Hi Pentaxians,

I am a great fan of infrared photography, but not a guy who is great at it. I bought a Pentax *istD, knowing that it is capable of taking IR pictures without modifying it and of course, it is giving me good results. But, being not good at post processing, I don't know how to get max. out of it's raw files. So, would like to learn from you experts who are good at it and also, will share my experiences with others as well. Cheers!

-Nalla

Cheers friend! I have used a K110D for infrared for years, I recently sold my K110 and am now left with the K200 and the K-5. The K200D is not a good performer in the IR wavelengths, the K-5 does a much better job (mainly because I can boost the ISO) but is nowhere near as sensitive to IR as the K110D.

Hi jase036,

It would be great if you can share some IR pics you shot with K110D. I am just processing few pics which I took with *istD and will post them over the weekend.

-Nalla

Sure, here are a few, all taken with the K110D, Cokin P007 IR filter, various lenses and for some I also used a polarizer. There are false color as well as a B&W shot. These were all shot RAW with custom WB then I ran them through LR for basic adjustments then into PS for further adjustments, B&W convertion or channel swapping (for the one with the blue sky). In my experience, although the kit Pentax 18-55mm is by far my least sharp lens, it is also one of the few modern auto AF lenses that I own that does not present a hotspot in the center when shooting IR images.












Feel free to comment, critique or ask any question about any of my images!

WOW! great images jase. Especially water flowing in 1pic is really fantastic and the last one too..It certainly needs experience to process images like this.. thanks for sharing!
What sort of custom WB you set with your camera.. I usually try a grey card and green grass too, but I never got such an effective images..

-Nalla

My WB is set with the lighting that is present when I take my images, I will usually zoom in on some of the foliage that I am going to photograph. They key to set the white balance is to ensure that you have the camera set to manual and with the correct exposure, then you select custom WB and take the image to determine WB. That will usually get you pretty close, but I always shoot in RAW in order to be able to make final adjustments to the WB in post. I will also usually further neutralize the whites if needed with Nik software's White Neutralizer (found in the Color Efex plug-ins). This is especially useful when I get the center hotspot with some of my lenses, although to fully fix the hotspot some dodging and burning is also required.
The water flow in the first image is the result of using a small aperture, low ISO and the longer exposure time required for IR photos, even with the IR sensitive K110D. The last one was shot in an overcast day so there was a lot of refracted IR light in the sky, so it became a great candidate for channel swapping (red channel swapped with the blue channel) giving me a nice "blue" sky. A lot of the people from my country ask me if I took this photo in some other country where they have snow =P (I am currently in Venezuela, a tropical country without winter).

Thanks jase, for your very good explanation of your settings. I follow your suggestions, next time I shoot. Keep sharing ur pics, they will inspire me..

-Nalla

Great to find this group. Hopefully we can see more images in the coming months.
Thanks for the images jase036. Nice work that is a beautiful state.

For my IR shots, I started out using a *ist D/K200D with filters and then moved to converted full spectrum (clear glass) K-x. I still have to use filters in front of the lenses but even with the most opaque ones, I still get much shorter exposure times (handheld) compared to my earlier bodies. Live view on the K-x helps out at times.
I am still learning. I enjoy the post processing of IR images as it is suited for all kinds of interpretations.
Here are a few images:

Great images, I especially like the "Massey Ferguson 65"
I have always wanted to convert one of my cameras to IR, but for work I need 2 bodies and everytime I buy a third thinking to convert the oldest body I end up having to sell it to help pay for the new body :P

Here are a couple from an internally converted Canon Powershot A630 (720 nm filter) camera. A touch of photoshop to be certain as well. (PS my real camera is a Pentax K5, but was not used in this shoot...)

Real nice work, cdurfor.
Lovely processing and subject matter.
Really liked them all but the third one really spoke to me.

Thnx... Its amazing what you can squeeze out of a Point and Shoot....

WOW!! cdurfor, your post-processing is really amazing. Wish to see more & more IR shooters like you, jase and jools

Because of the recent post by JoZ3 about light streaks on his images (which I agree is because of light from the viewfinder), I was reminded of this thread and decided to post a few more of my images from this summer.
Light and foliage are dwindling in this part of world as we get colder, so my IR images will diminish although I am curious to see how they show up in the dead of winter.

Thanks to all for the help on improving my technique for shooting IR, hopefully soon buy a body (used) to convert to full spectrum.

These are my first tests with two layer of exposed color negative and my ToyCam (VQ1015).




After my first tests with a Chinese filter (MASSA 720nm IR Filter) with K-r (you can see a hot spot with the kit lens)




A few months ago I bought the wonderful Olympus C2020z and the Hoya R72






A small tests where you can see the lights leaks (The c2g filter (GIMP) was used to convert a layer of IR to black and white, in the top layer I used a normal image and apply the colors to black and white layer.)



The future shots I will cover the viewfinder: p