HDR Photography | Full Tutorial

HDR Hotography is a relatively new way of taking photographs which allows for new frontiers in artistic expression by the photographer and new advances in image capture by your camera.  The basic concept of HDR is the blending of multiple exposures to produce a wider range of visible details in a photograph.  That's the short description.  If your ready to dig into the detailed step by step instructions on creating HDR photos both in your camera and on the computer, then please read on.

HDR Photos: What are they?

• HDR (High Dynamic Range Photography) a means of blending multiple exposures to encompass a larger visible range into a single image. This allows an you to produce details within shadows and highlights simultaneously in a single image. This allows us to get an image which better represents what our eyes saw when we shot the photograph.
• Why? – Because when we look at the world through our eyes, we are seeing about 15 Stops of light (using camera talk)… The camera however only sees about 4-5 stops (depending on the camera sensor or film type). As such you are forced to decide what detail is important in a photograph when you shoot it, because you will not get all that your eyes see. As an example: When shooting a landscape on a bright sunny day, if you want the details in those bright clouds, you will have pure black in the shadows of your trees, if you want details in the shadows, then you will end up with “blown out” skies. HDR photography blends exposures from multiple images (overexposed images, properly exposed images and underexposed images) to give us a closer approximation of the 15 stops our eyes saw when we shot the photo.
• Images are merged into a 32 bit per channel space and the tone-mapped back to 16 or 8 bit per channel space (32 bit per channel images cannot be displayed on any current screens.  Through the use of special software that 32 bit image is turned into a 16,12, or 8 bit image for your computer.

   

HDR Photo Examples

 

 

HDR Photography Software
(this is not a comprehensive list, but are the most often used):

• Photoshop

• Photomatix

• Nik HDR Efex Pro (Visit website to learn more…)

 

HDR Photography and Your Camera:

• Tripod

  • HDR photography uses multiple exposures which must be melded into one image. You can not have movement between shots or you will get blurred images.

• Remote Trigger: to prevent movement during shutter press. You can also use the timer option in your camera which will allow you to press the trigger with a delay before the actual exposure occurs.

• Mirror Lockup: If you want to really get picky about movement you can use your mirror lockup to reduce camera shake during exposures.

• White Balance: You want WB fixed. Doesn't matter so much which WB option one you pick,, but you want all WB settings to stay the same throughout the image set. (personally I think this is not an issue as long as you're shooting quickly and especially if you're shooting RAW as this can be fixed in post).

• Contrast: Since HDR photography can be highly contrasty (is that a word?). You might want to try using “flat” straight line contrast on your source images before importing into your HDR program.

• Disable Sharpening: This will help remove exaggerated contrast in the HDR program. You can turn it back on for the final image.

• Low ISO settings.

  • Most HDR images will be still photos using a tripod thus shutter speed is not an issue so you might as well get the best image quality you can.

  • Lower iso gives less noise and since HDR images inherently produces more noise,, high iso will simply make the problem worse.

• Use RAW to produce the largest dynamic range for each exposure.  In addition there are a laundry list of other reasons for using RAW for any type of photography you shoot.

• Manual Focus:

  • You don't want the AF to accidentally focus on different focus points between exposures.  As such manual focus can be a good way to avoid this issue.

• Use full frame exposure mode (usually called "evaluative"):

  • Since the object of HDR is to produce exposures which encompass the brightest and darkest areas of the photo, you must incorporate those areas into your initial "base" metering.  If you use "spot" meter, for instance, you may well be metering from a particularly bright or particularly dark part of the photograph.  This will force your entire exposure set to start at an inappropriate exposure for the image your shooting.

• Aperture Priority Mode (f-stop)

  • Best option when taking HDR images.

  • You want a consistent aperture through all exposures to give consistent depth of field.  If you use "P" or "S" or "T" modes on your camera when shooting you run the risk of having the camera automatically switching aperture settings between shots.

  • This is an absolute must when shooting a panorama HDR photo.

• Bracketing: ?is the basis of HDR photos.  It is the use of bracketing your exposures which gives you the over, middle and under exposures you need to pull details from multiple light ranges.  The easiest way to bracket photos is to use the bracketing feature in your camera.  If you do not have this feature then you will have to manually change the over/under exposure settings between each shot.  Check out your camera's documentation for details about how your camera does bracketing.

  • Generally you want to bracket using shutter speed.  This avoids the depth of field issues discussed above.  The best way to ensure bracketing by shutter speed is to use "A" aperture mode on your camera.

  • 3, 5, 7 exposures is the standard.  Sometimes you'll want more, and sometimes you'll even want even numbers (see below).  I personally shot three for 90% of my photos.

  • Usually you will want equal exposures on both sides of “0” exposure.

  • Don't be afraid to take more images – even if you do it manually to really push the range.

  • If you're camera only brackets 3 shots… then do your bracketing in two stages. (ex: -2, -1, 0 then 0, +1, +2) and simply toss the extra “0” exposure.

  • Use “continuous shooting” to rapid fire giving less chance of movement through the series. If you're camera has a burst mode… use that.

  • Be sure to check for “blinkies” after you have taken the photos (blinkies are a display mode on most cameras which tells you what areas of the photo are over or under exposed)… you want at least one photo in the highlights and one in shadows which have no blinkies. That means you have one photo from each end of the visible range which contains all the desired details.

 

 

HDR Photography Software:

• Photomatix:

  • Import:

    • Align source images (takes longer, but better results)

    • Reduce chromatic aberrations (I would rather do this in LR or PS post)

    • Reduce noise (use it if you are shooting RAW)

    • Ghosting artifacts (things that move,, leaves in the wind, water, etc) helps to reduce ghosting.

    • Tone curve options: not applicable for RAW,, if using .jpg just go with default.

    • White Balance… (better to do in Lightroom / Photoshop post processing)

    • Color space: probably best to use largest color space (pro photo RGB)

  • Tone Mapping:

    • Your fist combined image after import will look bad. You must do “tone mapping” to make it useable.  This is done either through "Details Enhancer" or "Tone Compressor" options.

    • You can save this “unprocessed” version as an .hdr file. This allows you to come back and work again without going through the blending process again. (probably not worth the hard drive space).

  • Details Enhancer Tab:

    • Light Smoothing gives you a variety of looks… low gives you a surreal appearance,, high will give you a more realistic look

    • "Strength" is your intensity of HDR contrast

    • Color Saturation and Luminosity: Best to not use these within PM. Better to do this in LR/PS post. I find it best to us PM only to combine your images.

    • Micro Contrast: Sort of like “clarity” in LR/PS.

    • Tone Settings: best to do in Lightroom / Photoshop post processing.

    • Color Settings: best to do in Lightroom / Photoshop post processing.

    • Smoothing Settings: can be used to reduce areas which have too much contrast (looks too fake).

      • Micro smoothing (global)

      • Highlights smooth

      • Shadows smoothing

      • Shadows clipping

    • You can create a preset of your settings if you find you use the same settings all the time.

  • Tone Compressor Tab: (note: either you use tone compressor or details enhancer… can't use both)

    • Tends to be too global. Not enough finesse.

    • Harder to explain the sliders in tone compressor so I will say it's best to just play with them and see how it effects your photo.

    • The sliders below the graph are all better done in Lightroom / Photoshop post processing.

  • Export your image from a tone mapped image to something you can work with (tiff, jpg, etc). Since we used RAW (I hope) you should save it in the format closest to raw ( 16 bit TIFF). Otherwise you are loosing some of the benefits for which you shot in RAW for. From this point forward your HDR photograph is a photo just like any other photo and can be worked with in any program just like you would any other image file.

•  

  HDR Efex Pro: (Visit website to learn more…)

  • Select you images from Lightroom and then export into HDR Efex Pro. Or manually add them into HDR EP.

  • Select alignment and ghost removal options

    • Alignment is used to match images by structure rather than by the frame dimensions. This clears your image but also removes pixels. So when possible use a tripod so you do not have to use this feature.

    • Ghosting: helps to fix random “ghosts” you get from moving objects in the frames (ie: leaves in the wind, a flag, etc).

  • Adjust tone compression

    • Sets the intensity of the dynamic range of the image.

    • Will be influenced by HDR method

    • Strong compression = flat image weak compression = clipped highlights/shadows

  • select HDR method and strength

    • 20 methods available (each one is a different algorithm).

    • sets initial tone compression.

    • Sets style of mirco-contrast adjustments.

    • Method strength slider controls the intensity of micro-contrast adjustments.

  • Adjust global adjustment sliders

    • Structure effects the image clarity like "clarity" in Lightroom and Photoshop.

    • Warmth can be thought of as a pseudo white balance (best to just get it right in the original or in LR).

  • Perform selective adjustments (unique to NIK HDR efex pro)

    • Using U-point technology you can make specific global adjustments (only on a local level).

      • Fix local color/contrast/brightness issues.

      • Emphasize a subject / diminish distracting objects.

      • Correcting shadows/highlights for more natural look.

      • Correct local color temperature (warmth).

      • Smoothing skies or water (structure).

      • Increase / reduce method strength.

    • When using selective adjustment u points.. it is often a good idea to check the “show mask” box beside any given selection point. This will allow you see exactly what in the photo is going to be effected by your local adjustment.

    • Upoints can be duplicated to cover larger areas,, then “grouped” so that adjustments to one control point will effect all points in the group.

    • Selective adjustments can also allow you to use differing HDR Methods and strengths to different areas of of the image. (ex: you want to use subtle “natural” method on trees and sky, BUT you want to use a harsh “dingy” method on an old car that sits in the photo).

  • Apply finishing adjustments

    • Vignette tool

      • Adds dark/light borders

    • Levels and curves tool

      • Can be used instead of global contrast if you're better with levels.

      • Will effect color and saturation, so do you saturation adjustements AFTER you work with levels/curves

   

 

HDR Image Noise:

• Noise becomes worse In Photomatix when there are no exposures to give it details. This means that none of your images contain the details of the highlights or the shadows. (see previous point about “blinkies”).

• So to reduce noise and improve detail… You may need to take a couple extra shots beyond what you got from bracketing. You may want to add an additional photo at each end of the dynamic range +5, -5 to ensure you have all possible detail within the dark and light areas.

 

 

Final Post: (Either in LR, PS or Camera RAW)

• Important! Now you've brought back the HDR to your post software. Remember we did not do the post processing steps in Photomatix since you can do this better in Adobe. AND if you are making your post in LR or Camera RAW then you have added advantage of “non destructive editing”. If you make these changes in Photomatix then you are making direct pixel changes which cannot be undone.

• When saving your HDR it's always best to save it along side (or grouped to stack) with the originals which created it.

• Post processing for the HDR image is the same as any other image. And since post in LR, PS or Camera Raw is basically a whole other topic, I won't go into details here.

 

 

Getting the Surreal / Fantasy look in HDR:

• You will want to use Tone Mapping > Details Enhancer options in Photomatix (there are many mode options in Nik Efex Pro which work for this).

• You will want to push “strength” to it's max in most cases.

• “Light smoothing” you will want to set “left of middle” in most cases,, maybe middle.. but you don't want to start getting halos around your objects. At that point you've gone beyond surreal to just looking like you've made a mistake (which in my opinion, you have). Besides the halos are very distracting and take the viewers focus off the shapes and composition that you presumably worked so hard to shoot.

• When doing this style you will likely start pushing some of the “post” sliders that we would normally save for LR, PS, or Camera Raw.

• As with the previous instructions, we will then export into our Adobe post software to finish your development.

• Since HDR in this style is already unrealistic… you can use your White Balance temperature settings and Tint sliders to give new artistic looks to your image. Same applies for working the HSL (hue, saturation and luminance) sliders.

 

 

HDR Photography with Panorama
(instructions are for Photomatix but you can do this with any program)

• Place all the images for your panorama into a single folder.

• Select your first three photos (or however many exposures you are using per shot).

• Bring them into Photomatix and do your processing settings as you see fit using the information above.

• Save a preset with these settings. (let's call it “pano”)

• Go to “Batch Processing” in Photomatix.

  • Generate HDR image

  • Tone map with details Enhancer

    • click “settings” and “load” the preset you created above. (pano)

• Select three images at a time (or however many you are using for each part of the Panorama).

• Align images (check)

• Select Source Folder: Go find all the images for your Panorama.

• Click “run”

• Now Photomatix is going to pick the images in order, three at a time (or whatever you set “select x images” to). It will then process each set of three and produce a TIFF (just like when we were working with only one set of images).

• You can now bring each of those TIFF files into PhotoShop (PhotoMerge) and proceed as you would with any panoramic image.

• Once you are completed with your Pano (or any HDR) you should not only stack your HDR image with it's associated source images, but you should also make the HDR the top image. IN this way when browsing your images in LR (or Bridge) you will see only the HDR/Pano . All the source images will be hidden behind the final product.

 

 

Pseudo – HDR from a Single Photo:

• You will not get a true HDR images from a single photo. You also will have a hard time reproducing a “real world” look.

• It is best to use a somewhat overexposed image for this.

• Pick you image > import into Photomatix

• The process is essentially the same. But the results just are not as good since you are missing a large amount of information that you would have had using multiple exposures.

• Now! Even though your results will probably not be to great… Your image is going to be a bit fake looking and will have various artifacts, you can still use this image to help improve your original source image.

  • You can bring both your pseudo hdr and your original image into Photoshop and then using Layer masks you can blend the “best of both worlds”.. For instance many people like what hdr does to clouds,, so you can mask in the sky with the original foreground.

 

HDR WorkFlow:

• Stack you source image for each HDR first.. This just makes things much easier to work with when viewing your images in Lightroom or Bridge.

• Should I process images BEFORE they go into my HDR software? In general no. As you process an image you are removing information from the photograph and part of the whole HDR “thing” is that you are blending multiple images to increase as much information into the photo as possible. Better to wait until after you've created your HDR.

• If you are using Lightroom you should get the Photomatix plugin which allows you to simply select images>right click> import into Photomatix.. then it will import your final hdr right back into LR. (www.hdrsoft.com/download/lrplugin.html)  No need for a  for Nik Efex Pro as it installs directly into LR to begin with.

• When importing HDR source files you can import in TIFF files instead of RAW.

• Generate HDR Image dialog box (as discussed earlier).

• Do your thing.

• Save tone-mapped image back into the same folder as the source files (if using LR plugin, it will do this for you and stack it with the source files.).

• Move the HDR image to top of the stack so it becomes the representative image for the stack.

 

Naming HDR images:

• when your software produces an HDR it ads a suffix to the files name. (default for Photomatix is “tonemapped”). You can change what this suffix will be.

• Now using “smart collections” (in Lightroom or Bridge) Or equivalent in Aperture.. you can create a “smart collection” which scans all images for the word “tonemapped” in the file name. In this way you can create a new collection named “hdr” which will automatically be filled with all your HDR imagery on the fly.