Hobie Cat Forums

HDRs are a way to layer 2 or more images of the same subject held together by different f-stops (but identical tripoded images for incredible dramatic effects).

To use this `latent`ability of your digital 35mm camera, you will need to use a program called Photomatix Pro 3`.

Imagine it like having a dual camera set for the same picture at exactly the same x,y.z coords but .5 to as many f stops as your lens can handle...
Then paste the two (plus) images together (to fill in the `blanks`or the regions you never thought were there. Enjoy!

Here`s a small example out side my house tonight at sundown:



Sleep in coloured dreams, friends

Fred

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

That's a pretty amazing effect Fred. What does HDR stand for? So really you are superimposing one shot over another, and each of the shots have different f stop settings. Is that right ?

_________________


Don't take life too seriously................it ain't permanent.

K, so what's the 'trickery'?
Not much, If you have a very solid understanding of 'Photoshop' this should be child's play...
Go to your 'Histogram' motif and try to 'glue' all the parts that were either over exposed or under exposed.
The Mid tones will give you the most 'push/pull'.

If you can't afford Photoshop No worries Photomatic can give you a graph of the luminance and the RGB. Just layer them and if it's messed up and glue (just undo it until you get it right.

Hint : just in case you think its a winner. SAVE AS .....Repeat until finished.
Remember the more the layers the better as it will fill in all 'blank spots'

This program with a very sturdy 'Manfrotto' tripod will allow you to soar with the eagles...

Speaking of which, this program was never designed for motion imaging....but who says???

Consider 60 frames a second as a start point.....

See you in the 'Underworld' as you bisect a 20 second high speed roll and take it apart 1/60 of a second on layer paste...

Fred

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

Hi Slaughter
HDR = High Definition Resolution.

It is the same shot taken at EXACTLY the same shot with a solidly locked tripod (ie: Manfrotto is the standard in Pro photography. I has to be cranked or it all goes to sheit (fuzzy).
Each time you carefully just go up ,5 to 1 f-stop and expose.
If you can pull off 8 shots, you Rule!. I suggest a digital wireless remote to stop the shakes.

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

Patience, Patience. I remember in '74 I went to Firenza (Florence, Italy) and studied Michelangelo. That old Italian fart knew more about tricking the human eyeball than we've learned in the last 500 years. I swear I spent a week just figurrng out the layout of David. It seems I wasn't the only one as it seems to be a standard in classical art studies. Yet nothing has changed....
...same as it ever was..same as it ever was......
He was an absolute master of perspective and Contrast.
The perspective can be achieved by lenses. The Contrast/eyeplay can be achieved by repeating a 'trick of the eye'. I'll leave the rest for you to discover with this simple yet highly effective tool to be the eye trickster.

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

Slaughter
The Cabo san Pompeii was 3 separate shots taken as quick as I could with 1 f-stop apart with a cheap 'travel' tripod (I got lucky even though I can still tell it was not 'locked' properly). Each 'layer' was unsharp masked and adjusted for maximum contrast and pasted together in Photomatix 3.
The shot was taken in the evening dusk light direct into the fading light from our 8th story Hotel room in Cabo San Lucas.
Thanks for asking
Fred

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

Caution!
I've you have ever done photo editing for the printing Biz, DO NOT reconfigure your RGB palette into CMYK unless you do a save as first to preserve your originals...
If you fail to do this, you will end up with the worst mess ever conceived in hell (which you cannot undo).
Photomatix was never designed for a 4 color printing press. If you can only think in 4 colors:
Cyan
Magenta
Yellow
Black
This is not your program. Fair warning.

You need to think in the colors as your Monitor sees them:
Red
Green
Blue
and of course Luminance (brightness/intensity) control.

However as anything worth printing; the final save as Master Original can be saved as a CMYK. However, unless you are highly familiar with the nuances of both color palettes, ;leave the CMYK matchups to the pros. 10 plus hours of hard work is not worth messing up, immho.

Cheers M8s
Happy RGB for you and me
Fred

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

Hmmm, I've always known HDR as High Dynamic Range.
Great for sunset shots like you've shown.

The range between bright highlights and dark shadows the is very small in a camera compared to the human eye. If you have extremes of bright and dark you usually have to expose for one or the other but the camera cannot cover the entire range. HDR is a way of taking multiple exposures to expose for the bright parts of the scene and then changing the exposure to correctly expose the dark parts over a series of photos. The camera is best locked to a steady tripod.
The series of photos is then brought into the HDR software where it is combined to produce a single image covering the entire range.

The following photo of Telstra Tower on Black Mountain in Canberra was shot on the weekend we were going to go to Lake Maquarie and had to abort due to weather. Consists of 3 shots exposed for tower, stars and foyer.

_________________

Yep, agree with what Cowsgomoo said. Great use of HDR on that one too!

_________________

I'd rather be sailing,
Mark.

Hi Cowsgomoo
Thank you, you're right it is High Dynamic Range. (Brain freeze)
Lovely shot of the Tower.
Good description of camera limitations.
I assume you use Photomatix Pro as I know of no other program that has the ability to paste the layers together?

Fred

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'

Hi Fred,
Yes I have used Photomatix Pro. Great bit of software. The newer versions of Photoshop such as CS5 also do a pretty good job at merging things too.

_________________

Hiyas
Left Photoshop alone after I got out of the 'Printing Biz'. (reminded me of extreme stress and impossible deadline).. I still use Elements even though I miss the directness of a pro program (without the dumbdowns that Elements is saddled with)
Thanks M8. Hope you're getting the best out Photoshop still.
From that Tower shot, I'd say, you're doing great!
Would love to see more of your work, if you wish to share.
Fred

_________________
Always looking for ways to make good things 'Gooder'