1st HDR attempt

[mikerob2334]

Here's my first try at an hdr. I used 3 exposures for the final. I tried to stay away from the fake painted look as much as I could, but it still seems a little too dark for me. What does everyone else think?

Columbus Lock & Dam by mikerob2334, on Flickr

[ChrisBrn]

I think, it is very succesful!
It doesnt have that surreal/comics feeling and at the same time there's much detail and color tones.
I think it's ace!
Very well done!

[Sterling]

You're right. It is too dark. And those are pretty harsh halos along the horizon. Your software has taken a normally bright blue sky and turned it artificially dark and murky. I have a feeling that a much better photo could've been produced by taking one shot exposed for the sky and another shot exposed for everything else, and then just blending the two.

[EOBeav]

My thoughts are that an HDR shot needs to stand alone as a photograph, and this one is a little weak compositionally.

[mikerob2334]

Originally Posted by Sterling

You're right. It is too dark. And those are pretty harsh halos along the horizon. Your software has taken a normally bright blue sky and turned it artificially dark and murky. I have a feeling that a much better photo could've been produced by taking one shot exposed for the sky and another shot exposed for everything else, and then just blending the two.

It really wasn't a bright blue sky, that's pretty close to what it looked like to the naked eye. I actually didn't use HDR software, I did everything manually in photoshop with multiple exposures. After I finished with this edit, I decided to download the trial version of Photomatix. The result was much better with this. Guess I'll have to buy it now!

[JamesBrandon]

Gotta agree with EOBeave here. The photo could use a bit more interest as far as composition goes.

As far as HDR processing, here's my rundown:

-The halo running across the top of the image is the first red flag for any HDR image. These can be fixed by being careful with your 'smoothing' slider in Photomatix, or by masking in the original sky in Photoshop.

-Don't be afraid to just use the original sky from one of your RAW files. HDR skies can very easily look way overdone. I usually mask in an original sky and then add some detail to the clouds to make them POP.

-The water doesn't look right to me. IMO, you should either mask in one of the shots where the water was frozen in place by the shutter, or take a shot with a loooong shutter speed to really over exaggerate the ghosting in the water and use that one. It never seems to work very well when you use the photomatix result water.

Keep 'em coming!

[rki747]

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