FIrst HDR attempt with photomatix

[wildman]

So after my intitial try and reading all the comments I downloaded photomatix and used a bracketed series I shot today in a park close to where I live

Something doesn't look quite right and I can't put my finger on exactly what is not right here

 

[wildman]

White balance looks a little out to me - there's a definitely a red/orange tint to the picture (the clouds are the give away). Think that's also causing the sky to go slightly green in colour.

I think my monitor needs calibrating, I can't identify that tint in the clouds. The foreground deffinately has an orange glow to it though. Hmmm I'll try adjusting WB

 

[wildman]

same shot different bracket set taken about 4 mins later which is why the cloud has gone (it was pretty windy)

I am still seeing what looks like too much ornage in the foreground. Only exlpnation I can think of is that the sun was starting to set behind me and was low. WB was set to Auto, I adjusted the tint in PE6 to try and make it cooler without stripping too much colour from the bushes etc.

 

[wildman]

Definitely too much orange, which is made worse by the too high saturation.

Two things I really want to say though is:
1) Why do you think this photos needs to be an HDR, what do you think the true DR is, would there be a way to get a good photo of this scene using a single exposure?

2) What is the subject of the photo? how did you compose it? hat was in your mind when you setup the tripod and pressed the shutter button? What other positions and angles did you try before deciding this was the best? What am I, the viewer, supposed to get out of this photo, what am I supposed to think, or focus on?


In particular, question 2 needs to be answered before technical questions relating to HDR are worth resolving. Then you need to answer question 1, why do you think you need HDR here?

To be honest I can't answer those questions because I was on my way back to the car when i walked over this bridge, saw the nice colurs in the foreground and simply thought this would be a good place to try for some HDR bracketing as the sky was blue (ish), the water was dark and there were some dark rocks in the front.

So basically i didn't plan anythng other than to test something. I'd likely go back there soon adn try again but this time actually taking the time to compose properly rather than the 2 min job I did this time of tripod up, camera out and then hot foot iback to the car