My first attempt at HDR - maybe too early ;P

[Canonboi]

http://i457.photobucket.com/albums/q...ithGaussia.jpg

(With Gaussian blur)

EXIF Data
Camera: Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi (450D)
Exposure: (1/4000)
Aperture: f/3.5
Focal Length: 18-200mm @18mm
ISO Speed: 800
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire
Exposure Program: Aperture priority

(Note: I know this is my second post here in the critique section but I still don't know how to post my EXIF data here. If I'm not mistaken if you upload these photos in flickr, the EXIF will be there too, ready to be read by anyone. But unfortunately, I live in Dubai where flickr is blocked! So please bear with me for providing you a written information about my pictures instead.)

Okay, so I know I may have overdone the thing especially the second one with the gaussian blur. But I was just fooling around, playing with Photomatix until I got these photos.

It was a cloudy day and I never saw such a cloud formation in 3 yrs!!! That's right. I'm originally from the Philippines so basically I get to see such dramatic cloud almost everyday. My original photo doesn't seem to do justice on the clouds and the sun's rays (although I can see them because I'm wearing polarized sunglasses) when I took this shot. Frustrated I tried to play around with it in Elements 6, aligned this, cropped that, etc. Then when I was "quite" happy with the result there, I tried this thing called HDR and came away with these shots.

Please tell me what did I do wrong (aside from overdoing the damn thing). Composition-wise I don't know if there was a composition here! LOL! What's my subject? Maybe that sun's rays, or perhaps the cloud formation, or maybe the park in the middle - I DON'T KNOW! If there was a fluke composition thingy here it's that I framed (accidentally) the sun between those buildings! But then that was a fluke! LOL! Perhaps I was so enticed at shooting at those clouds I haven't seen in 3 years without thinking about everything I learned from this wonderful, inspiring, informative site with talented people who love my newest passion now and forever, photography. *CHEESY*

NOTE: I only took this photo once. But I know in HDR editing you need 3 of the same photos in different exposure, so what I did (and please tell me if I did it wrong) was I took the original picture, edited the RAW, overexposed it and underexposed, to get those three files. Is it okay to do that?

[Murtasma]

First lets talk about the settings you used to take the image then I will chime in a little on the HDR (Tone mapping) processing you did. Also the Critique sections are really for help one one specific image you have posted two images here altho both look very similar I would remove the 2nd image since the first is marginally better.

1. F 3.5 is a little too wide open to obtain the necessary depth of field to have the buildings and clouds in focus. I would have stopped the lens down to about F8 instead and focus on the buildings. It's hard to tell exactly what is out of focus on both images because of the excessive use of tone mapping in the image and smoothing that was done. Lots of details have been lost in the image. Can you upload the original source image unmodified and link to it?

2. You could have safely moved your ISO down to 400 or 200 and reduced image noise. You can't notice the noise in the image right now because so much smoothing was done but it's best to use the proper combination of ISO speed and aperture to obtain a shutter speed that will work well.

3. Changing the exposer value in the RAW files won't get you anymore detail in the image that you couldn't obtain with a curve adjustment or shadow/highlight adjustment. The whole point of HDR is to compress a tonal range that is larger then the camera can capture by using tone mapping. You could have probably gotten a better rendering of the scene just using a single exposer here then using shadow/highlight or curve adjustment and some layer masks to obtain a HDR (Tone Mapped) look.

4. As for the composition in the image I think if you would have walked down the sidewalk more toward the buildings and up the steps to the left you could have gotten a stronger composition with fewer distracting elements like the cars and the big white wall. I could be wrong because I can't really tell what it's like on the other side of the wall but it looks like there are some palm trees and other vegetation there.

5. HDR (Tone Mapping processing)
It's really hard to pin point what went wrong without seeing the settings you used but I think it's a combination of incorrect focus and aperture selection and the fact that you used a single image to create a tone mapped version. Don't sweat about the processing this time around. Get yourself setup on a tripod and take 3 exposers. Try again during another sunset and you should see much better results.

Keep on try doing get turned off by HDR once it all clicks you will know what would work with HDR and how many stops you need to capture to create the image you have in your head. It just takes practice.

[Canonboi]

Thanks for your insightful comment. I knew it sucks! Hehe. I overdid a lot of stuff here and there, but hey, I only played around with it. But no excuses. Thanks for you comment.

Anyway, here are the links for the original and another HDR of the same image but not too out of this world.

(Original)
http://i457.photobucket.com/albums/qq297/mdfp1d0/0.jpg

(Another try)
http://i457.photobucket.com/albums/q...dfp1d0/asd.jpg

[Japaslavian]

In cases like this, you would get a far better result for taking only two exposures. One for the buildings/foreground, and one for the sky. Then masking the two together. NOT blending, like HDR does, just taking the well-exposed parts from the two, and making one. IE, take the shot exposed for the sky, and replacing the blown out one in the shot exposed for the building.
It will be far more realistic, you won't have to deal with 3rd party programs, you won't get massive halo effects, no over-saturation, no funky things happening, etc.

In fact, this type of technique looks, and works better than HDR probably 95% of the time.

[jiminyClickit]

Canonboi, Welcome

Your (Another try) is much better, and with another great cloud formation would work well. Just a little HDR looks good.

[takethislife5150]

Originally Posted by Canonboi

Thanks for your insightful comment. I knew it sucks! Hehe. I overdid a lot of stuff here and there, but hey, I only played around with it. But no excuses. Thanks for you comment.

Anyway, here are the links for the original and another HDR of the same image but not too out of this world.

(Original)
http://i457.photobucket.com/albums/qq297/mdfp1d0/0.jpg

(Another try)
http://i457.photobucket.com/albums/q...dfp1d0/asd.jpg

I really like the Another try photo, I find its somewhat dark theme to be very appealing to the eye

[lissykeeper]

I really like your Another Try also. The original picture you posted just bugs me because of the haloing around the buildings. But I commend you for trying an hdr. I haven't even attempted that one yet!

[Canonboi]

Thank you takethislife5150 and lissykeeper for your appreciation. The first one really sucks, I knew that. But thanks to Murtasma for pointing my mistakes (which are pretty obvious!) I finally corrected them. But while the Another Try is good it still pales in comparison to other HDR images of other "noobs in HDR" like me who are also testing the waters of HDR. But I will keep trying and won't give up.

Thanks a bunch.

[Canonboi]

Originally Posted by jiminyClickit

Canonboi, Welcome

Your (Another try) is much better, and with another great cloud formation would work well. Just a little HDR looks good.

jiminyClickit himself! Wow! Thank you so much for appreciating my another shot at it. I'll take it as an honor; you're a Critique Moderator for crying out loud!

When I'm perusing at my photos now and come across that "funkadelic" photo (my first foray at HDR - and I blew it...out of proportion) I'm thinking how sad was I when I post that shot! Lol! But like the "Don't Give Up" article said, "mistakes are part of the journey" that is digital photography.

And I will learn from them.

Thank you guys so much for your comments.

[bahgheera]

Originally Posted by Murtasma

3. Changing the exposer value in the RAW files won't get you anymore detail in the image that you couldn't obtain with a curve adjustment or shadow/highlight adjustment.

I'm not sure this is correct - I thought the raw format contained more color info than can be displayed, so changing the exposure value on a raw file balances the entire image towards the light or dark end of the scale? In other words, increasing the exposure on a raw file will put the mid point of tonal range higher, making dark areas brighter while bringing out detail, while decreasing the exposure will have the opposite effect. Yes?