First Ever HDR - C and C Please

This is my very first crack at HDR. Thoughts? Comments? Any beginner tips for me?

This was 11 exposures.

Kind of strange subject matter, unless there's a personal connection. For one thing, the haloing around the trees is pretty severe, and the colors are out of whack.

Halos and the dead can work but not here.

First thing I noticed was the halos, they are pretty strong. There's also a shadow of what looks like your tripod and despite all the exposures, the the main grave flowers have blown highlights. Looks like it just needs dialing back a bit although a rather morbid subject matter.

Why 11 exposures? Start with 3....and a calibrated monitor.

The sky and the halos are not good. The halos are usually due to the Strength slider being too high, the Highlight Smoothing (or Smoothing) being too low.

What you are actually going for in this image is called Tone Mapping. That is the overcooked look that people are mistakenly calling HDR. This image would probably look a lot better if it looked more natural.

Baby steps first, there some good advice given already for you to try again.

Same image, only non-HDR and a different perspective taken on the same day. Thoughts?

I like this new image a lot better.

Also, from the look of this image, it doesn't appear that you ever needed to capture multiple images for the first one. I think you just should have played with it in PS. It doesn't look as if you were shooting at a High Dynamic Range scene.

Agree ^^^^ There is nothing in that shot that would benefit from HDR.

There have been times when I would shoot an AEB bracket, get back to my computer, and then realize....this is better as a single shot and some PP.

There is a time for HDR and there is a time when HDR will ruin a great shot. Sometimes it is perfectly fine to have dark shadows, it adds contrast to the image. The main thing I use HDR for is when I'm trying to get a better sky, or I'm shoot real estate interiors. If I can compose the foreground and get enough sky that I can pull it out in PP, I just go with it. Or, I take two shots and I layer them and mask in the sky.

I got carried away with HDR for a while and now I'm a lot more selective with it. For example, I'm shooting a stream and the dynamic range from the stream (because of the trees) to the sky is just too wide. On a shot like that I will use it so I can end up with a final image that captures what I saw.

A good rule of thumb is....when the sun is behind you, you usually don't need HDR. It's perfectly fine to have some dark shadows here and there.

Thanks for the comments everyone.

I took this picture on my way home. I just got photoshop cs5 and wanted to try an HDR. I thought no better subject than my grandfathers gravestone. I knew it wasn't an 'ideal' HDR setting, which is why I also took a 'correct' exposure. I figured i'd take an 11 exposure scale for my HDR so that i'd have too many exposures to work with rather than too few. I think, even through stupidity, I learned that there need to be EXTREME darks and EXTREME lights to require an 11 exposure HDR. My next time out i'll try to capture a 3 or 5 exposure HDR and see what the results yield.

What are some halo-eliminating HDR tips in photoshop cs5? Anyone? I like the surreal pre-set that photoshop HDR pro offers, but it also resulted in all of these halos!

smackitsakic wrote in post #11213063
Thanks for the comments everyone.

I took this picture on my way home. I just got photoshop cs5 and wanted to try an HDR. I thought no better subject than my grandfathers gravestone. I knew it wasn't an 'ideal' HDR setting, which is why I also took a 'correct' exposure. I figured i'd take an 11 exposure scale for my HDR so that i'd have too many exposures to work with rather than too few. I think, even through stupidity, I learned that there need to be EXTREME darks and EXTREME lights to require an 11 exposure HDR. My next time out i'll try to capture a 3 or 5 exposure HDR and see what the results yield.

What are some halo-eliminating HDR tips in photoshop cs5? Anyone? I like the surreal pre-set that photoshop HDR pro offers, but it also resulted in all of these halos!

You only need to do this IF the spread in dynamic range in the composition needs it. Too many people waste their time with HDR when there really isn't a need for it. Either that, or they take a single image and then create multiple exposure images from that and THEN process it as an HDR (it isn't). The result is usually a hodgepodge of over-tonemapped images...take a look at most of the 'HDR' threads in the critique forum and you'll see what I mean.

Not trying to dissuade you from it, its just that HDR is really getting overplayed, and not in a good way. When the conditions call for it, by all means give it a shot and practice...just don't spend your time shooting multiple images when there isn't a need.

As far as halos...avoiding them requires a combination of intensity level, light smoothing, etc. I'm not familiar with CS5 (been using Photomatix and will probably give NIK Efex a try soon).