My Elise on a bed of fallen Jacaranda flowers

[ozoney]

I'm playing a bit with the HDR technique. Some recent strong winds dropped the flowers from the Jacaranda trees around my office. The lighting was interesting. So, I raced home to grab the camera and tripod and setup the following shots. Each are three exposures - blended and tone-mapped.

[JUNGLISTluder]

WOW - now those are awesome shots! Nice work.

[knucklehead]

That looks awesome. If they're still making the Lotus calender next year that should be a ringer.

[ransackman]

Wow, no photoshop?

[kestrel74]

cool !! my new wallpaper !

[Mr_Baker]

Originally Posted by ransackman

Wow, no photoshop?

Whether Photoshop was involved or not, I think it is safe to say the final image is not quite reality. It is a dramatic effect here.

This thread mentions Photomatix. Big discussion of HDR and the life and death issues involved: ()

Attention Photographers: Multiple Exposures please

What tool did you use to accomplish this look?

Your images look a little grainy (or posterized) to me, in the sky particularly. Not trying to complain, just wondering whether that's the software or the original images.

[ozoney]

Not reality?!?!?!? Ok. Then neither are black-n-white, fisheye, panoramic, macro, ..., nor any photo where dust is cloned out, levels, curves, colors, and exposure levels are manipulated.

I don't work with photoshop. I'm a gimpshop user.

This is a tonemapped blended stack of 3 exposures. There is a 'normal' (reality exposure), one dark exposure, and one bright exposure. The dark and bright are two stops in each direction on the exposure scale on my camera. These images get layered/stacked with the blend exposure plugin, and then I manually adjust the layers bringing out the highlights and shadows. I merge it down and voila.

My coworker/friend is a big fan of HDR. So, I just started to mess around with it. I'm not totally sold on it, but I think the technique is pretty bleeding interesting and is fun. I still like practicing 'reality' photography. There is a huge variance in the results people are putting out with this HDR - some images are illustrative-cartoonish, and others are hard to tell if they are HDR or not.

One problem is continue to experience with the HDR is speckling and haloing. I think what I need to do is blend more exposures - take 5 maybe where the stops are -2, -1, 0, 1, 2 for the exposure settings - well I've read that this could help with those side effects.

cheers

[Gizmo3000]

That's the nature of HDR/ToneMapping - often results in highly stylized/hyper-realistic photos.
Some people take it a bit to the extreme, but I like how Ozoney did it.

Photoshop is often used to combine multiple exposures
but the program Photomatix automates the process as well.

The process comes in handy in traditional photography when there's areas that are too dark or too light for proper exposure in a single take.

[JonOrangeElise]

I'm VERY impressed. One of my magazines (Mac|Life) just published a how-to article on HDR, and your shots look better than anything we ran. very nice!

[PhlypSide]

Nice poster quality stuff!

[ozoney]

Thanks! (Its the car, and its Hawaii...)

[Mr_Baker]

Originally Posted by ozoney

Not reality?!?!?!? Ok. Then neither are black-n-white, fisheye, panoramic, macro, ..., nor any photo where dust is cloned out, levels, curves, colors, and exposure levels are manipulated.

I'm not trying to tell you something you don't know or rip on you by saying your images are "not quite reality". ransackman seemed surprised that PhotoShop was not involved, and I meant to point out that you don't need PhotoShop to alter an image dramatically. You explained your process using GIMP.

I agree that film alterations seem to be acceptable while digital alterations are frowned upon by many people and that is unfair. Every photo is an interpretation of reality. Reality is often overrated.

I've done some HDR projects myself and some have worked and some haven't. I agree it's fun and that haloing can be a problem. It's a tool like any other that can be used for good or evil.

[EdHahn]

Thomas Kinkade!

[AnsisK]

I'm a fan of HDR, but I feel you've taken it a little too far. Sometimes when the tones are so extreme I like to pull down the saturation to lessen the drama cause by the HDR process.

It's good to see people still making real HDR photos when you can just mess around with levles to get a similar effect. Good job!

Would anyone help contribute to an HDR thread if I opened one?

[Zen Dude]

I love the pics!!

- z

[NMRJock]

It's got to be fake... Look at how clean those wheels are!

[SweetDaddyD]

Very cool. Would make cool prints.
Saved to my Lotus folder.

[Mr_Baker]

Originally Posted by AnsisK

Would anyone help contribute to an HDR thread if I opened one?

I've got a couple shots that I'd contribute. One of the HDR photos I'd show doesn't look like an HDR, which makes it different from most.

[ozoney]

I would like to see the HDR that doesn't look HDR. Again, I like the more traditional photography, but I'm beginning to see where HDR can come into play and enhance imagery. btw, I'm attaching thumbnails of the three images I used to create one of the HDRs in my original post. I was ready to throw away everything Monday evening after I downloaded from the camera. I was really unhappy with the images. So, last night I thought I would try to HDR them and was amazed at what the technique produced. (And as a final modification to my images, I try to always crop to 2.35:1 aspect ratio.)

[Mr_Baker]

Here it is, the Pontiac Chieftain. It's an HDR from 3 images, if I remember right. What I think was added was the translucent glow and the detail in the shadows.

Also, another shot (Milwaukee Road #261) that looks like it might be an HDR and isn't. It looks unreal, sorta cartoonish, but it works for me in this case. It's better than the original, that's for sure.

Where you are with HDR is pretty much where I am. If it helps get a certain look, or turns a photo from bad to good (or great), bring it on. I guess this could apply to any stylized technique. Sometimes you want the processed look, sometimes you don't. HDR turned your Elise photos into something cool.