I suppose that when you are somewhat famous, everything you say has a chance to get spun out of control. It is like this for Scott Kelby. The last couple of days he has posted about a photo shoot that he did, and the post processing he did with some of the images. Part 1. Part 2. There is just so much to comment on this post…
First, having someone document a shoot is pretty cool, I think. The fact that this one wasn’t going well just makes it even better. Shows that we all have to keep our heads on straight, and can still pull something out of the ashes.
Second, Scott shows us an effect plugin which he decides not to recommend. This is great. I like to see what people are using and how it is used. I don’t buy plugins (yet). They just seem soooooo expensive, and that is part of the reason that Scott does not recommend it.
Third, the comments are crazy entertaining. The plugin, by Lucis Art is what is driving all the comments. It is a mostly one trick pony that creates a rather striking effect. Scott posted about a older version of this a while back, and how to create it without a plugin. The comments concentrate on two things. One, they don’t like the Dave Hill look (I think he has some great photo’s), and those that think that the effect is overused. First, Dave doesn’t use the plugin. He invented this “look”. He certainly has the right to do to his photo’s what he likes. Why wouldn’t anyone else? I am amazed at the self richousness of photographers. Raw vs jpeg, crop vs no crop, in camera light balance vs post, “natural” vs post. The list is endless. I wish people would just take pictures. If you don’t enjoy someones work, just move on. I haven’t seen others using this effect, but then I don’t actively look for them. I did notice a couple of flickr groups, but I hadn’t seen them before today. I have yet to see in in print. Hardly overused. But who cares anyway.
One interresting thing is that a commenter talked about a plugin I had not heard of before from Topaz Labs . They have a plugin that comes close to this for a lot less money. I don’t know how close, because I haven’t tried it yet, but it does have a free trial. They also have other plugins for noise, sharpening, and others. I would love to know how good the noise one is. I could use a good noise filter.