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UER Forum > Archived UE Tutorials, Lessons, and Useful Info > ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~ (Viewed 3125 times)
Wolfheart 


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~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
< on 8/7/2009 9:23 AM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
I'll try to tell how I do it - this sure ain't only or even right way to do hdr images but this is how I create them. I also try to give some tips that I've found good for use.

1. First you need digital camera and tripod.

2. Pay attention to compose; check that horizon is at line. Find something interesting to main subject of the picture. Learn to see, pay attention to details. Try to avoid putting main subject in the middle of the picture - almost always picture gets much more interesting when main subject is somewhere else than middle of the picture. Try to catch the atmosphere of the place to picture - so when composing think picture, not the whole place because picture gets only part of it. But remember always play with situation - sometimes it is good to break rules to get better photos.

3. If possible, use exposure bracketing and self-timer. I shoot with Canon PowerShot S5 IS and there are both of these.

Exposure bracketing means that camera takes example 3 photos with different exposures with just one shoot. I almost always take that 'middle' photo with under exposuring 1/3. This gives me almost always one and well exposured ordinary photo if hdr doesn't work. And those other two pictures I'll take at wide as possible, which means with my camera that other picture gets under-exposured -2 and that other over exposured +2.

Self-timer is good to avoid camera's shaking when shooting, I'll usually use 10 seconds delay.

So now we have 3 (same) pictures with 3 different exposures

4. Then I put them together. For that I use Photomatix Pro, which is quite simple and good program. First open those 3 pictures to Photomatix Pro (File-->Open)

5. Put them together (HDR-->Generate-->and ok few times).

6. After that you have some kind of "raw hdr" there. Go to HDR-->Tone Mapping. This is where we really get into hdr. There are quite much to get involved, but I'll usually use just few of them (those "important!" ones):

Strength: Almost always at 100

Color Saturation: Almost always at 48

Light Smoothing (important!): I almost always use +1 or +2, some rare cases +0 but almost never those minus numbers - they give so unreal look that... It just doesn't work for me.

Luminosity (important!): I almost always use numbers under zero here, but of course it depends the photo - some rare cases can need even plus numbers.

Microcontrast: I always keep it at +2 so put it there and forget.

Micro-smoothing (important!): with this you can also do quite lot to mood of the image. I usually use those more grainy values, something like +2 to +9, but this depends too.

When you have found combinations that seems good to your eye, just press ok. After few moments you have hdr picture there, and you can save it: File--> Save as.

After this I open picture to Photoshop, maybe do autocontrast or adjust it with my own hands and maybe play with colours.

And finally, here are one example to compare (photos ain't exactly same but almost). First ordinary 'one exposure' photo:



And here are hdr, built by three photos with different exposures:



As you can se, hdr can give much wider tone scale - this room was so dark that when I did want to get chair to see with just one photo, window did burn over. But with hdr, no problems, or at least not so big problems.

I wish that somebody gets something useful out of this (even my english is pure pain). And don't forget to show results if you get any.

trent 

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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 1 on 8/7/2009 12:57 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Nice tutorial man. And I'm so glad that it wasn't the bleeding retina kind of tutorial. You don't want people suing then when their eye's start bleeding.

I currently don't using bracketing on my camera even though I should be. I just take appx. 5-9 shots with different shutter speeds to get a rage of underexposed, normal, and over exposed. Sometimes I'll run 11-18 or photos through Photomatrix for one image....but tripod/camera stability is HUGE.

Then in Photomatrix, I can vouch for your suggested settings. In my experience I've found myself getting very close to those same levels you mentioned.

If I can bust out an HDR image and people don't notice that it's HDR, I consider that a win.

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msgsudz 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 2 on 8/7/2009 4:02 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
thanks for posting this...great job.

"She's built like a steakhouse, but handles like a bistro!" - Zapp Brannigan
snap228 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 3 on 8/7/2009 4:51 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Thanks for the post. I've been a little confused about the HDR process, despite my research, so it's nice to have something to reference.

Banditt 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 4 on 8/7/2009 10:42 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Great tutorial post. I will definitely try Photomatrix as I keep hearing it is worlds better at HDR compared to PS.

FLICKR
hilite 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 5 on 8/8/2009 10:24 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
If one is really lazy, you can also just create bracketed photos from a single
16- bit TIFF

And when you finally disappear, We'll just say you were never here.
snap228 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 6 on 8/9/2009 1:53 AM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by HI-LITE
If one is really lazy, you can also just create bracketed photos from a single
16- bit TIFF


I tried that once, but had sucky luck. I used photomatix and 1 RAW photo. It looked exactly the same. But I just tampered with the exposure in photoshop and saved three separate files to combine. Nothing technical. Am I doing something wrong?

profoundunderground 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 7 on 8/9/2009 2:52 AM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
If you shoot raw, you can easily create hdrs from a single frame. The only problem with doing this is the more you tweak your settings in camera raw, the more noise you create. But, this technique can be useful when the scene your trying to capture has movement, or anything that can't be duplicated within multiple frames.

If your making a hdr from one raw file, I tend to tweak more than just exposure. Fill light and recovery play a big part in it, and I often tweak highlights, lights, shadows separately for each frame. When I'm processing my raw files for hdr, all my work is based off the histogram for each image. My zero exposure will have a peak in the center of the histogram, where my negative and positive exposures will have peaks on the left and right side. This way you get the maximum in dynamic range.

As far as the tutorial, I think its pretty good. The only thing that I don't really agree with is having strength set to 100. For the work I've done, I find this to be a little too much, but I do realize that these settings will be different depending on your cameras, and exposures. Lastly, I just want to say to wolfheart that considering your shooting with a point and shoot, I'd love to see what you could do with a dslr. Keep up the good work.

Wolfheart 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 8 on 8/9/2009 9:35 AM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
That hdr from one single raw picture was new to me - I have not played with raw's at all (because working mostly with these compact camera's, or should I call them super zoom's and there ain't no raw option in these PowerShots). Sounds good anyway.

profoundunderground 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 9 on 8/11/2009 6:18 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Not trying to hijack this thread, but there was one thing I wanted to add.

Out of all the hdr work I've seen, time and time again the one thing that I've noticed that makes images look unrealistic is the saturation in the greens, and sometimes the yellows when it comes to plant life, trees ect. I'm curious to see if I'm the only one who feels this because I am slightly red/green color blind. Despite the minor color-blindness, looking at some hdr landscapes the greens often look like they are radio active to me. Any thoughts?

trent 

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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 10 on 8/11/2009 6:32 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by profoundunderground
Not trying to hijack this thread, but there was one thing I wanted to add.

Out of all the hdr work I've seen, time and time again the one thing that I've noticed that makes images look unrealistic is the saturation in the greens, and sometimes the yellows when it comes to plant life, trees ect. I'm curious to see if I'm the only one who feels this because I am slightly red/green color blind. Despite the minor color-blindness, looking at some hdr landscapes the greens often look like they are radio active to me. Any thoughts?


Nope, they're still radio active and make people's eyes bleed. Some people like cartoons. Some people like real life.

He who rules the underground, rules the city above.
hilite 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 11 on 8/11/2009 8:51 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
There's an HDR book at your local book store.

http://ca.wiley.co...Cd-0470412992.html


I read it in Chapters, its not really worth the price but its good to browse through for some help here and there.



And when you finally disappear, We'll just say you were never here.
Wolfheart 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 12 on 8/12/2009 12:38 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by profoundunderground
Not trying to hijack this thread, but there was one thing I wanted to add.

Out of all the hdr work I've seen, time and time again the one thing that I've noticed that makes images look unrealistic is the saturation in the greens, and sometimes the yellows when it comes to plant life, trees ect. I'm curious to see if I'm the only one who feels this because I am slightly red/green color blind. Despite the minor color-blindness, looking at some hdr landscapes the greens often look like they are radio active to me. Any thoughts?


I agree, I've found green hard to hdr, but I think it is just question of adjustment; it is possible to get at least quite natural. Somehow it just seems that most of people trying hdr get overwhelm about "unrealistic colour explosion" style (and I admit it did happen me too at the beginning, but thank god I did cure).

Chthonian 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 13 on 8/12/2009 9:13 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
The settings you use for HDR are pretty much exactly what I use, give or take a bit of playing around.

If you're looking to get raw file support for your PowerShot, Wolfheart, check out the Canon Hack Development Kit http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK, it's an open source piece of non-destructive software that adds in a lot of additional support to your camera, one of which being the ability to save the raw files from your sensor. I've played around with it a little bit on a friends' camera, and we did get it saving .cr2 Canon raw files. It might be worth a look, if you're interested in pushing the camera a bit more.

profoundunderground 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 14 on 8/13/2009 7:44 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
If i had a powershot, my mind would be blown. Great link

Wolfheart 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 15 on 8/29/2009 2:46 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by umbra
The settings you use for HDR are pretty much exactly what I use, give or take a bit of playing around.

If you're looking to get raw file support for your PowerShot, Wolfheart, check out the Canon Hack Development Kit http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK, it's an open source piece of non-destructive software that adds in a lot of additional support to your camera, one of which being the ability to save the raw files from your sensor. I've played around with it a little bit on a friends' camera, and we did get it saving .cr2 Canon raw files. It might be worth a look, if you're interested in pushing the camera a bit more.


Holy hell - thanks for that link - especially those long exposures seems very, very, very good! I really must concentrate it (as soon as i get sober again, stable where our pony is and where my fiance works has today its 40 years anniversary, bit of party time soon, so I've already started with beer).


Glass 


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as one does

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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 16 on 8/29/2009 5:27 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Mobile
 
I've has photomatrix pro on the compy for about a year now without any real motivation to use it until now! I will try it out now per your recommendation and instructions! Long live wolfheart: the hdr viking!

Wolfheart 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 17 on 8/30/2009 6:47 AM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by Glass
I've has photomatrix pro on the compy for about a year now without any real motivation to use it until now! I will try it out now per your recommendation and instructions! Long live wolfheart: the hdr viking!




Good luck (and don't forget to show your results)! And be careful - playing with hdr's can be quite addicting...

Chthonian 


Location: Ottawa, ON
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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 18 on 8/30/2009 6:57 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by Wolfheart

Holy hell - thanks for that link - especially those long exposures seems very, very, very good! I really must concentrate it (as soon as i get sober again, stable where our pony is and where my fiance works has today its 40 years anniversary, bit of party time soon, so I've already started with beer).



Never too early to start with the beer.

You have any luck installing and playing around with the CHDK?

Wolfheart 


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Re: ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~
<Reply # 19 on 9/1/2009 4:19 AM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by umbra


Never too early to start with the beer.


That is so true... Even I try always to start not before 17:00 (unless it ain't just one pint with food or something like that). Stupid principle but makes that first taste even better.

Posted by umbra

You have any luck installing and playing around with the CHDK?


Not yet, I find out that Windows doesn't let me move anything to my camera straightly and I don't have card reader. I will check my little sisters laptop if there would be one... If it doesn't I probably have to buy one (as soon as I get money enough, they robber at least 20 euros of them here).
[last edit 9/1/2009 4:20 AM by Wolfheart - edited 1 times]

UER Forum > Archived UE Tutorials, Lessons, and Useful Info > ~ Wolfheart's HDR tutorial ~ (Viewed 3125 times)
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