Graduated ND or HDR?

[HighPlainsPhotographer]

I am getting ready for a dedicated photo trip to the Moab, UT area. I am trying to decide if should spend the money on a couple of GND's or pick up software to do some HDR's. Any thoughts?


Shaun

[lmitch6]

My vote would be for GND's. I'm of the school of thought that it's much better to get the image as close as you envision in-camera, on scene. You'll find a lot of use for GND's in landscape work.

[Jon]

Grads - you can always shoot a series for HDR processing later, but the grads will give you immediate feedback and are more suited to dynamic situations.

[Dorman]

HDR would be cheaper, GND would be more effective and far less work PP'ing wise.

[jdkeck]

This is my opinion, based on y personal preferences and experience.

GND filters may not be very effective in canyonlands. There horizon is typically "jagged" and a soft GND will not fit the horizon. You will either end up under exposing regions on the canyon or over exposiing parts of the sky, maybe both in the same picture.

I'd suggest reading Photoshop LAB Color: The Canyon Conundrum and Other Adventures in the Most Powerful Colorspace, by Dan Margulis. Shooting RAW and then PPing in LAB color is very effective for canyonland pictures taken in bright light. For several reasons, mainly because I normally create panos from stitched images, I prefer to use masks if necessary to adjust for high contrast pictures. I haven't been very happy with my few attempts at HDR with canyonland pictures.

I'd also like to add that LAB color doesn't work well in flat light conditions, RGB space is more effective. Margulis covers this in the book. At least if you shoot RAW you can play with the image until you are exhausted.

Jeff

[volleybrad]

If it's windy and there is a lot of foliage, I would suggest Graduated ND.

[Mike K]

HDR as implimented in photoshop series of 3 (usually 5 or 7 or more) images varying in exposure that are blended. However the blending can also be done with 2 exposures quite well.
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital-blending.shtml
and there are PS plugins that make this process really painless, click on "full description and examples"
http://www.fredmiranda.com/shopping/DRI

One of the limitations to blending two images is that wind, etc could make things move between the esposures. This can be solved (with less dynamic range available by the blending methods above) by shooting RAW, then creating two images with differing exposures through RAW---> TIFF. These images will be exactly the same scene compositionally, and alignmentor camera movement will never be a problem.

I use both GND when the scene/composition lends itself to that approach, but often I find the blending approach more flexible. This creativity is part of the fun of digital.
Mike K

[HighPlainsPhotographer]

Thanks for the replies. I am going to order a couple of GND's and take a few sets with HDR in mind. Then I can decide what works best for me.

Shaun

[asylumxl]

I've seen a few HDR taken with GND and i think thats best combo ;).

[Hogloff]

GND. I've seen many fantastic photos taken with grads. I've seen many over-processed photos made using the HDR technique. Too easy to end up with a flat looking HDR image.

[Tsmith]

Like others have suggested _ just remember to take bracketed shots so you'll have the images to work with when you get back.