My HDR Production..

Hey there!

As I've told you a few posts back, I have recently looked into HDR Photography.

I have read loads of articles and tutorials in order to be prepared for my next shoot at the beach so I'd have good photos to work with.

I will now describe my steps I took from capturing to editing.

THE SHOOT

- use a tripod [ no great outcome without these 3 legs! ]

- use aperature priority [ I selected f/5.7 ]

- automatic shutter speed

- shoot in RAW + L [ more editing flexibility ]

- auto-bracketing mode [ will shoot 3 or more photos with different shutter speed resulting in different exposure ]

- take more than just one series

THE PROCESS

-take a look at your photos and choose a series that you'd like to edit

0 [ shutter speed: 1/100 ]

-3 [ shutter speed: 1/400 ]

+3 [ shutter speed: 1/25 ]

- the editing probably works best with the programme "Photomatix Pro" [ I did not use it, since there's another great programme called "LUMINANCE HDR" for free

- then add the 3 [ or more ] photos you selected to Luminance [ all need to be the same file type, in my case RAW ]

Adding the photos to Luminance

- you'll eventually end up with this:

Ready for tonemapping [ adjusting certain parameters ]

- there are nine different types of tonemapping which can be selected + adjusted [ I used Fattal, since I wanted to end up with a dramatic photo ]

- I used the parameters [ alpha: 0,15 / beta: 0,88 / Color Saturation: 0,65 / pre-gamma: 0,79 ] advice on adjusting parameter were found here: http://www.hieronymus41.de/luminanceHDR.pdf

Adjustments

- then save the LDR and maybe edit later on [ I liked it this way already, so I didn't edit it anymore ]

And here's the finished HDR Production:

I would love to recieve any sort of feedback, since I have just started learning a bit about HDR Processing.

Thank you for reading!

xx, Steph