As with many new trends HDR has arisen to be a new fixture in the language of photography at least in the digital side of the house. First brought to peoples attention in 1999 at Sigraph, a new method of going beyond the limitations of technology to be able to capture a richer color gamut. Since the human eye can differentiate in the range or more then a 1,000,000:1  and a high end digital camera only 300:1. Capturing the entire color spectrum or at least what we saw when we where at a beach on vacation rarely was captured to the same degree.

It is a great methodology that allows us to be able to capture its richness in colors as a 32bit image it has such a wide color gamut that we have to then go to a secondary process Tone Mapping to reduce the image to a 16bit that can actually be displayed on a monitor.

The main problem is that you can end up in one of the 2 extremes, either an image reminiscent of a painting or one that is photorealistic with such a color gamut that when properly executed looks like nothing has been done except it its perfectly lit in the background and foreground.

Is it simple yes, it is such a prominent new technological term that it is now becoming a feature on comeras, though I don’t belive that the in camera operation will surpass the longer process of Bracketed capture of 3 images at +2 0 -2 in apature priority, digital processing in Photomatix at present considered to be the best software for creating HDR images, though it is no way the only one their are many great alternatives though they all have different features and at least at present I have not found one that would make me want to change. This is the basic method followed by editing in photoshop.

I believe that Trey Ratcliff from Stuck in Customs Blog new book states it best that it is a technology that will evolve into many sub-styles and will continue to evolve.

It is my belief “It is a great tool but it is just that another tool in our great arsenal”

Hope you will try it out

Kris Navarro

In a previous post, I described the basics of HDR photography.  Today’s post is dedicated to using one particular piece of software, Photomatix Pro, to generate multiple HDR images for use in a time lapse video.  I’m currently using version 3.2.

Before I begin, I should mention that Photomatix Pro retails for $99 USD and can be downloaded here, or at a 60%-75% reduced rate for students at this link.  (All prices as of Nov. 2009)  I’ve also tried the free software Qtpfsgui with mixed results.  If you can’t afford Photomatix, I’d definitely suggest it as they may have worked out the bugs by now.

Making your first HDR image

You’ve already taken a series of bracketed images and your hard drive is bulging at the seams from taking pictures in triplicate.  Your first step in compressing these images is to pick a set of images from the middle of the series and generate a single HDR image.  For this tutorial, I’m using three images but you can use up to five images for one HDR image.  My original images look like this:

Next, I click “Generate HDR image” in Photomatix, select my three photos, and accept the default settings.  The image that appears is a composite that probably looks pretty bad.

Tone mapping

Click on “Tone Mapping” and immediately your image should look better.  Play around with the different settings until you get an image that looks good.  Be careful not to overdo it or your final video could look more like a cartoon that a photograph.  My final image looks like this:

Now that you’ve decided the best settings, click on the “Presets” drop down menu and select “Save Settings…” Press “Process” if you’d like to save your new HDR image.

Batch processing

This is a bit complicated, so I’m going to break it down into steps.

1) From back at the start up screen, select “Batch Processing.”

2) On the pop-up menu, check “Generate HDR image.”

3) Check “Tone Map with Details Enhancer” and select “Settings.”  Pick the preset you just made.

4) Make sure the correct number of images to be processed is selected.  Again, I’m using three at a time.

5) Choose your source folder and output folder.  Make sure that only the bracketed photos are in your source folder.  Check “Custom Location” and create a new folder for your generated HDR jpegs so you won’t have to seperate them later when you make your video.

6) Check “Remove 32-bit HDR image after Tone Mapping” if you want to keep the HDR jpegs but delete the large HDR files.

7) Click “Naming Option…”  Select “Name by set number, positioning number:” and check “at end of filename” and “Use shortened version.”  This step is important because it makes your new HDR jpegs ordered by number and therefore easier for VirtualDub and other video making programs to process.

Click “Run.”  (Hmm, I guess WordPress changes “8)” to a smiley face with glasses)

Next time I’ll use some processed HDR images to make a time lapse video and explain flickering and how to fix it.  As always, I’d love to answer any questions you might have.

Photographed by gari.baldi

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– License

Sky.

I was starting to feel better but then my temperature started to spike. It’s now at 101. I couldn’t get a doctor appointment until tomorrow.

Here’s an HDR image of the sky that I shot on November 27. Details the same as that day.

Benny from Team Digital has sent me the latest suite from NIK software, yet to put it all to use but have been using Silver Efex Pro for a while now and if your into Black and white, it is the only way to go. Brent Pearson is another guy who uses it. This image has been tone mapped with photomatix and stylised using Silver Efex Pro. Ok it isn’t a pretty landscape but I like it just the same.

I will be doing some reviews on the Nik suite soon. All accounts are it is an awesome bit of kit. On sale now!! Hey we love spending money right???

Park—Irvine, California

I shot this yesterday—I’m under the weather today and I’m not going to do any shooting. Details of this image are the same as yesterday.

Senior Center—Irvine, California

HDR photography isn’t for the faint of heart. I spent a long time working on this image.

This morning, I read Ken Rockwell’s excellent Nikon D200 User’s Guide cover-to-cover and I learned a lot of things that I wish I had known before. I used a tripod and my wireless remote.

One of problems that I had with this image was the bit of cloud just to the left of the lamp post. In Photomatix Pro’s tone mapping, the highlights in the clouds looked fine, but after I processed the image, they were blown out. So I created a second darker version and combined them in Photoshop. I combined these two layers and then duplicated the new layer and combined that with itself, in order to restore some contrast. I lowered the saturation at the very end by -7 because the image was starting to look too much like a picture postcard.

I used the 18-55mm kit lens with manual focusing. I shot five images at 1-stop intervals to create the HDR image.

3 Raw => HDR

Park—Irvine, California

I actually shot this yesterday, so I’m straying from the theme of the site, which is to shoot a new photo every day. But this is the shot that should have appeared yesterday. I just couldn’t get it right and I’d spent enough time in front of the computer. I knew what I needed to do to fix it, so I worked on it this morning.

While yesterday’s photo looks flat, this photo has more tonal range. This was a result of trying to remove the halo effect that occurs where objects meet the sky. In today’s photo, you can still see some haloing, but I don’t find it to be objectionable.

Here’s the technical info:

• Camera: Nikon D200
• Exposure: 5 shots bracketed at 1-stop intervals
• Processing: Photomatix with additional post-processing in Photoshop CS3.
• Handheld

Happy Thanksgiving to Americans. I’ll be eating the traditional Thanksgiving Tofurkey and other vegan food. I’ll spend some time testing out my wireless remote so that I can go out tomorrow and shoot with my tripod.

Park—Irvine, California

A new HDR photo taken at the same park as yesterday’s photo. Details are mostly the same: Nikon D200 with 18-55mm kit lens, handheld. Processed with Photomatix and Photoshop.

I’m happier with this image than yesterday’s because this one is a bit less natural-looking, which I like.

Hey all couldn’t help taking this photo for the dramatic sky!!  There weather had been shit for most of the trip to say the least!!  Shouldn’t complain too much I was in Italy after all!!  this one was HDR’d also!!  multiple images in photomatix!!  Plus a texture used one that we shot on the day!!  Stay posted for textures they will be available very soon!!  You will be able to purchase the textures on line thru our paypal acc!!

Park—Irvine, California

This is my first attempt at HDR photography. Here are the basics:

The camera was a Nikon D200 with AF Nikkor 20mm 2.8 lens. On a tripod, I bracketed the image 5 stops at 1-stop intervals. I used Photomatix to process the RAW images using Details Enhancer and then exported the TIFF file into Photoshop, where I did some more processing.

I did a few versions including one that looks cool but really fake. I settled on this realistic image.

I think I’m going to start doing more HDR images and try to master the process. One problem is that I hate using a tripod. Maybe I’ll try some handheld images.

Well, let me start off by saying CONGRATULATIONS ROUGHRIDERS!!!!  WooHoo!!!  They won tonight and they are in the Grey Cup!!!  I’m a huge Rider fan!!  WooHoo!!!

Okay now that I released my excitement I  can get back to the real reason I started this blog….

My assignment this week was to take an image and convert it to black and white through Photomatix.   I decided to photograph one of our local wineries.  Here is a photo I took of the winery in color.  I didn’t like the way this image looked in black and white so, I left it in color.  I am also happy of the way it turned out.

Okay now, I’ll show you how I changed my HDR images to black and white:

1.  Take your photo or your series of photos (you can use a single raw image if you wish) and make adjustments in Photomatix to taste.

2.  Click on Process.  If you don’t like the result, you can click on tonemap and make further adjustments.

3.  Once finished making adjustments to your desired image, click on process, then click on tonemap and take your saturation levels down to zero.

4.  Make adjustments to the way you want your photo to look like and experiment with those sliders, don’t be afraid to move those levels around.

5.  Click on process and if you do not like the resulting image, you can click on tonemap again and make further adjustments.

I’m beginning to realize there are really no rules when it comes to making adjustments in Photomatix and HDR.  It is up to how you want the images to look like.

Here are some sample photos of HDR in black and White:

Since I am on the topic of Photomatix I thought I would post this pic which was my first real success with HDR photography. A lot of you guys probably haven’t seen this pic but I think it worked out pretty cool. Taken on the trust 20D at the first Red Bull Air Race in Perth.

Also we have a new blogger in the flock, Jamie Nicolaou, check out his blog HERE

Story to come, going to bed I’m knackered!

La Defense, Les Quatre Temps

La Defense is an area slightly outside of Paris that has endless skyscrapers and modern buildings. That’s a pretty cool thing in that part of Paris, they had the courage to go “New York style” on buildings without taking out the heritage that they have. When I went there on Sunday evening (actually I went to go shopping, but don’t tell anyone) the dusk was looking quite nice.

The colorful lighting of the shopping center (Les Quatre Temps is a shopping center) was cool and I wanted to shoot it. But it was a bit more difficult because it kept changing colors, it went in waves from blue, red, green and yellow. I wanted to capture the green. Now as I was doing HDR in the evening it meant three shots, and one of the shots took about 10 seconds. So I started the photo when the colors were blue and hoped that the green would be on my photo. It almost worked this is why the colors on the right are slightly different.

Well it’s a colorful shot, I did accentuate them in Lightroom to punch them up a bit.

Details are:  Aperture: f/10  -  Exposure: 1,6 sec  -  Focal lengths: 18mm  -  ISO: 100

Yet another HDR from the Pony Farm in Temple, NH

Here is another HDR from the Pony Farm in Temple, NH. I probably should have masked the pony to the right.

Here is another HDR from the Pony Farm in Temple, NH. The saturation may be a tad high (the buckets), but I think it works in this photo.

Welcome to J.Hutchins Photography blog! Here you can see my latest Flickr uploads. As always, comments/critiques/etc are more than welcome. Make sure to view all of my posts LARGE on Flickr!

I had to go back into my extremely neglected archives so that I can vary my recently posted photos a bit instead of nothing but Turkey, I need to get away from work and go on a trip! That will be Thailand to meet my wife leaving in exactly in one week. This will be a second attempt at getting good pictures in that country as my first one was what prompted me to get a DSLR after my P&S became full of dust particles that ruined almost every picture I took the first time I was there. Anyways, here is another one of my favorite buildings–if not my favorite–in Tokyo, the Tokyo International Forum. The first batch I had processed I went really heavy on the orange hues for some reason. I have quite a few that I shot with a fluorescent white balance under these incandescent lights which gave a very blueish result.

I have been bitten by the HDR bug, I mean everything can’t be Australian Landscapes, there has to be some people in there too. This is an image tone mapped in Photoshop thanks to the Photomatix plugin that comes with photomatix. This was a single image and it sort of came out how I wanted, that gritty illustrated look. I obviously have done some work in photoshop to further stylize the image. I plan on learning everything there is to know about Photomatix and will be making that my subject for the workshop on True North.

On that subject I hope you have booked. The last I heard there was only 30 spots left.

Perdu sous les nuages

Imaginile obţinute prin tehnica HDR (High Dynamic Range) permit afişarea unei dinamici de culoare şi luminozitate, mai mare decât poate oferi aparatul foto în mod obişnuit, dar pe care ochiul uman o poate percepe.

Procedeul constă în mixarea într-un program special, cum ar fi Photomatix, sau Adobe Photoshop, a 3 sau mai multe imagini cu expuneri diferite, cu o diferenţă între ele de cel puţin 1EV (exposure value), pentru ca efectul să fie vizibil.

Pentru a realiza fotografii HDR aveţi nevoie de un aparat foto ce poate realiza auto-bracketing. Această facilitate permite aparatului să realizeze automat 3 fotografii, una cu expunere normală, una subexpusă şi alta supraexpusă faţă de cea normală. Este de preferat să folosiţi un trepied pentru ca cele trei imagini să se suprapună perfect şi să folosiţi declanşarea întârziată a aparatului pentru ca atingerea camerei cu mâna să nu producă mişcări nedorite.

Aceste fotografii sunt încărcate în programul specializat, care le combină într-una singură, având posibilitatea apoi să ajustaţi anumiţi parametri ce ţin de luminozitate, contrast, temperatură de culoare etc.

În Adobe Photoshop e simplu: File -> Automate -> Merge to HDR… şi se urmează paşii următori specificaţi de program. Photomatix este ceva mai sofisticat, având mai multe opţiuni, dar în cazul de faţă se alege butonul Generate HDR Image, apoi se urmează indicaţiile următoare având grijă să bifaţi opţiunile Align source images, Reduce chromatic aberrations şi Reduce noise. După care vă puteţi seta după gust diverşi parametri de luminozitate culoare, contrast etc.

Am realizat câteva imagini HDR folosind o “săpunieră” Panasonic DMC LS2 şi un aparat Fuji Finepix S5700. În primul caz fotografiile sunt făcute din mână iar în cazul camerei Fuji am folosit un trepied.

Uite ce a ieşit!

LE: Ultima fotografie este realizată cu un aparat Canon EOS 1000D, cu expunere manuală (fără auto-bracketing) şi folosind un mini-trepied.