My first HDR

[gregrocco]

My first time trying HDR, used the standard -2, 0, +2 and used Picturenaut to process it. Comments?

http://i365.photobucket.com/albums/oo93/gregrocco/tree.jpg

[randy.wick]

Well, I strongly believe in honesty so here goes: I don't know what you were trying to accomplish here. I can't see any benefit to composing an HDR image of this composition, and in any case this doesn't really seem to accomplish the purpose of HDR, which is to display detail in a wide range of contrast that a single image would be unable to achieve. Here you still have blown out lights and imperceptible darkness surrounding the lights. It's important to keep in mind that HDR is not a replacement for lighting.

Try taking a bracketed exposure of of something where your +2 shows details which would be overly shadowed and your -2 shows details which would be blown out (i.e., landscape with sky). I think you'll be happier with the result.

[-Douglas-]

I was wondering how one of these would turn out, hmmmm

[gregrocco]

Well, I strongly believe in honesty so here goes: I don't know what you were trying to accomplish here.

No problem, lol. What I was trying to accomplish was an ultra-colorful, somewhat hyper-realistic photo. I've only had my XSi for a month or so, and I'm still learning the ins and outs of DSLRs. When I've tried photographing something like this (a bright object in a dark room) in the past, I've usually come up with one of two results, either too dark, or too bright (with the flash). Personally, I thought this came out kind of cool, and IMO, it does look a little better in the original RAW format.

[-Douglas-]

just checking things out!

http://i396.photobucket.com/albums/pp49/dougle/POTN/testHDR/xmastree.jpg

Gregrocco, I don't know what PP software you have but I ran this in PS CS3.

duplicate layer
filter>blur>average
invert the layer
set blending to overlay
added selective color adjustment and set blacks to 39%

What do you think?

[gregrocco]

I actually didn't do any pp on this, other than to run it through Picturenaut. I'm currently saving up for a more current version of PS, as I'm still hamstrung by the PS 5.0 LE I got from my father in law a few years ago...

That looks better than mine, by the way, sharper and brighter.

[gregrocco]

I'm curious, also, since I'm still learning, what would the response have been if I had simply posted this as an artistic attempt, and not mentioned HDR at all?

[-Douglas-]

I'm thinking maybe some vignette to block most of the ceiling and the wall hanging and then you would have a good shot for a Christmas card or something along those lines IMO.

[JoYork]

Gregrocco - I really like the image once it's been post-processed as Dognbone did it. Your original image was a bit flat. I often find that with my own attempts, they often need "finishing off" in Photoshop or similar to make them pop a little more.

[JackFlash19]

That edit really pops Dog! Very nice job! I did think the original image was a bit dark