My Home at Sunset - should I go HDR?

In the minutes prior to this shot, the sun was so intense that it was blowing everything out and the contrast was simply too intense to get anything from the shadows of my 'hoose'. In the minutes after, the nice hues had mostly gone and turned to grey/black sky. This shot was taken in a window of about a minute where the histogram was 'acceptable', but even at that, I've lost a fair bit of data in the dark areas. Now, i've looked into HDR but I don't like it... possibly due to laziness, or maybe because ... i dunno.. it's cheating or something. Now I can't justify that because I know many a great shot has been attained due to HDR, but I simply do not want go there... it all feels wrong.

My question here is, am I naive because I refuse to use HDR? Would I have attained a much better shot if I'd patiently taken before/during/after shots and merged them? Or is there anyone else who feels the way I do... and if there is, why?

Cheers!

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What are you a knight? Try HDR and see. It can't hurt!

Organic Treats wrote in post #11091646
What are you a knight? Try HDR and see. It can't hurt!

...well, I don't like to brag, so please call me Jim... although 'Sir' Jim would be more appropriate.

I have tried HDR mate, and I could happily use it if I was going for abstract stuff, but I have a real problem with portraying 'true' images using HDR... I feel that it's unnatural and is ultimately portraying a false image. Admittedly, I used a fair bit of shadow/highlight in Photoshop on this image - and a number of other adjustments in this case - but i feel that manipulating an image i've captured is acceptable, (this may sound hypocritical) but merging a number of images to create a single image is simple false. Or am i being too ethical?

I am not a pro photographer, so maybe I can afford to enter into 'ethics' - if i was pro, anything for the shot that will sell - but I really wanted to hear others' views on this.

I suspect i may be alone on this, but... us knights are a bit different from the rest of you peasants.

I know what you mean in that when shooting a sunset... in less than 60 seconds the light changes dramatically.

When I do any landscape stuff... I just automatically bracket every shot with at least 5 exposures, at 1 stop interval. I never trust a histogram, especially with sunsets. I make final decision on the best exposure on a calibrated 30" screen, not on the back of a camera live view. A histogram is not always the best way to judge exposure on specular highlights, and every scene is different. But shooting in bracketed exposure ALSO then gives me the option to blend layers from two images, or go into HDR mode.

But you need to take all the exposures quickly. I can take 5 exposures in manual mode, just changing exposure time, in about 15 seconds. Real quick. That way the scene is about the same. It is very critical for sunsets. But even more critical if the sky and clouds are moving.

I spend a lot of time in PhotoShop, so grabbing 5 bracketed images in RAW always works best for my workflow. This way I never miss a shot due to bad exposure, since I cover all my bases. But of course this only works for static scenes.

Great crib, Jim. You can download the trial version of photomatix and if you didn't take any bracketed shots, you can try a single raw image, or alternatively make 3 or 5 tiffs in one stop increments. Although hdr people will scream about God killing kittens and not being true hdr, its surprising what this technique will pull out.

Surely, one who lives in such a home could easily have the hired (or indentured) help stand just out of frame holding enough reflectors to properly light the side of the building, or the entire loch for that matter.

You should not have any ethical conserns over using HDR for this or any other image, especially if you state it. I'm very interested to see what you come up with on this shot.

BTW - Where is this? I did a quick drive through Scotland last summer (2009) and definitely want to spend more time there and explore more areas.

Wouldn't this image be great for one of the famous "before and after" contests?

When done right, an HDR image is more realistic than a single image. In a situation like this where you have a huge range of light and dark, a single image will never look like the real scene looked to your eye. When you merge multiple exposures and then tonemap and process them properly, you will have an image that is more realistic than any of the single images. HDR doesn't have to be overdone.

And, no, it isn't cheating. If using various filters on your lens, flash, post-processing, and the like aren't cheating (and they're not), then neither is HDR. That sentiment apparently came from journalistic photographers that are trained to never alter an image. That's fine and good for journalism, but we're talking about art here, aren't we? Besides, like I said, a properly-done HDR image is MORE realistic-looking than any journalist's single image in this kind of scene.

JimMcrae wrote in post #11091826
I am not a pro photographer, so maybe I can afford to enter into 'ethics' - if i was pro, anything for the shot that will sell - but I really wanted to hear others' views on this.

Like pixelhack, the only pros who don't alter their images, are photojournalists. If any pros don't alter their images, it's likely because they got the image all in-camera, not because of ethics.

I agree though, I'm not a fan of overdone HDR, but if you use it for it's originally intended purpose - to control dynamic range, you should give it a shot. I like to get a relatively flat image out of Photomatix (or whatever processing software you use), and then treat it like any other image with the post-processing in Photoshop or camera raw.

A lot of very useful points here and interesting that everyone appears to agree. I'll take a look at Photomatrix then. Many thanks for all the comments.

moeronn, you just can't get the right quality of slaves these days... It's Eilean Donan castle on Loch Duich in the West Highlands, home of the McRae clan. So it really IS my home but I don't actually live in it

Cheers!

pixelhack wrote in post #11093017
When done right, an HDR image is more realistic than a single image.

I don't think that I 've ever seen an HDR image that is 'realistic'. Certainly not 'more realistic than a single image'.

Roy Mathers wrote in post #11094303
I don't think that I 've ever seen an HDR image that is 'realistic'. Certainly not 'more realistic than a similar image'.

Ah, a different view... interesting. I await responses to this with bated breath.

Thanks Roy.

Sir Jim:

I think your photo looks fine as is. I feel there is enough detail in the castle to separate it from the clouds in the background, yet it's darker than the sunlit spots, giving it that mysterious feeling that a castle deserves. While HDR is appropriate in some shots, I find that it is overused and often overdone.

You have done well, Good Knight!

I like the image - and my answer is that it possibly could benefit from an HDR.

It's worth a try - you have a large dynamic range that the sensor doesn't cover by itself.
In the end - as people said, you have to try and see for yourself.

Roy Mathers wrote in post #11094303
I don't think that I 've ever seen an HDR image that is 'realistic'. Certainly not 'more realistic than a similar image'.

Possibly because you always see tonemapped HDR image - if you reduce the tonemapping to a minimum an HDR image can be very realistic.

On the other hand - you can tonemap a single image so that it looks like an overdone HDR.