HDR Tips

Derek W

Derek W

Derek W

Soldato
Joined
1 Oct 2008
Posts
12,841
Location
Designing Buildings
I've just been out with my camera taking a few pics to have a go at HDRing some images. now I just took them with my camera without a tripod so I've noticed there are some slight movement in the image (must stop drinking!) is this going to pose a problem when I create the HDR images or should I have used a tripod despite the short shutter speed? Any advice welcomed.

Will post my results later on as I'm off the football the now. :D
 
For merging multiple images, yes it can cause a lot of trouble, though even with a tripod you can still encounter problems with the images not lining up correctly/issues with things within the image moving around.

I gave up on HDR with multiple images and just shot with one raw and converted it three times to get the images. Whilst this works quite well it is also limiting where the image required more dynamic range than i could pull out of the single raw. i.e. where the landscape is almost black against a nice bright sky, all you could get for the land was noise. This is the only real circumstance where the true method for HDR works as it is supposed to. Where the dynamic range of a scene is not beyond that of the camera HDR is generaly not worth the time or the effort.
 
What actually is HDR & HDR Rendering?

I dont really know and google define didnt show up much, can someone please dum this right down for me, and what kind of options/settings i will find this in.
 
take a look on google for hdr after the sponsored link the first result has a good guide on whats involved.
 
Kei said:
For merging multiple images, yes it can cause a lot of trouble, though even with a tripod you can still encounter problems with the images not lining up correctly/issues with things within the image moving around.

I gave up on HDR with multiple images and just shot with one raw and converted it three times to get the images. Whilst this works quite well it is also limiting where the image required more dynamic range than i could pull out of the single raw. i.e. where the landscape is almost black against a nice bright sky, all you could get for the land was noise. This is the only real circumstance where the true method for HDR works as it is supposed to. Where the dynamic range of a scene is not beyond that of the camera HDR is generaly not worth the time or the effort.
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But if you are only taking a single exposure then you compeltely defeat the purpose of HDr. HDR is used to combine the dynamic range from different exposures. If you have a single RAW then you can just process it in photoshop or gimp to get the dynamic range you want.

If you have a situation where the foreground/landscape is dark and the sky is bright then you want to use a ND grad filter, not some cheap software tricks. Then you wont suffer from noisy images.
 
you can also just use one of your images from the camera and just under expose it and over expose it (in photoshop or similar) so that you are left with 3 images..
 
I've found the auto alignment in photoshop is better than that of photomatix, so I tend to merge to HDR in photoshop, save it as a TIFF image and then import that into photomatix to play with there. Although the gradient tool in lightroom 2 is enough for me in most instances now so I don't bother so much any more.
 
heres my first attempt, just really merged the images and not fiddled about with the settings at all. I've noticed there is a 'wobble' in the picture when i zoom in, ignore the composition etc as I'm just testing it out and I will be getting closer to this building later on but since its 'keep out' thought I'd just stand on the road rather than going in. Anyway heres the pic :

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and heres the original normal exposure image

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I usually align/crop with Photoshop, then use Photomatix to merge HDR, tweak with Camera Raw, then more tweaking with Photoshop if needed.
 
Derek W said:
That was the link I was meaning for James07 to look at. nice site with clear explanation on it. :cool:
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Thats what im after :D

EDIT: IIRC

HDR is a was of enhancing a photo? Making highlights and shadows stand out more, making better exposure for a pictue?

Am i right?
 
James07 said:
Thats what im after :D

EDIT: IIRC

HDR is a was of enhancing a photo? Making highlights and shadows stand out more, making better exposure for a pictue?

Am i right?
Click to expand...

Essentially thats what it does. since the camera is limited to one exposure per picture it is sometimes difficult to pick out the detail in the sky as well as the ground. doing an HDR image benefits from gaining both highlights and shadow along with your main focused image, combining the best bits from all three. :cool:
 
Derek W said:
Essentially thats what it does. since the camera is limited to one exposure per picture it is sometimes difficult to pick out the detail in the sky as well as the ground. doing an HDR image benefits from gaining both highlights and shadow along with your main focused image, combining the best bits from all three. :cool:
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Haha, i understand it now :p

So if you want the walls around the building in the pic above to look good and also the sky you have to do some HDRing to get it looking how you want it to look as the camera will do either one or the other?

Ha, feels good when things click into place.
 
either that or you can photoshop in another sky but obviously with that amount of branches and crap in the way it could post difficult. HDR is, in my opinion, an easier way of doing things
 
Had another go at HDR this evening. I'm quite happy with the result considering how dull it was today up here. I was a little disappointed cos I was looking for a sunset picture tonight. I gave up and walked home only to discover a lovely orange sunset happening behind me :mad:

Anyway heres what I took this evening. I know theres a lot of wobble on the right of the picture but all in all I like the image produced. C & C welcome

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D.P. said:
But if you are only taking a single exposure then you compeltely defeat the purpose of HDR...
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I was about to say the exact same thing. If the dynamic range is sufficient enough to use a single RAW then the shot probably doesn't require the HDR treatment in the first place. Unless you want the shot to look like a 3D render that is.

Derek, it's good that you're trying out a new technique. I would definitely use a tripod and I would definitely use bracketed exposures rather than a single RAW. I would also try and find subjects that require HDR in the first place.

Your first shot is pretty good to be honest, it's a nice subtle use of HDR that has produced a natural image, which is rare for an HDR newbie. However, looking at the 'before' shot I would say that you probably didn't need to go down the HDR route. The original is really overexposed and if it was correctly exposed it might have been a good shot on its own.

The second shot is more consistent with peoples first HDR attempts. Apart from the miss-aligned shots there's the classic 'halo' effect where the foreground meets the sky and the building looks like its come out of Half-Life 2.

I'm pretty sure that a longer exposure on a tripod would have produced are more interesting shot of this scene.

Just my 2p.

Panzer
 
Panzerbjorn said:
The second shot is more consistent with peoples first HDR attempts. Apart from the miss-aligned shots there's the classic 'halo' effect where the foreground meets the sky and the building looks like its come out of Half-Life 2.
Click to expand...
Yup. The mis-alignment is very obvious down the right side of the tower and overdoing the processing has given you a halo effect.

You don't necessarily have to have a tripod, though obviously it helps massively. As long as the longest exposure is still easily hand-holdable then you should just be able to put the camera in burst fire and rattle off three without moving much. If you have moved a bit then PS / photomatix should be able to sort it out for you.
 
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