Fusing exposures...worth it?

[nemesis256]

I've been testing out Photomatrix Pro for HDR and fusing exposures. I want to be able to get a realistic looking effect with my landscape shots. Essentially the dynamic range that our eyes see instead of the lower dynamic range that cameras see. I couldn't get the effect I wanted with HDR (it looked too unrealistic).

Exposure fusion sometimes gave me what I wanted, but in the 7 or so sets of images I tried it out on, only one came out better in comparison to increasing the fill light in Lightroom. So I'm thinking of doing that instead. If I Take the shot with the best exposed sky, and increase the fill light (as high as 70 or so) and contrast in Lightroom, I get approximately the same effect as fusing exposures.

Does anyone else do this instead of using exposure fusion? Do you frown upon it? Remember, I'm only trying to get a "realistic" dynamic range.

[inkista]

I normally do that in combination with "recovery", instead of fusing exposures, especially if the scene doesn't actually have a very high dynamic range. But you might want to take a look into using the open source tool enfuse via a gui interface like Bracketeer, XFuse, ImageFuser, EnfuseGUI, etc. (I use Hugin for this stuff most of the time).

By default, enfuse tends to yield more natural-looking blended exposures than Photomatix, and you don't have to go by way of HDR files/tonemapping to do it, although if you change the settings around, you can get similar effects to Photomatix tonemapping. Bonus, if you tell it to fuse by sharpness, rather than by exposure, you can use it to focus stack.

[nemesis256]

Thank you, that was very helpful! I tried out all the programs you mentioned and I found ImageFuser to be the best. It seems to be the only one that has an auto align feature.

I'm still interested in whether or not other people use the "expose for the sky, increase fill light and contrast" method.

[Murtasma]

I've tried that method before but sometimes the results can be less then optimal. Other times it works fantastic, I have yet to figure out why that method works best on some shots while not so great on others. As long as your shadows aren't completely blocked up or really close to getting blocked up you can usually get some pretty good results doing that.

[navcom]

Originally Posted by nemesis256

I'm still interested in whether or not other people use the "expose for the sky, increase fill light and contrast" method.

I use fill light to enhance an image. But remember that as you raise the fill light, you degrade the quality of what you are enhancing as is evident when you take it to an extreme. Fill light should be added sparingly.

I generally opt to use ND grad filters where possible to control high-contrast situations. It's old fashioned but still gives the best image quality in my opinion. When you use an ND grad (or anything that you use at the time the picture is taken), you are modifying the existing light at it's source versus post-processing where you are working with pre-recorded pixels already set in stone.

While it's true that post-processing can do wonders and even shooting in RAW format can allow for some pretty dramatic mods after-the-fact, it can't work miracles. For best image quality, you are better to get as close as possible to perfection in camera and use post-processing sparingly.