Search My Blog

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Venturing into the World of Infrared Photography

I've always admired the effects and mood created from infrared photos. Recently, I have taken the plunge to send my third body, a 350D for a full infrared (IR) conversion. The reason I did this is to add another tool in my gear lineup to create certain effects to my works. With this tool, I hope I'll be able to realize some ideas that gives the sense of mystical, ethereal or dreamy look.

I'm still familiarizing myself to the post processing aspect of Infrared photography and have been trying to understand how to achieve what colors throughout the whole pp cycle.

Here's my first IR shot, a shot taken in Genting.


My first IR


Then, the camera was used during my KK trip. This was shot at the Tip of Borneo, Kudat, Sabah.


Wonderland


Another shot at the same place. Shot by my wife, pp done by me.


Tip of Borneo


And recently, this was shot in Putrajaya.


Peacefully Blue - IR


I really like the post process for the last shot. I'm spending a lot of time trying to understand about the channel swapping, color balancing, etc. in the post process step. I will share any information that I have learned or experiment in my blog.

6 comments:

Enche' Adykasyah said...

Hye Min..

Me think - simplicity is the best solution for IR..

Fancy PP will sometimes create hideous output.. I've tried before..

Or maybe I need to improve of the PP thingy.. Hehehee....

Enche' Adykasyah said...

And another thing that I'm aware about the IR converted body is.. You need no CPL filter to see through water reflection..

Amino @ Lordmint said...

Ady,

Thanks for the feedback. Simplicity makes the processing job much easier, but it doesn't mean that IR is not suitable for shots with plenty of elements in it. If you have plenty of elements, then it'll take you longer time to complete the post processing as you need to mask a lot of things and small intricate details.

Yea, that's not the only thing a converted IR body can see.... ;)

Nicholas Leong said...

I love the last shot. Certainly the best of the lot.

My own experiment so far is a failure :P

libpuritan said...

nicely done, min. how long did it take you to process one? =) i'm a lazy pp-er!

Amino @ Lordmint said...

nick, thanks. i think that shot is by far my best IR so far.

steph - for that last shot, no more than 5 mins. it depends on the complexity of the shot. if there's a lot of tree branches and leaves scattered everywhere, it'll take longer time.