"Picture Style" on Canon 5D Mark II

I just bought (and received) the Canon 5D Mark II. I hope that I love it, because it was a BIG investment.

Kendra, my associate photographer, and I have been talking a lot about color of images right out of the camera. It's interesting how each camera takes images a little differently. We wanted to find a way to make sure they are more similar an ready RIGHT OUT OF THE CAMERA...less editing = less time = less cost.

Here's my experiment tonight.
I went into my camera and changed the "picture style" several times to see how the colors would change. The camera was set at ISO 800, f/1.8 at a 1/40 on HIGH RES jpg (NOT RAW).

Hopefully, this will be helpful to someone other than myself. I learn better by talking through things, so I figured I'd do it on my blog.

PLEASE feel free to continue this conversation by writing comments on here about these settings...anything you observe in my images or things you've done on your own.

The image below was set with the camera setting "standard"
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 0
Color Tone - 0




The image below was set with the camera setting "portrait"
Sharpness - 2
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 0
Color Tone - 0




The image below was set with the camera setting "landscape"
Sharpness - 4
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 0
Color Tone - 0





The image below was set with the camera setting "neutral"
Sharpness - 0
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 0
Color Tone - 0




The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 0
Color Tone - -3




The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 0
Color Tone - 3




The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 0
Saturation - 3
Color Tone - 0




The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 1
Saturation - 1
Color Tone - 0




The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 1
Saturation - 2
Color Tone - 0



The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 1
Saturation - 1
Color Tone - 0





The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 1
Saturation - 2
Color Tone - 0





The image below was set at
Sharpness - 3
Contrast - 3
Saturation -1
Color Tone - 0

Sunshine and daytime pictures

Also - I've been having some trouble with sunny day pictures. Any advice - I know earlier mornings and later afternoons are better, but I've also heard some say to use a fill flash, some say no flash, a reflector, find shade ...... What are your best suggestions?

Bright, direct sunshine is one of the hardest "issues", I think. Great question.

A couple things you can do...

1) find shade - this is typically my #1 suggestion. But blotchy shade is almost worse than no shade at all.

2) shoot directly into the sun - utilize it! if you have an f-stop of 5 or higher, you get those beautiful hexagon shaped sunshines. you'll get silhouettes, so plan on it and use it to your benefit. if you don't want silhouettes, you can flash.

3) fill flash - this can work, but often there is less contrast and from my experience, lenses don't seem to focus as well when shooting into bring light.

4) plan on dramatic shadows! sometimes these can be really great in photos...experiment!

I haven't used a reflector, so I am not able to comment about it. Sorry.

Post-processing

Do you use Lightroom or Aperture to load and organize your photos? I've been using iphoto, but was able to get a copy of photoshop and am worried that iphoto does something to the color profile. Also... do you do much with "actions" in photoshop. I really am new at the editing process and am not really even sure what that is, but am curious about how much editing you often do with your photos.

Yes. I use Aperture. It's great for organizing...but I don't honestly use it for much else. I have a good friend, Noemi Photography, who uses Lightroom for most of her post-processing! It must just depend on your preference and experience with your programs.

I LOVE actions, but they can be somewhat debilitating. When you don't NEED to learn how to do it yourself, you can fake it pretty well, it doesn't make for great photography. Does that make sense? I started using PS and just used actions. Then, I took a class at MN Center for Photography (no longer exists) and learned SO MUCH! Being educated about PS makes a huge difference, even though I still use the actions (for time sake).