Orton Images and Scanned Film
I was poking around on flickr yesterday, and happened upon something called “Orton images.” Basically, the idea comes from the days of slides (not that film is dead!), and is a sandwich of two images, both over-exposed, with one in focus, and the other out of focus. More details may be found here. Of course, the effect is pretty easy to accomplish in Photoshop.
I thought I might try the technique on a few pictures. below are a few more examples of the technique. On the left are the original images, and on the right are the “Ortonified” versions. Click on any image for an enlarged version.
For the purposes of demonstration, I’ve used the same settings for each image. The intensity of the effect can be varied by changing the amount of blur, and the opacity of the overlaid image. Also, monkeying with the “exposure” of the sharp image will alter the contrast a good bit. Pretty cool.
Some images also lend themselves to a combination of effects, for instance, application of tone-mapping (above left) or black-and-white processing.
On the matter of the scanned film, I tried the VueScan software mentioned yesterday with my Epson 2450 scanner. So far, I’m not noticing a tremendous difference between use VueScan and the supplied scanning interface. However, that may have something to do with the settings I applied and the slide I selected as my first attempt. I’ll try a couple more later on. If worst comes to worst, I’ll just have to spend some time at Rob’s scanning.
Gee, now. That would be terrible — having to spend time at a friend’s house.
January 5th, 2007 at 10:48 AM
interesting………………..
January 5th, 2007 at 11:16 AM
I just printed the Turkey Point Lighthouse one out, at a small size (fit’s on an 8-1/2×11), and it really looks nice. I might try a few more this afternoon. Got some errands to run right now, though.
January 5th, 2007 at 11:43 AM
please do continue your documenting of the film- and slide-scanning you’re doing, that’s something that I (and I’d imagine most photographers) really need to get around to. I know I’ve just not bothered due to lack of knowledge about how to get the best quality (and this little thing called ‘time’).
January 6th, 2007 at 10:52 AM
[...] Geren’s been playing with “Orton imaging” so I thought I’d see if I can replicate the effect. [...]
January 8th, 2007 at 6:40 PM
[...] I know I’ve made images of this barn before; as I passed it today I figured I’d get a fresh one and try that Orton thing that Geren mentioned. The instructions he points to really lightened up the image, so I backed it off a little and had to play with the transparency to get it somewhat reasonable looking, and here for your evaluation (clicking on either should take you to a larger version, hosted by flickr) are the original and the “Orton” version: [...]
March 5th, 2007 at 4:59 PM
Actually, Geren, the Orton effect is much easier and more dramatic with transaparencies. As you saw, I’m working on getting the same high contrast effect using software. After shooting a great number of Ortons with slides, I’m getting close, but still not where I think it should be. If you can easily replicate the exact effect, I’d sure like to know your technique. Best regards,
Tony
March 5th, 2007 at 9:58 PM
Tony,
I’m using a tweak of another process. The basic steps are:
1. Open image
2. Make duplicate layer
3. Click Image => Apply Image
4. Set blending mode to Screen and click ok
5. Make another duplicate layer
6. Click Filter => Blur => Gaussian Blur
7. Set radius to make the “out of focus” second image and click ok
8. Change blending mode of third layer to Multiply.
9. Flatten
It doesn’t work with every image, but it does work with a very large percentage of the ones I’ve tried.
I’ve made a Photoshop Action to handle all the steps, and it pauses for input to the Gaussian Blur filter. It can be downloaded here.