On the street HDR - 1st attempt C&C

[CloudINC00]

Well, I was walking around down-town and I happened to have my 28-80mm on me. I wish I had something wider, but here's a photo from the shoot:

http://fc44.deviantart.com/fs37/f/2008/276/4/6/Bust_Stop_HDR_by_CloudINC00.jpg

it's a 3-shot HDR, JPEG. I know, I should have shot RAW.

This being my first time, I spent a lot of time in PP (Both photomatix and Photoshop) and I'm still not happy with it.

With later images, I used more smoothing (using Photomatix by the way). What I want to do is tone down the halo-effect, even though the sun was behind the sign (so there was a "natural" glow there).

What is the key in the PP stage? Especially with images like this.

If someone wants the original JPEGs, I'll be happy to post them but they'll be big.

I'm ready for any C&C, good, bad, etc. I just want to get better.

[CloudINC00]

Here are some typical photomatix settings I use:

STR: 100
SAT: 70
LT: 4
LUM: 5

Tone
WT: 4.8%
BL: 1.8%
GA: 1.1

Color
TM: -2
HI: -2
SH: -4

Micro
CO: 2
SM: 2

S/H
HI: 30
SH: 20
CL: 0

sorry for the short names, but they should be in order anyway (using Photomatix Pro 3.0)

This is "okay" for that over-done look but I want to move on to more realistic photos, especially when my wider lens come in the mail.

[canonloader]

Light Smoothing, the 5 radio buttons on the Tone Mapping interface are a big part of what causes halos. The further to the right you go, the less halo. #5 should cause no halos. Then in the S/H Tab, Highlights Smoothing can sometimes cause halos.

I'll include some various xmp settings files I have saved for some of mine. Drag them out of the zip file into your Photomatix install folder, they go into the Presets folder. Then in the dropdown at the bottom of the tone mapping panel, you can see them there and just click to load one. That will cause all you sliders to jump to the settings used in that file. Try some different ones to see what you get, and don't forget to save ones you like too. :)

[zacker]

nice shot.... but you have sensor dust...lol, lol.. thats what i hate most about HDR, it brings out all the spots on the sensor and lens.