Any body here ever do a "HDR" in PhotoShop?

[eoJ]

im thinkin the wider the gap in exposure the better it would work.

There is software specifically for doing HDRs. Prob the best out there is Photomatix - HDR Soft. It is a Photoshop plugin.

http://www.hdrsoft.com/

See an excellent example of HDR on the splash page.

I believe 1-stop diff with 3 exposures (one-stop over exposed, correct exposure, and 1-stop under exposed) is preferred. You can use 1/2-stop bracketing but the results are not as dynamic.

Some of the most dynamic digital photos I have seen have been done as color HDR images, then converted to B&W and tweaked using Niksoft's Silver Effects Pro.

http://www.niksoftware.com/silverefexpro/usa/entry.php

I'm in the same fix as your wife, old school film photography struggling with digital.

[randall]

trust me...shes struggling more. i didnt even know this stuff existed. thanks again...when i have more time i plan to really look at it.

[Capt Rick Hiott]

Here is a quick one I did a couple weeks ago using Photomatix. It takes some playing around with. Im not crazy about this shot. I needed more light in the house to make it look right.

[eoJ]

That HDR can use a little more exposure range. The shadows under the chairs should have floor detail in them, the landscape and sky outside the windows should have color saturation like the interior of the room. The fridge door should be all detail, not a white blob.

That setting has an extreme range, may require shooting 5 images at +/- 2-stops between exposures to cover everything???

That's a great place to learn how to expose for HDR. It seems to cover everything. Don't give up! Try it again.

How big are the files you used? How many exposures? What was the bracketing? And how long did it take Photomatix to do its thing?

[Capt Rick Hiott]

Yeah,,,like I said, If I had a little more light in the house it would have looked better. It was pretty dark in there with no lighting on at all.

I did combine 5 shots to get this one with 1 full stop between them.

The RAW file size of each shot is around 10.0MB. It didnt take that long for Photomatix to do its thing,,about 30 sec I guess.

Post some of your HDR shots Joe...............

[eoJ]

I have not done any HDR yet. I have only been studying it, reading about. But you are inspiring me.

A little under the weather right now, in a few days I will shoot something for HDR and download the trial version of Photomatix. I have done the tutorials on their webpage, just need to get after it and do it!

Stay tuned.

[randall]

im super busy right now also but this is very interesting to me. i need good photos all the time. thanks again for the heads up. i spoke to a good friend thats a pro and he said he was aware of it and would help me.

[RollerGuide]

i too have photomatix on my mac but it's a standalone application and not a PS plug-in

like some have said...for HDR to really do wonders you need pictures with a decent color range between shadows and highlights...

and it does take some playing around and at times a lotta luck to to really nail it

[designt1]

i too have photomatix on my mac but it's a standalone application and not a PS plug-in

like some have said...for HDR to really do wonders you need pictures with a decent color range between shadows and highlights...

and it does take some playing around and at times a lotta luck to to really nail it

I found that over and underexposing a high quality RAW image file in photoshop (2 brightness levels down, 2 up, and the original) works great for HDR photos as well as bracketed shots.

Here is my first HDR photos taken from a single high quality jpeg (not RAW)

Before

After

[Capt Rick Hiott]

Your right,,,I shoot 5 RAW shots for a HDR.

Good job!