HDR Photography

[im2smrt4u]

So, I've been playing with some HDR photography with mixed results...Here is my favorite so far:



And a couple other tries:





Anyone have any HDR photos to share? Any tips? What program(s) does everyone use?

[Manic_Skafe]

I used to use Photomatix but I don't really bother with HDR these days. The effect is way overdone in all of these but some like that.

[im2smrt4u]

Perhaps it is a bit overdone. Another one I just did with a different shot of the temple:



I'm playing with the settings in Photomatix to make the effect less extreme. I need to re-do the lobby and glass dome pics...

[Radio Monk33]

Cool. I find it a bit overdone in many circles. I like the first one, but of your shots I find the second shot in particular too extreme and artificial looking. Just my 2c.

[Starkizzer]

The first shot is actually a better representation of how the glass dome looked with the sun shinning in. I think in some cases HDR can give photos a more realistic feel.

[fnaqzna]

I used to play around a bit with PhotoMatix. Decided to give another go recently:

[im2smrt4u]

Beautiful desert shot!

Here is one from the other thread. This version is processed from the RAW file in Photomatix:



This one is processed from the same RAW image and +/-2ev versions were made in Lightroom before processing:



Very noisy, but a cool effect for the old bridge.

---------- Post added at 12:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:23 PM ----------

The lobby shot redone a lot less extreme:



And the original source image:



This seems to be a case when the non-HDR image looks better than the HDR version. Perhaps things would be different if I had my tripod, but perhaps not.

[Confederate]

Here are a few that I've worked on. It's a cool process. But yea can be overdone.

[Pacifier]

HDR does not improve every picture, HDR can but usefull, but not allways.
use it when you have a strang light situation, a mix of bright and dark areas, then combining different exposures do make sense

And please don't put every slider in your program to the "max". Most of the times it looks horrible.

Here is a good tutorial for photomatix:
Photomatix Before the Coffee

And a HDR I have made:

[powerclown]

I think I screwed this up, sky is blown out.
Cool pix in this thread, I like hdr most of the time.

[powerclown]

Hdr://crazyhistogram

[Stone]

Have any of you HDR enthusiasts noticed that CSI Miami *seems* to be shot in HDR? I say seems because I have no verifyable proof, just my own observations. But that's the way I explain the intense color saturation. I know Miami doesn't look like that, naturally. I'm open to other possibilities/explanations if anyone has some.

[im2smrt4u]

While not likely HDR, I'm sure they do some sort of digital enhancement to the video. I highly doubt that is natual lighting all the time.

[Cynthetiq]

there's lots of movie coloring done just like photoshop or after effects. it's done to for many reasons, but most of all to get a look just like HDR.

[MSD]

Originally Posted by fnaqzna

I used to play around a bit with PhotoMatix. Decided to give another go recently:

I would pull saturation on the blue channel back and cut midtone luminance a bit. You got your exposures right but it looks like you pushed it a bit too far.

Originally Posted by powerclown

Hdr://crazyhistogram

Did you just push the sliders all the way to the right? I'm not sure what you were going for here.