Tag Archives: HDR photography

I still keep making High Dynamic Range (HDR) images. I can’t help it. This popular technique involves making a series (usually three or five) images with identical composition, usually on a tripod to ensure an exact alignment of the images. Each one is taken with the same aperture but with different shutter speeds so that you end up with images that may be 2 stops under-exposed, one stop under, ‘normal’, and one and two stops over. You can use auto-exposure bracketing if your camera supports it – but I have to change the settings manually on my camera to achive that range of exposures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The images are then subsequently merged in post-processing software to create an image which incorporates the full range of light levels in the scene, without any areas of under- or over exposure. The result can be quite natural or quite dramatic, depending on your preference. I find that the technique can turn a scene with flat or uninteresting light into something quite compelling. It is also useful when the range of tones from dark to bright in the image exceed the limited range that can be recorded by the sensor of a digital camera.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can do the merging in Photoshop (CS5 has good HDR functionality), but I continue to use Photomatix which is a specialist tool for HDR imaging, offering a great deal of control over the appearance of the image created.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But the technique can be overdone – and often (perhaps usually!) is. It can difficult to resist punching up the local contrast or saturation levels to a point where the effect is hyper-surreal or oppressively garish. Oversaturated, grungy images, which one critic has referred to ‘Harry Potter photos’ are all over photo-sharing sites on the net, and have given the technique a bad name in some quarters. Used with discretion and moderation however, I think it can be brilliant. And sometimes it’s good fun to create that surreal effect.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ll do some more posts about Tassy later, but in the mean time you can see other photos from Tasmania (only a few which employed HDR!) on my website in this folder. There’s also a folder with a number of other HDR images here. Hope you like them!