N-Scale Magazine Nov/Dec Issue

FYI

TIFFs are generally Higher resolution than JPEGS.

 

I've got a little experience here, both as a photographer and the person who directs photographers for high end publications.

You can indeed shoot jpeg, if it's at the highest resolution your camera can muster. But, the very first time you open it, save it as a tiff. Keep the original jpeg. Submit the tiff. It is considered unaltered! Jpeg is just a compression algorithm. With higher end digitals and DSLRs, virtually no one can tell the difference at the highest quality (i.e, least compression). Once your image is in tiff format, it is lossless. The problem comes with highly compressed jpgs, which lose sharpness and color depth.

A lot of pros have switched from tiff or raw to jpeg. The reason is that the conversions are done in hardware in the camera by the camera-makers rules. Photoshop is just fine--I used to shoot raw almost exclusively, but the latest digitals are much better than I am, and much, much faster, in interpreting an image.

I know that Kirk is a fanatic about unaltered tiffs. I really don't understand it. I submitted some unaltered tiffs to him, and he rejected them as underexposed. They were NOT underexposed. Digital images tend to look underexposed because the camera attempts to preserve highlights. So some manipulation is expected before a digital image goes to print. I, and other designers, do this every day. Once a highlight is blown on a digital, it's gone forever. But shadows can be boosted. Digitals are better at shadows than highlights, so the camera bias is to save the highlights. Some editors don't understand this even today.

And the funny thing is, I can change exposures and levels, and no one can detect it! So what's unaltered today? They certainly can detect masks and layers (to take out unwanted backgrounds, for example), but I dare anyone to tell whether the sharpening was in the camera or by software.

I guess I'll have to write a book on this.

[ December 15, 2005, 08:11 PM: Message edited by: Pete Nolan ]

 

Thanx for the "tech speak", Pete! You 'splained that much more eloquently that I could have...

I might've had to read the manual when I got home...but now...

 

Personally, I will continue to renew both since they are the only pure sources for N scale. I have not be happy with the lack of color shots and the seemingly interminable how to's in Hundman's publication which, I feel, after being around here for almost two years, will appeal to a very small segment of the N scale market.

 

Mark,

I think Bob has been desperately seeking submissions, so he had to fill the editorial space with something. That something has been interminable how-to's. Unfortunate--but an editor has to fill the editorial space to justify the advertising.

 

I think most publishers would really like for us to send high resolution TIFFs; 35mm transparencies work really well; 5"x7" or 8"x10" really sharp prints (from 4 megapixels and up) or photos from 35mm also work.
I would recommend sending the text as a Word file in rich text format, but send a printed copy also.
When we send things out to be published, we just provide the Word file, a folder containing the TIFFs, and a printed copy of the article with the associated photos captioned. The CD is burned using either Nero or Roxio - the CD is "finalized" before sending.

 

I understand about the different formats.

My camera does jpegs.

 

I have been a loyal supporter of both mag's since their debut. But I am not going to renew N-scale until they revamp and focus on US!
NSR has gone light years ahead of N scale. Better photos and on time. My $ and support will be for NSR from now on.

 

Pete is really on the money...

Even Time and Sports Illustrated have moved to digital photography away from traditional print or slide film, mostly due to the time and money savings involved and the fact that the quality of digital cameras has gone up substantially in the last five years.

This is often more of a problem with editors or production people that aren't willing to give up the "old" way of doing things and are still convinced that slides are the only way. If a publication is willing to take digital images (RAW, TIFF, JPEG and so on) they have taken the first step. However, what an image looks like my monitor may look completely different on someone else's monitor in terms of contrast, exposure, etc., etc. Apple computers (common in graphic design use) typically display an image with more brightness than what you will see on a Windows PC. These are all known quantities and unless you have your monitor(s) calibrated to your color output or pre-press house that is going to print your magazine, you aren't going to know just looking at the photo on screen if it is going to be color correct, correct for exposure and more. Only the high-end magazines have the budgets and means to do high-end workflow and close color correction with their pre-press and press house. Otherwise you make due with what you have and shoot to get things as close as you can.

Ultimately if an editor is really getting hard up for material and content, you can only be so anal in the quality of the photographs before you have to ask yourself which is more important to my readers.

Today's basic point and shoot digital camera's take really nice photos right out of the box. Anything 5 megapixel or larger would be ideal for a magazine publication and even 3 megapixel images can be used in most cases.

Pete if you want help on that book let me know...

- jamie

 

Lashedup:

Your points are right on the money. My Apple monitors are calibrated to my major client's monitors, which are calibrated to a printer's presses. So everything is exact.

But the difference between my calibration and a standard printing calibration is really tiny! It was done only for the purpose of printing gray neutrally, as opposed to a sickly green-gray or a feminine pink-gray. That was the only reason we went through a system to system calibration--which drifts over time anyway!

I submit to magazines all the time. No one has trouble with my color calibration--it's Nikon's, for heaven's sake! But NSRR (KIrk) has had problems with that. I guess he got burned in the past--I have no knowledge of what happened, just that he related a problem to me a while ago. Damned if I know what's going on there. I really don't understand why major magazines will accept my images without question, and NSRR has problems with them. So I don't submit--not worth the trouble!

 

I have not been real impressed with N scale magazine. Compared to N Scale Railroading, it seems a tad ameturish. There have been some neat how to articles.

 

I have read N Scale magazine for years, including many back issues gotten one place or the other. I have subscribed to it for at least 8 years.

my subscription is about to run out, and with all the talk about Hundman's problems, it doesn't seem too smart to invest $50+ in another two year subscription.

guess I will just have to see what happens and purchase the mag one issue at a time.

too bad...

Michael Hewitt

 

N Scale Magazine was the first in N scale, I think. I have gotten a lot of good ideas from it (Thanks to Ron Beardon, in particular).

 

Pete: Here is something that I don't understand in light of your post. Kirk told me not to adjust any pictures as that was done by the printer in the final stage before printing. Even he (Kirk Reddie) does not change the picture. So, why would he not like your picture? Seems like he would rely on the printer to "fix" it.

OTOH, this NSR magazine process has evolved. There were pretty bad pictures in the very first issue and Kirk has been through different printers since then. I do think he is comfortable with the process as it is now.

Interesting comment you have, to me. I use a Nikon, too, and never had a word said about it.

[ December 30, 2005, 07:19 AM: Message edited by: sapacif ]

 

Pete: Here is something that I don't understand in light of your post. Kirk told me not to adjust any pictures as that was done by the printer in the final stage before printing. Even he (Kirk Reddie) does not change the picture. So, why would he not like your picture? Seems like he would rely on the printer to "fix" it.</font>[/QUOTE]Well someone is "touching" the photos as NSR has a borderline almost cliche tendency to remove backgrounds from photos and insert some type of generic sky instead. While this effect sometimes looks good, if it isn't done right and properly match the lighting it looks forced. Plus the masking of backgrounds isn't always very clean either.

So unless people are submitting their photos with backgrounds removed and smoke/effects added to their images (which shouldn't be the case if NSR is demanding untouched photos) then someone at NSR is modifying the images.

Hey, its their publication, they can do what they like and I'm just happy they are around to support this community.

 

Please let me say that Kirk did not demand images be done in any particular way. I was lost at all this and he told me how to send them in. Just clarifyng a little.

I am glad they are around, too.

I have not noticed the backgrounds; I will go back and look.