Light Painting - An English Church - Using Adobe LR & PS and Silver Efex Pro

In this tutorial, I demostarte the art of light painting at night and then creating a super dramatic Night-to-Day Black and White Image. I will complete a sky replacement and two conversions into Black and White one using Adobe Lightroom and the second using Silver Efex Pro. We will also be developing your Adobe Photoshop layer and mask management skills where I demonstrate how two images can be combined for a very dramatic composite effect.
If you would like to follow along the two RAW photographs used in this video can be found here :- drive.google.com/drive/folder...
The Church in the Shot is a wonderful English Country Church near to where I live in Norfolk, England. It is called All Saints Church, Crowfield, Suffolk. A must to visit. See my earlier video called The Haunted Church for a spectacular day-to-night transformation. You can find this here:- • Haunted Church - Day-t...
If you enjoy what I am doing here on KZbin, I would appreciate a 'like', and if you have not already subscribed, please join me on this wonderful adventure I am having :-).
If you have five minutes please have a look at my website, it has a lot of information about me, some of my best work is displayed in a galley and you can purchase awesome sky packs and find out about my latest Workshops, in London, Paris, and more. If you have time, I would love to have feedback to see how I could improve it... jrmathlin.uk/
If you would like to see more of my work, you can find it here:-
Facebook :- / jrmathlin
Instagram :- / jamiemathlin
500PX : - 500px.com/Jamie_R_Mathlin

[@robertleem5643]

Last year 2023 I visited Norfolk and photographed over 40 churches over 3 days, I revisited this year and did just over 30, did 2 night shots including Salle and Crowfield, this church is simply stunning to photography during the day and night

[@petrasandersvdruit8429]

👍👍YES!! the sound is much better now... i can hear you 😂

[@jamiermathlin]

great news 😀

[@dennisj.6135]

Good afternoon Jamie, Bravo, another great video and creation. Two months ago I discovered your channel and was at a stage of how I could make photography fun while thinking about the upcoming Winter season. The fun of creating day-to-night photos over this time and trying to recreate what you've been teaching us is fantastic. I look forward to future videos and teachings. Very best. Dennis

[@jamiermathlin]

Thank you Denis for your kind words and for taking the time to leave this comment. I am very happy to hear that I have helped you find creativity in these dark, cold evening 😀

[@leeprim]

Jaime, another great video. I really look forward to your weekly broadcasts. Very informative and enjoyable.

[@jamiermathlin]

Thank you Lee 😀

[@DMW5533]

Also another great video looking forward to your workshops and website. Won’t be able to travel to England but looking forward to seeing what comes of it I hope you do well

[@jamiermathlin]

Thanks Dave, I did run my first London Workshop in 2023, met some wonderful people and have a real blast for 7 days 😀 some of the pictures from the Workshop are in the Workshop details sheet.

[@colinyoung9432]

Love the transformation Jamie, all good the colour one was great as well as the BW versions... Happy new year, Colin Devon uk.

[@jamiermathlin]

Thank you Colin, I hope the weather has not been too crazy over the Christmas period in Devon !!

[@mikehughes6366]

Excellent Jamie, especially like the Silver FX ❤

[@jamiermathlin]

Thank you Mike 😀

[@MyStocko]

Another brilliant video Jamie. Love your teaching style, attention to detail without becoming boring. I learn something new every video, especially the use of subtract object in masks. This is a fantastic procedure. Purchased your night skies, and have a lot of fun injecting them into old images. Keep the videos coming, look forward to the next one.

[@jamiermathlin]

Thank you David, your support is very much appreciated 😀

[@salomon4263]

Fantástica y divertida lección de como consigues esos b&n fantásticos. Yo también lo he pasado muy bien y aprendido muchas cosas con tu forma de tratar los detalles. Gracias y un saludo.

[@jamiermathlin]

Muchas gracias por tus amables palabras y por tomarte el tiempo de dejar un comentario, se lo agradecemos mucho. 😀

[@BarneyStreit]

Jamie, aside from your fantastic editing, I also enjoy the creativity you use during the capture. Who else but you would combine, of all things, a porch light image with a light-painted image? Should you desire, you could also do an entire video series about capturing your images, and the thought process you use. From your work, I get the distinct impression that you had a lot of fun both capturing and editing your images.

[@jamiermathlin]

Hey Barney, thank you for the comment, it is very much appreciated, and yes, you are correct I do have a lot of fun capturing the images, as much as processing them. I tend to see the end images as I am shooting, so I shoot in a way that will complement the final image, knowing roughly what I want to do. I wish I had more time to film the capture process as well as the processing, may be something for the future 😀

[@user-vg8my3zg8e]

Great, thank you.

[@jamiermathlin]

You are most welcome 😀

[@Telewest792]

Hello Jamie you make it look very easy like i said I’m a pretty reasonable photographer and I have made the decision to commit to learning photoshop with all it’s different facets and i have been using light room a lot more as i come from the DXO photo suite I find it isn’t as hard as the first time i tried i guess that’s what time gives you I’ve been ln my studio pretty much every day for the last 2 weeks just working at it and i must say it is a lot of fun thanks again for your videos.

[@jamiermathlin]

Thank you Mick, I am very happy to hear that my videos are helpful. Personally, I find that Lightroom is the key to processing my images, Photoshop adds the addition of photo manipulation, such as adding or removing things, if you wish to replace the pixels, whereas generally speaking Lightroom is more about altering the pixels that are they through light and colour management. The true turning point for me with LR & PS was when I came to understand what the tools available can do, and then I started to think about these tools when I was taking the photograph !

[@SpencerPullenPhotography]

I really enjoy these videos you are doing. Would it be possible to see some using Affinity Photo? Thanks!

[@jamiermathlin]

I am very sorry Spencer, I do not use Affinity Software, however, I will take a look at it, now you have asked the question, to see what it is like 😀

[@davidclement5927]

Hi Jamie, another really good video; I always learn a lot from your videos. Can I please ask why you use Photoshop Beta as opposed to the latest "production" version of the Photoshop software and also why after following your initial processing in LR and PS, you go back to LR instead of using Camera RAW as a layer (smart Layer) in Photoshop. Finally, why you don't process you B&W using Silver Effex Pro as a layer in Photoshop. Thanks, Dave.

[@jamiermathlin]

All great questions David, to answer, I tend to use Photoshop Beta more, as I find the Generative fill function a little more capable (perhaps there are continued development elements, not sure), With regard to Camera Raw, I am not a fan, this is very much a personal preference, but I much prefer the Lightroom interface, and as crossing back and forth between LR and PS is seemless, there are no issues. With regard to Silver Efex, again personal preference I prefer LR as my main interface, as you have probably noticed, I do most of my masking in LR , so tend to use Photoshop only for the things that LR cannot do 😀

[@davidclement5927]

@@jamiermathlin ; thanks for you quick response. I now understand the logic behind your decisions. I used Photoshop Beta when Generative Fill was not available in Photoshop (Production), but then switched back when it became available. Based on your feedback, I think I will switch back to Photoshop Beta.

[@craigvidler2617]

Jamie I'm really glad I stumbled across your KZbin work, I really appreciate these tutorials so such so I even bought the sky pack and am sweating on the next one. One question for you when you take an image out of Lightroom to Photoshop and then bring it back into Lightroom it comes in as a .tff, does the tiff file contain as much information as the dng did? All the best from Down Under.

[@jamiermathlin]

Hi Craig, good to hear from you, and thank you for the purchase (I hope you like the Night images), and thank you for the comment and question. TIFF has similar properties to DNG, they are both 16-bit file types, meaning they have the same colour depth and dynamic range, you can change the Photoshop export file format if you wish to PNG, but there is little advantage as the file size, colour depth, and dynamic range remain the same. Here you can find more information on file types and bit depth configuration :- www.photoup.net/learn/differences-between-file-formats-raw-dng-tiff-gif-png-jpeg

[@craigvidler2617]

Thanks for the information Jamie and yes I am having a ball with the skies@@jamiermathlin

[@1duesy]

I'm one of the viewers asking about Denoise performance. Even the preview window takes several minutes! You kindly asked me to furnish system info for feedback. Here you go... SYSTEM: Dell Precision Tower 7810 from 2018. Upgraded to 1/3 TB SSDs (C and D drives respectively). Intel Xeon CPU E5-2630, 32G RAM. GRAPHICS CARD: NVIDIA Quadro K4200, 20G RAM. Any insights appreciated, thank you!

[@jamiermathlin]

If you do not consider AI-based software tools, you actually have a very well-specified computer, mostly Enterprise components, so I expect that using Lightroom and Photoshop (not accepting the AI Tools) work very well, however, the AI Tools are extremely demanding with older processor architecture and as a result all CPU manufacturers have introduced additional elements to there newer processors that are specifically designed to compute the AI-based instructions. Apple was first in 2020 with the new ARM based M chips, which contain a 16-core neural engine in addition to the standard CPU cores and GPU cores, meaning that an M3 base model Chip actually has a total of 34 Compute cores, but only 8 of these cores are CPU cores in the traditional sense, The M2 Ultra chip has 104 Compute Cores including a 4 core module specific for video encoding, but again only 24 traditional CPU cores. The development for these ARM-based chips has been incredible, used in iPhone, iPad, and MacBooks, they have changed the future of computing. Intel is rather late to this party but has finally produced their more modern chips (late 2021 onwards) with AI-engines , however, these processors consume a great deal more power than the ARM-based Apple M Chips, hence the much longer battery times available on Apple Laptops. Unfortunately, the tech world still tries to compare Windows computers to Apple computers using Benchmarks, more specifically benchmarks that do not generally relate to everyday use. I changed over to Apple in 2015 for all my creative work (photos and videos), I still have a Windows machine, but this is reserved for playing games as you can have a monster graphic card in an x86 architecture Windows computer. I could speak more about how the architecture of the processors work, such as memory bandwidth and memory instructions, etc, but I am sure you are losing interest by now 😀 however if you wish to know more you can find out more information on the Apple ARM architecture here :- www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2023/10/apple-unveils-m3-m3-pro-and-m3-max-the-most-advanced-chips-for-a-personal-computer/. and the Intel architecture here :- www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/docs/accelerator-engines/ai-engines.html

[@1duesy]

@@jamiermathlin this is fantastic info and I'm not bored in the least! I knew I had a powerful machine which I recently upgraded to 32G RAM and two SSD drives. Topaz Denoise runs pretty good but Photo AI brings it to a crawl. Interesting that the former is so much faster than the native Denoise built into LRC. Topaz recommends upgrading my graphics card and possibly the power supply, together about $650. However, I wonder if I should just get a new machine?

[@jamiermathlin]

@@1duesy Some of the new grapgics cards has AI features now included, specifcally the Nvidea card 400 series, but I am not completely sure if these new features offers support for the Lightroom AI Denoise function, so you would need to do some research, however, please understand that the graphics card does not contribute as much as you think to these types of functions, the card you have currently is a workstation graphics card and covers all of the normal LR & PS functions very well (rendering, animation etc). The software world is finally starting to utlise the hardware that has been made available, so from here forward software will be far more dependant on AI-Engines, rather than the traditional Windows approach of brut force and power consumption. If you are considering changing you machine I would recommend a MacBook Pro, depending on your budget, you have a large choice. If you use your computer mainly for photos and videos, this really is the right direction, if you play games, then keep your windows machine. The advantage of the MacBooks is that it is a laptop with Desktop performance, it can be connected to your monitor with a single cable for power and video signal, you can connect wireless keyboard and mouse, and when you want to take it with you, unplug and walk, plus with battery life up to 20 hours and no loss of perfromance when unplugged it is a game changer. Just for reference I have a Windows machine with an Nvidea 3090Ti graphics Card, 32Gb Ram and AMD 58003DX CPU (2022) and 800watt power supply (uses about 650watts from the wall), that takes 1m20s to denoise a 61MP image, my MacBook Pro M1Max 32GB (2020), takes 18s (this uses 30watts from the wall), and my Mac Studio M2Ultra 64GB Ram (2023) takes 8s (thats 10 times faster and uses around 45watts from the wall). Plus Video editing a 1 hour 4k Video Render and export takes 58mins on my Windows Machine and 8mins on my Mac Studio. If you want to stick with Windows go with a 12700k or better Intel processor (has AI-Engine) and a 400 series Nvidea Graphics Card,, 32GB Ram will be more than fine, but be warned, within 4-5 years x86 architecture will be fully replaced with ARM, Intel and AMD are currently rushing to change over to ARM, because of the power savings. If you think you would like to change to Apple, let me know your budget and I would be happy to advise you on the best way forward. I hope this was helpful.

[@jamiermathlin]

@@1duesy One other note, Topaz Denoise does not use an AI instruction set, it is based on conventional x86 instruction sets, where as Photo AI does use the AI instruction set, when available on the relative hardware. Just checked 🙂 so I think this explains your dilemma...

[@1duesy]

@@jamiermathlin I can't tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time to advise me. Thank you. Alas, I'm a Windows user with little need for a laptop. My Dell machine came to me used at a friendly price a couple of years ago. From your comments, sounds like the machine's main components won't keep up with the increasing demands from AI-based applications. Currently, I batch Denoise in Topaz after all edits in LRC and Photoshop which looks like I have it backwards based on your workflow!

[@1duesy]

Generative fills are lower resolution than the native photo where the detail difference is noticeable. Any suggestions for improving? Thx

[@jamiermathlin]

The generative fill function is limited to 1024 x 1024 pixel resolution, if you go bigger than this it will be noticeable, however even if you stay below this resolution it can still often look less sharp. Take a look at this video where I use a huge amount of Generative fill, but still maintain good enough resolution :- kzbin.info/www/bejne/pp7Ip2p5fbSGfM0&ab_channel=JamieRMathlin

[@1duesy]

@@jamiermathlin thx, will do!

[@DMW5533]

Hey Jamie. How come you always use DNG as a file format and not the original. Canon raw file or convert it to tiff?

[@jamiermathlin]

Hi Dave, most of the time I convert them to DNG when importing them into Lightroom, mainly to maintain compatibility with Lightroom, and I find that the processing is smoother. The CR3 RAW files direct from my Canon R5, also seem to work well with Lightroom. The good thing is there is no loss between RAW and DNG they remain 16bit files with the full-colour depth and dynamic range 😀

[@BostonFeliksovich]