First go at HDR

Here is an HDR shot I did for realty purposes. This is my first attempt at HDR. It was shot at night so I used the room lighting of which is extremely orange/tungsten. C/C welcome.

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Very clear and natural looking.
I see the lights are blown out a little (which may not be a bad thing), but if you wanted more detail there, you could try a darker exposure to capture those highlights without clipping, before the merge.

Old Baldy wrote in post #13689231
Very clear and natural looking.
I see the lights are blown out a little (which may not be a bad thing), but if you wanted more detail there, you could try a darker exposure to capture those highlights without clipping, before the merge.

natural and clear is exactly what I was aiming for. I didn't even think of do some tweaking to the originals before merging them. Unfortunately me being a dufus I deleted the 5 originals.

A couple of things.

1) there are highlights that I would not consider specular that are completely blown and distracting (for example any area on the furniture in which the finish blows out - back of the chair, edges of the side table - as well as the crystal/glass on the right). Because you are using HDR, these areas should be captured and handled appropriately.

2) as is the case when you shoot directly into a bright light source, there is a large area of lens flare overlying the table leg and chair directly in front of the camera. Next time, you should consider shading the lens (even above and beyond what the lens shade might provide) to avoid this flare. Processing only makes it more visible.

3) if you are going for an HDR capture/rendering, you cannot have the chandelier lights and the glass surrounds and fixtures completely blown. Even if you take a single exposure just for them and blend that area back into a rendering like the one you posted, you need to pre sere these details. Otherwise, the light source is a distraction and it is likely an interesting part of the scene that is no longer viewable. Also, consider the aperture at which you shoot the scene, if the star patterns emanating from each lamp bulb are undesirable.

Shooting this during the day will help bring the luminance of the room closer to the level of the bulbs in the chandelier, so less overall compression will be necessary - however, then you will have to deal with the mixed lighting conditions (exterior daylight and tungsten interior lighting). Real estate photographers should carry a huge assortment of daylight balanced bulbs and replace the tungsten ones in each room with daylight ones for such shots .


Just some thoughts.

kirk

ok nice thanks. I knew the blown out sections were an issue and also the lens flare but didn't know if it was going to be too much of a distractions I'll retake the shots in better lighting conditions and play around with the aperture. Thanks for the feedback greatly appreciated.

You're welcome - have fun with experimenting!

kirk

Nice Crown molding and chair rail.

kirkt wrote in post #13691188
A couple of things.

1) there are highlights that I would not consider specular that are completely blown and distracting (for example any area on the furniture in which the finish blows out - back of the chair, edges of the side table - as well as the crystal/glass on the right). Because you are using HDR, these areas should be captured and handled appropriately.

2) as is the case when you shoot directly into a bright light source, there is a large area of lens flare overlying the table leg and chair directly in front of the camera. Next time, you should consider shading the lens (even above and beyond what the lens shade might provide) to avoid this flare. Processing only makes it more visible.

3) if you are going for an HDR capture/rendering, you cannot have the chandelier lights and the glass surrounds and fixtures completely blown. Even if you take a single exposure just for them and blend that area back into a rendering like the one you posted, you need to pre sere these details. Otherwise, the light source is a distraction and it is likely an interesting part of the scene that is no longer viewable. Also, consider the aperture at which you shoot the scene, if the star patterns emanating from each lamp bulb are undesirable.

Shooting this during the day will help bring the luminance of the room closer to the level of the bulbs in the chandelier, so less overall compression will be necessary - however, then you will have to deal with the mixed lighting conditions (exterior daylight and tungsten interior lighting). Real estate photographers should carry a huge assortment of daylight balanced bulbs and replace the tungsten ones in each room with daylight ones for such shots .


Just some thoughts.

kirk

This very useful critical feedback helps me too, thanks. I never even saw half of what you mention.

Glad it helps - I've taken many shots just like this in my experimenting with HDR, and I've made all of the "errors" multiple times. I've seen most of these "errors" in my own experiments more than once too.



kirk