoshop scanned slide.

[Roland Vink]

Years ago I took a picture of a flower, shot on Velvia 50 using an AIS 200/4 micro. The flower is of the NZ Pohutukawa - Metrosideros excelsa - a coastal tree which flowers around Xmas. The flower had fallen onto some boulders covered in green seaweed. It's one of my favorite pictures so we decided to get a print made. I had the slide drum scanned, and was amazed at how much detail that little 24x36mm piece of film contains, very happy with the results.

However, at 100% there are traces of CA which show on stamens near the edge of the picture. Would it be easy to remove? I have a friend who has photoshop but neither of us are experts at anything but global adjustments to contrast, WB etc. Anyone willing to give a step by step tutorial on what to do? Below is a 100% crop showing the CA, and a small image showing the overall picture. Many thanks!

[Birna Rørslett]

Perhaps run the TIF (16 bit) through a RAW conversion program that deals with this kind of CA? That'll remove the aberration quick and easy.'

Or, put the file on Dropbox or similar and I'll fix it for you.

[Roland Vink]

thanks! Two TIFs on dropbox here,the first is CMYK, then RGB:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/dh7x1x3cfv353zf/AAA76nU2rHoisvbCV-gaoaI3a?dl=0

I was told RBG give better colors...

There is also a spider web left of center that I wanted to clone out...

[Erik Lund]

Very beautiful and striking image!

Her is a screenshot from Camera RAW that show the defringe settings for this image and the resulting image downscaled for web.
I set it to 400% to see clearly what is going on as I slide up and down and increase / decrease the values 1-4 usually does it for most lenses but the colour is often very different!
I also removed the spider trace, but I would leave it in, to remove it I just used 'Clone' from a nearby area.

Just tell me if you want the file in Dropbox with the changes.

[Erik Lund]

Here 100% of the resulting JPG file

[elsa hoffmann]

Good Job Erik!
and ye - its quite a striking image!

[Erik Lund]

Roland please write again if you have any issues, It should not be to difficult,,,

[Roland Vink]

Sorry for my slow reply here ... thought this topic had gone quiet so didn't check! Thank you so much for your comments, as I mentioned this is one of my favorite images. This is also a pilot ... once I've have this picture printed to my satisfaction I'll be scanning a few more slides...

Eric: thanks for your suggestions. Bjørn also had a go at removing the CA using CS6, the results were much cleaner and sharper, but had the side effect of increasing the grain. I don't see the same issue with your image. I had a proof made and the grain is already visible ... don't want it to show up any more if possible.
If you could put it on dropbox that would be great. I'll also try to reproduce your efforts using a friend's system (she is a graphic designer - books, brochures etc - and has photoshop but is not expert on photo editing...), this will be a good practice for me and a nice project for the long Easter weekend


Once I'm happy with the TIF, I need to decide how to print it. Prefer not to frame it behind glass, our house has a lot of windows so too many reflections (last year we bought a panoramic print and couldn't hang it anywhere except for our bedroom as it was the only place we could see it without too many reflections). The guy who did the proof can print on paper and apply a varnish to protect it, but I've also heard of printing on aluminium, not sure how well it holds details and colors in comparison. Or alternatives?

[ColinM]

Once I'm happy with the TIF, I need to decide how to print it.

.... alternatives?

I don't recall seeing this important topic covered recently on NG.
If there aren't already threads on this, is it worth starting a new dedicated one?

Given the quality of work members show us here, I'm sure there are many of us who'd like to know the pros & cons, such as

• Approaches to deal with strong light sources in the room
• Different approaches to show particular types of image at their best
• Etc

[Erik Lund]

I added some clarity and sharpening to the first jpg I posted that's why.

I have now made a clean RAW conversion in ACR

https://www.dropbox.com/s/awvtmpobq5flzqw/RGB1998_Velvia%2059.15.psd?dl=0

That is the best CA correction I can do without starting to do any other 'cleaning up'

[Bjørn Rørslett]

I don't recall seeing this important topic covered recently on NG.
If there aren't already threads on this, is it worth starting a new dedicated one?

Given the quality of work members show us here, I'm sure there are many of us who'd like to know the pros & cons, such as

• Approaches to deal with strong light sources in the room
• Different approaches to show particular types of image at their best
• Etc

We have a Processing and Publication board especially targeted towards such issues. Feel free to start a discussion there.

[Les Olson]

Once I'm happy with the TIF, I need to decide how to print it. Prefer not to frame it behind glass, our house has a lot of windows so too many reflections (last year we bought a panoramic print and couldn't hang it anywhere except for our bedroom as it was the only place we could see it without too many reflections). The guy who did the proof can print on paper and apply a varnish to protect it, but I've also heard of printing on aluminium, not sure how well it holds details and colors in comparison. Or alternatives?

There is a wealth of detailed information at the Wilhelm Imaging site (http://www.wilhelm-research.com/).  Other useful sources are the Library of Congress (http://www.loc.gov/preservation/care/) and the Northeast Document Conservation Center, which has a very good leaflet on conservation of inkjet prints (https://www.nedcc.org/free-resources/preservation-leaflets/5.-photographs/5.4-creating-long-lasting-inkjet-prints)

As you will see, it can make a huge difference exactly which brand of paper and ink you use, as well as how the picture is framed, but strong light and high humidity are deadly for colour prints.  If you don't want to keep the light off the print, you might be better off just reprinting it every so often when the colour looks wrong.  (In which case storing the slides is an issue: Velvia rolls were acetate and need to be kept frozen - although Velvia sheet film was polyester and does not).