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Lesson Info
29. Printing Your Work
Lessons
M0: Orientation
1Series Hello & Introducing Benjamin Hardman
01:43 2Coffee with Alex - Benjamin's Story
22:38 3Benjamin's Workshop Introduction
01:39M1: Gear & Prep
4High-Resolution Setup
07:26 5Lightweight Gear Setup
05:33 6Backpack Breakdown
11:38Aerial Photography
05:51 8Gear & Clothing
07:26 9Research & Preparation
06:18M2: Shooting & Editing
10Seals of Glacier Lagoon
06:56 11Editing: Adobe Lightroom Basics
40:59 12Capturing Glacial Detail
08:23 13Editing: Macro Detail
15:17 14Exploring on Foot
09:47 15Editing: Image Stitching
17:18 16Photographing the Elusive Reindeer
07:21 17Editing: Subjects in Sunset Light
16:58 18Documenting Iceland's Jagged Peaks
06:21 19Editing: Atmospheric Mountains
14:56 20Mountain Drone Photography
10:50 21Editing: Aerial Abstraction
17:20M3: Finding Your Style, Curation, and Social Media
22Benjamin's Style
03:30 23What Inspires Benjamin
02:40 24Creating Your Own Voice
03:01 25Curation: Computer to Phone & UNUM
10:16 26Social Media Q&A with Alex
08:47M4: Running A Creative Business
27Benjamin's Story & Business Tips
05:23 28Presenting Professionally
01:39 29Printing Your Work
12:29 30Staying Inspired
01:02M5: Wrap Up
31Workshop Takeaways
06:03 32Workshop Summary with Alex
32:50Lesson Info
Printing Your Work
Early on in my career, I really wanted to further my presence in the local community. You know, I was shooting away in Iceland and abroad, but when I would come back to Perth, I just wanted to showcase my work a little bit. And one of the ways that I was able to do that was through printing and exhibiting some of my images. The whole time I've been doing this has been one of the most fulfilling experiences that I can think of in photography, you know, holding your print in your hands and actually looking at this physical piece of work that you've made, this piece of art. It really brings a new level of connection to the work that you've created. I thought it could be really cool to bring in my personal printer from home and show you what the process is from start to finish of how I would take one of my images and translate it to paper in my printer. So we're gonna open up Lightroom and do a few tweaks. There is quite a series of steps involved because when ink hits the paper, the level...
s of contrast that you see on your computer screen completely change. You know, the ink absorbs into the paper and blacks become lighter. Colors can be changed and lost. And we have this thing called soft proofing. So in Lightroom, you are able to download the soft proofing or profile, print profile of any specific paper that you are able to get your hands on. Usually they have a profile somewhere online for that paper. And for me, I'm using the Hahnemuhle paper, the Photo Rag 308 GSM. And this is around A3 in size. And I have found that print profile on the internet and moved it into Lightroom where I can begin to see, which is pretty awesome, how that profile will affect my image. So it's basically emulating the paper and what would happen when ink hits it. So we can move over to Lightroom now and I'm just going to simply tap S on the keyboard to open the proofing view. And there are two levels of intent and this is quite like nerd level here. A few of these things, I still am learning myself, but the way I understand it is that Relative will take any color hues that are outside of the printer's capabilities and bring them back to a workable hue in the print file. But Perceptual preserves out of gamut detail as it mentions here. So it preserves the colors or detail outside of what the printer's capability can be, but it can alter other colors around that in the process so it's more unreliable and I would usually use the Relative intent and you'll be able to see clearly both of the differences in how it looks in here. So from here, we're going to begin to change some things because we see very evidently that we lose a lot of contrast. When I begin to edit, it's going to pop up with a thing to ask me if I want to make a proof copy. So it's like a virtual copy, just a second rendition of the image that has been changed for print. So I'm just simply going to click Create Proof Copy and begin to bring back that contrast that we lost. Some of the key things that I'm looking for are brightening my image, bringing back those blacks, and simply just changing the crop to match the paper type. In this case, I'm going to go for a two by three and it is actually even skinnier but I think this is fine to use for now. I'm just checking the kind of composition in this new format, because we have to think about now the layers of the image again, and I am keeping it simple still by having the bottom third and top third just this strip of color. So there we go, we have that. And I think that we're going to need to add a little bit of brightness so that our darker areas, especially where the reindeers are, won't be crushed. So we can just add a little bit of shadows up. And I see in the foreground now that there is a darker patch that was, you know, not part of the previous edit, I'm just going to bring a graduated filter over the bottom and brighten that. So we get this consistent and cohesive kind of flow of white back towards the reindeer. And then going to do the same with the sky, going to bring a new graduated filter down and darken just a little bit. I do see however though, that I'm getting this curved shape in the actual gradation of the darker area in the sky. And one way that I've found to fix that is to simply just add a radial that is the same shape as that curve. So in this case, feather up, invert, and just slightly darken to just kind of make that top strip more of a flat and horizontal balance. Now I'm simply just going to add some more contrast, take away the fade, because anything that has already pulled the blacks back, we want to get rid of that because the paper is going to fade it naturally. So with some small adjustments. That was a really useful one. So that middle point in my tone curve, it really pulled those mid levels of contrast down. And that's kind of the things that are going to have a big effect in this final print. Starting to be happy. If you look in the top left, you can see how weird this image looks. I can actually take the preview off. It looks completely silly now but this is what we have to do in order for it to work in the print. Okay, starting to get quite happy with this. There's not too much necessary to be done here. Also be careful that the whites don't blow out because the paper is naturally white. So if you don't bring those down, then you're just going to get an area of empty paper essentially on your print, which, you know, maybe looks a little strange. Next up, I'm going to open this image in Canon Print Studio. So I'm using the Canon PRO-1000 printer and it prints up to A2 roughly, and it can print borderless, which is quite awesome. In most cases, I do leave a border so I can add a signature or something like that. And you know, if I'm taking these images, you know, down to a local cafe or something to present them in a small exhibition series, then I want to leave room to sign because that can bring some additional value to the piece that maybe is for sale. I'm a little scared that it's gonna be oversaturated but I'm going to commit because it really does, with this paper, absorb a lot of that saturation in the final print. Let's go ahead and open this now via the plugin for Canon Print Studio Pro, which we can see here in File, Plug In Extras, Print Studio Pro. And here we have. So inside of this new module, we have a series of settings that basically allow you to preset your paper size, the way that it's loaded into the printer, the level of quality that you're going to give that image in the print, and the layout, the level of amount of border that you want to give that image. And additionally, some small tweaks in color and contrast that maybe are apparent again when you are looking through this module at the soft proofing. Down in the print settings and color management section, there's actually a button for this to see that soft proofing. And for me, of course, I want to know that, that's valuable information for me to see before I put this piece of paper in. And, you know, they're a few dollars per print almost so we don't have room to just continually do tests. We want to be precise as much as we can. Maybe it's gonna take three times but hopefully we can do it straight off the bat and have something that's nice and ready to present. At this stage, we're pretty much ready to go for our print. So obviously, I have to add some paper to the printer. You can't print on air so I'm just going to get my paper and open it up. Going to use these gloves, just so that I don't get any oil on my paper from my hands. Of course, we don't wanna crease the paper in this process so you have to be really careful in that regard. And now just checking the edges because if there is a crease, obviously that affects the potential resale. So we just wanna make sure that we're using a good piece. In this case, I'm pretty happy, just going to manually feed it in the back. Printers can have two feed options. There's an auto feed and a manual. I have to use manual for this type of paper. Paper's in, can take my gloves off now and it's time to do it, we're gonna do the print now. Just one final check of the settings. This is when I get my inner OCD on. I see that there is a small increment of difference on the edges. Yeah, I'm happy with that. I think there's a adequate border. And of course, if the border is slightly longer on the vertical edges, then I can get a paper slicer and just make a nice even cut after we finish printing. So here we go, we're going to click Print and we're gonna try and get this thing into the real world on a physical piece of paper. Now we wait, always exciting. I'm sure I can make a pretty cool little time lapse of this. Full send. Thank you. Look at that. What are you printing? Reindeer, man. It's being born, it's being brought to life, something that's just a digital file. So cool, birthing. Being birthed. It's out. Oh, here we go. Check it out. Okay, that's very cool. I'm really happy with this outcome, just to see the smooth gradation, look at that. It's like white to black. Yeah, you go from the white to then proper-- But there, there is an edge, you see that precision. That's what you want, that's the edge. Always gotta have an edge. Benjamin Edgemin Benjamin Edgemin. Here we have the final product. And of course, this is a test scenario so I should be wearing those gloves. If I was going to take this in and exhibit this piece then we would want to take, you know, that additional layer of precision. I'm really happy with how it translated to paper because there were a few things, especially these small darkened areas in the foreground when we brought the additional crop element into that, and also in the sky. Printers like this have such high levels of precision that they really can translate even the finest increments of exposure. So we had that kind of gradual graduated filter and then we brought that radial in the middle. The outcome is this kind of perfect graduated exposure down to the mountain. It might be hard to see on the camera but with the eye, this came out exactly as my vision intended. Happy printing everyone and here is what I just created.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase
Ratings and Reviews
Matt Grandbois
Very Informative & Awe Inspiring Both Benjamin and Alex have played huge roles in my photographic style development over the years and it is great to hear first hand exactly what inspires and drives Ben to keep pushing his creative boundaries. Personally, I love his minimalist approach and it was super insightful to watch him explain how he developed that style and how he actively produces photographs in a cohesive manner. 10/10 recommend this workshop to anyone looking for a very unique and profound perspective with the intent of expanding your creative horizons.
Alec Brown
First Workshop The first workshop I have ever purchased. I've always been hesitant to invest in a workshop, however this went above and beyond my expectations. Fluid in progression, great insight and a super relaxed learning curve full of information. I feel this has prepared me to take my own personal photographic journey to the next level. Executed to perfection. Nice work guys! 10/10 recommended.
Janelle Dransfield
Moving to Iceland now...? Loved this workshop! I really liked the way the modules are split up, and the way you watch Benjamin go out on location for a shot, then immediately sit down and watch his editing process for that specific shot. So much editing to learn too, since he doesn't use presets! The workbook is also super thorough, so printing it out allowed me to pay close attention and just add little notes here and there. The Iceland road guide is also SO helpful and in depth. Can't wait to use it. Also loved that Ben talked about printing your own work. Would be cool to maybe see something from Wildist in the future that goes even more into depth on that (calibrating your own printer, working with a print shop, dropship sites, etc.) Awesome course. Thanks, Hardman.