How to get 'painterly rendering' in-camera?

So, @OpenCube had some questions about an image in one of the recent C&C threads, which had a look like a painting:

It turned out that in this specific image the effect has been done in post.

However:

So I tried to offer a couple of initial ideas:

While some of those approaches/ideas/lenses might work in certain situations, it still doesn't provide an answer to the original question, I'm afraid, because the initial image shows a background with a textured look to it, and from my limited experience that still looks somewhat different from the experimental rendering of the lenses and techniques mentioned.

So I wanted to pose the question to everyone here (particularly also to the more technical-savvy and people, if they're still around here reading from time to time...):

Do you think there's a technique to achieve a look like that in-camera? And if you have already made it work, how were you able to do so?

I would be very interested and thankful and am sure some other people here could make excellent use of such a technique as well!

Here's two more ideas:

Using Oscillo/CRT-lenses
Some of those lenses are highly optimized for certain distances or a distinct field curvature and because of it produce really unusual (and in many cases undesirable) results. They may not create a textured look per se, but a very painterly looking one nonetheless. Depending on the kind of background the glow/double edges may also help to give you something unique looking.

High-ISO
In addition to using a lens or filter with unique rendering it could also be interesting to using a very high ISO in order to create more noise in the background. While digital noise isn't beautiful in the way film grain can be in certain instances, it is indeed able to provide some feeling of texture. Combined with a lens that renders backgrounds in unexpected ways, it could be interesting...

St. Ives, Cornwall

I don't know whether everyone would call this painterly, but it is my attempt. This was done about ten years ago, so I have forgotten the precise details, but the general method was to increase the lightness and reduce the global contrast but increase the local contrast (to avoid losing too much detail).

If only the global contrast is reduced, the picture generally looks like it is being viewed through a misty window. A lot of detail is lost because our eyes see much less fine detail in low-contrast images. To compensate for this, the local contrast may be increased. The Clarity slider in Lightroom controls local contrast, but in a fairly limited way. I prefer to use Unsharp Mask with a radius of 5 pixels to 50 pixels or more, and an amount of 0.2 to 0.5 typically. I may apply it several times with different parameters.

The most common way to get impressionistic type images is with intentional camera movement, but it's kinda tricky and you have to practice with it to get the look you want.

Shoot a reflection and turn it upside down.

Use a slow shutter from a moving vehicle.

Mix of slow shutter and intentional movement

Thanks for the sample and explanation. While it looks very nice, it's not done in-camera though, correct?

Correct.

I don't know of any camera that could do that sort of processing. But there again, I could not say for sure that there isn't a camera that could do it.

A moment's thought about in-camera techniques suggests shooting JPEG at the least possible quality and smallest picture size for starters. Then the most "painterly" in-camera JPEG settings along with a wide-open aperture or whatever gives the "worst" aberrations. Appropriate attention to subject and lighting of course.

Although post-processing has been excluded, I would certainly consider the use of Wavelets which allows adjustment by detail size 2x2,4x4,8x8px ...up to 1024x1024px.

rawpedia.rawtherapee.com/Wavelet_Levels

Can also be found in the GIMP. In particular, editing the residual layer independently of the detail levels would be of benefit, I reckon.

Thanks! Interesting suggestions. I feel like JPEG compression (if that‘s possible to achieve in necessary severity in camera) could create fascinating results, but I somehow doubt it looks anything like in the sample image… Perhaps I‘m wrong though. I‘ve tried high ISO and feel like it helps, but even in the best cases it only seems like part of the solution.

Of course post processing techniques are find to mention here as well, so absolutely feel free to add and explain those, if you want! Always great to have many options. 👍

The main goal is an in-camera result though, because it makes a big difference in the situation if you can immediately see the image on the back of your camera and adjust/react accordingly!

Was just going to add this:

paulsphotopalace.wordpress.com/2015/10/30/wavelets-in-rawtherapee-a-short-introduction/

Understood, although what's on the back of a camera live view may well not match what goes onto the card,

Certainly not with my old Sigma which is raw-only and only puts a post-shot quarter-width thumbnail on the tiny 1.8" LCD.

Or one could just buy a canvas, brushes, paints and produce the real thing. Of course, that requires talent ...

While that would be a great and worthwhile thing to do as well of course, it would produce something completely different. Got any ideas for what I tried to describe?

I'd suggest that to get a "painterly" effect one find a brush and canvas .. and look instead to this discussion as "Photo Art" -- that is something different than looking through a clean window that the camera normally gives .. Here is one normal in camera "art" effect -- using the soft focus and white edge effects found under the "ART" settings on my Olympus. I added a "muted" setting for the rendition and set the noise filter to its highest setting --- Other cameras often also provide similar controls and options ......

Of course to get that soft focus one could smear Vaseline or another substance on the lens -- it's been done before I read .... To get closer to painterly perhaps revisit the photogram .. and the thought that movement or poor focus renders an Impressionistic effect misunderstands Impressionism, IMHO... although there was Futurism!!

WhyNot

Not really - for me one of the joys of photography is how close to reality one can come. What you're doing is interesting, but the end result is obviously an imitation.

And so is every photograph that I have seen. Being "close to reality" is far from being a simple one-dimensional measure. Photographs, paintings, etc. can be close to reality in some respects and very far from reality in other respects.

I get that and even feel the same way from time to time.

When life gives you lemons, make lemon aid. by simple.joy, on Flickr

Don't leaf me high and dry? Check! by simple.joy, on Flickr

However I don't think my enjoyment of photography would benefit from limiting myself to any specific kind of shooting or technique, so I try different stuff and usually have a lot of fun while experimenting. It's perfectly fine not to do that of course and if you have a very specific goal it's certainly a good idea to dedicate your focus and energy to it.

If you're talking about what I tried to describe here and the couple of attempts at it: Yes, of course, that's an imitation in part. There still are some differences though as the in-focus parts of an image often look drastically different from the background with many lenses, particularly those that have any claim to have some unique 'character'. We're no trying to make the whole image look like a painting necessarily, but for the most part the background. So the end result will probably look clearly different than almost all paintings anyway.

If you're not just talking about the couple of techniques used here, but my photographic experiments in general, I don't really know what to tell you. I've heard a couple of things about my shots: That they surely are mostly photoshop anyway, that there isn't enough in focus and was even told that they look nice but simultaneously asked who they were supposed to be for?

That they're an imitation is a new one though. 😅

I'm currently wondering a few things about this related to high noise iso as a starting point to build into what becomes a more brush strokey look but I have to remember to do that and I keep forgetting. It's a fight against instincts to shoot noisy ya know.

@leitz my goal is to make new and fantastic imagery. Imitation, flattery, illusion, whatever, I'm bending spoons and trying to break through into finding things new. If I could find a way to do pointilism as a photograph.. hey that gives me an idea..

I hesitate to mention it but photography is pointillism. Just look at the pixel level and see .... It may not be Seurat composition but the technique is basically the same ....

WhyNot

It's like raaaaaaiiiin on your wedding day.