My Birthday Gift To Everyone :)

HDR means ‘High Dynamic Range’. Using software like Photomatix you can create images with a more detail in the highlights and shadows than you can with a normal photo from todays digital cameras. Its similar to the old technique of exposure blending. Taking one photo for the sky and one for the ground, then merging them both together in Photoshop. HDR takes it a step further by increase the amount of detail in the image and allows you to create some unique photos. You can use it carefully to create natural looking photos or you can use it creatively to create atmospheric and emotive photos. The choice is yours as to how you process the end result.

High dynamic range (HDR) images enable photographers to record a greater range of tonal detail than a given camera could capture in a single photo.   This opens up a whole new set of lighting possibilities which one might have previously avoided�"for purely technical reasons.  The new "merge to HDR" feature of Photoshop allows the photographer to combine a series of bracketed exposures into a single image which encompasses the tonal detail of the entire series.  There is no free lunch however; trying to broaden the tonal range will inevitably come at the expense of decreased contrast in some tones.  Learning to use the merge to HDR feature in Photoshop can help you make the most of your dynamic range under tricky lighting�"while still balancing this trade-off with contrast.

As digital sensors attain progressively higher resolutions, and thereby successively smaller pixel sizes, the one quality of an image which does not benefit is its dynamic range.

  This is particularly apparent in compact cameras with resolutions near 8 megapixels, as these are more susceptible than ever to blown highlights or noisy shadow detail.  Further, some scenes simply contain a greater brightness range than can be captured by current digital cameras-- of any type.

The "bright side" is that nearly any camera can actually capture a vast dynamic range-- just not in a single photo.  By varying the shutter speed alone, most digital cameras can change how much light they let in by a factor of 50,000 or more.  High dynamic range imaging attempts to utilize this characteristic by creating images composed of multiple exposures, which can far surpass the dynamic range of a single exposure.

Step 1: Source images

There are two main ways to create the source images needed for HDR.

You can either use AEB, auto exposure bracketing, on your camera to take 3 images while you are out, or you can use RAW to take 1 image and then use a RAW editor to produce 3 shots back at your computer. I shall start with auto exposure bracketing.

Auto Exposure Bracketing (AEB)

The main advantage with AEB is that you can get better source images with less noise. For example, a sunset. You would normally get really dark shadows and enhancing them later from 1 single RAW file would increase the noise. With AEB you can take a completely seperate image for the shadows and one for the highlights to preseve the detail and keep the noise to a minimum. The disadvantge to this approach is that anything moving in the image will become blurred and repeated as it moves across the 3 images. To start with you will need a camera that has the AEB mode and a tripod.

You will also need a tripod so that the 3 shots you take can be perfectly aligned later. Go to the menu on your camera and set the AEB mode to -2 / +2 stops.

Step 2: Generating a HDR image

Open the 3 images into Photomatix.

From the HDRI menu select Generate HDR. Photomatix will ask you if you want to use the 3 opened images or load in some. Make sure it has “Use opened images” selected and click ok. Now Photomatix will confirm the exposures for each image. 9 out of 10 times it will get it right, but just incase make sure that each image has the correct exposure settings. In the case of this guide they should be +2, 0, -2. Click ok, then check that “use standard response curve” is selected. If you are using 3 images taken at the scene tick the “Align LDR images before generating HDR image” option just so that Photomatix aligns the images for you. Click ok and after a few minutes you will see your HDR image. It won’t look exactly right just yet. Some areas will be slightly over-exposed and it’ll look odd.

Step 3: Tone Mapping

This is the magic part.

Using the Tone Mapping feature in Photomatix will convert your HDR image into something usable. Goto the HDRI menu and select Tone Mapping. You will see how your photo looks more like a standard HDR image. The sky will be nicely exposed, as will the ground. The trick now is to adjust the settings to get a nice balanced image. You could be creative and go for something a little more fun if you feel like it. For the image in this guide I wanted something special and yet not too far from the real world. I’ll start with a quick run down of the various options.

Luminosity
Adjusts the brightness of the shadows. Moving the slider to the right has the effect of boosting shadow details and brightening the image. Moving it to the left gives a more natural look to the tone mapped image.
The optimal value depends on the image and the effect you want to achieve.

Strength
Controls the strength of local contrast enhancements. A value of 100% gives the maximum increase in local contrast.
The optimal value depends on the image and the effect you want to achieve.

Color Saturation
Controls the saturation of the RGB color channels. The greater the saturation, the more intense the color. The value affects each color channel equally.

White Clip - Black Clip
From watching the way the histogram changes, the white clip adjusts the highlight contrast and the black clip adjusts the shadow contrast.

Micro-smoothing:
Basically this setting should be called “How arty do you want your shot?” At 0 you can get the cool arty style HDR images with all the detail in everything from walls to clouds you didn’t know where there.

However, if you want a nice simple blended exposure photo set it to 30. 95% of the image should be perfectly exposed as if you spent hours putting them together in Photoshop. This is a great new addition to Photomatix as it allows people to use the software as they see fit. If they want a nice photo that is perfectly exposed then they can get that just as if they used ND Gradient filters on their lens. However, if like me they want something a bit more unique they can drop the micro-smoothing down and get something dramatic.

Light smoothing:
Never set this below 0 as you will get horrible results.

Microcontrast
Controls the accentuation of local details. The default value (High) is the optimal value in most cases. However, this control may be useful in the case of a noisy image or when the accentuation of local details is not desirable (e.

g. seams of a stitched pano in a uniform area may become visible when local details are too much enhanced).

Painting With Light, A Photoshop technique for enhancing image tonality, “most images need at least one of their elements to be pure black, meaning black with no detail, and need at least one of their elements to be pure white meaning white with no detail”

Painting with light is a fun technique that gives great results. It is called painting with light because this is what you are actually doing while taking the shot - painting with light.

You don't need much to experiment with this kind of shot, just make sure you have the following items:

1.

A camera capable of long exposures - film cameras will work OK, but if you really want to get the most out of the shooting session, use a digital camera. You will be able to see the results in "real time" and make corrections as you go.

2. A nice tripod. Since you will be doing some long exposures you want to make sure your camera sits still. If you don't have a tripod you can make one in a few minutes.

3. A flash light - and by flash light I do not mean flash as in a speedlight, but the flash light or what our British will call a torch.

4. A dark location. This one is tricky. If you are going to shot at home - a dark room will be OK. If you are going to shoot outside - make sure that you are not doing this under a street light, or where a car can come by and "paint its headlight" all over your shot.

Here is how it's done:

Set your camera on the tripod and take a sample shot with flash / lights on.

This will help you verify that your composition is OK.

Set the exposure to a relatively long value. Stop down the aperture as much as you need. If you are outside do nothing. If you are inside - this is the time to turn off the lights.

Make the click. Once the shutter is open use your flashlight to light the stuff that you want to "paint". You can use the flashlight as a brash, and "smear" the light, just like you would have done with brush and paper. Or, you can use the light as a pen, and do precise work. Areas where you go slowly will be more lit then others. Be careful not to linger to much over the same stop - you will burn it. (The machos amongst you will correctly identify this as the "I forgot the iron on the shirt" phenomena).

Once the shutter closes, you are a free person again. Inspect your image and make corrections.Here are some great ideas to use this technique with:

Product like shot - In a closed (dark) room place your product on a table and paint it's contour.

You can use several colors to make a strong effect or to draw different (even imaginary) parts of your object.

Location shot - find a location with some ambient light. Find an object that is less "hit" by that light. now you can use the ambient light to capture the background, while painting the object with light. You will get a nice effect - with some surreal foreground and a "normal" background. Also the white balance will be different on ambient and painted - another cool side affect.


Environmental Graffiti - If you are shooting a wall (or even on thin air...), you can scribe on the wall. Make funny graffiti; Write huge love notes; Make a political statement - there will be no trace left other then the one on your memory card.

This is a generic term and the technique can be used in many ways.

For example, in interior architecture when the size of the building makes it impossible to place lights where they are needed the photographer can simply take the shot in complete darkness, set the camera on a time exposure and walk around the building, firing flashes or pointing a torch (but not towards the camera) to provide light where required.
Or the technique can be combined with existing light, say from stained glass windows. The shot would be taken at dawn or dusk so that a very low level of light enters through the windows. The exposure would be set for the windows and during the time exposure the photographer (or preferably a few assistants) simply charge around in black clothing firing flashes to illuminate the rest of the set.

On a smaller scale, in the studio, we can use specialist and expensive tools to place light exactly where needed, again during a long exposure.

Or we can use a low-wattage tungsten lamp, or a small torch, or just about anything else we choose.

Basically the technique consists of setting the camera at about f11 (ISO 100), setting the shutter to about 30 seconds, shooting in complete darkness, and shining the torch (flashlight in the USA I think) from whichever directions are required to get the effect required. The important things to remember are that the torch must move constantly and must never face directly to camera. Using this technique we can make the light come from any direction we choose and can control the exposure of any part of the subject exactly as required. We can create strong shadows, no shadows, even light, pools of light, backlighting, rim lighting….. you name it, just about anything is possible!

Of course, the torch will probably have a much lower colour temperature than studio flash, probably around K2000, if the torch is the only light source then this can be corrected on computer, or filtered with a lighting gel.

This technique can also be used in conjunction with flash, to paint light on to areas that are difficult to light with flash. In this situation the torch will need to be colour-corrected with gels unless mixed lighting colours are required or acceptable.

In the shot of the honeycomb grids I made a mistake and there is a light trail showing through the honeycomb fitted to the reflector. This could be cloned out easily enough but I left it in because the idea is to show you the technique, warts and all, not to produce a perfect photo. Note how the background has been lit, note too the light shining straight through the honeycombs to cast strong shadows.
I had a pupil in the studio Friday, he achieved fantastic results after only an hour or so of practice. My own shot, below, of the wine bottle was produced this morning in 5 minutes. It’s terrible but I’m posting it here because it illustrates the technique.

This technique can of course be used for people too, and nudes are a perfect subject. The important thing is to get the model comfortable so that s/he can keep perfectly still during a 30-sec or so exposure. There are more examples of people photography in my alternative lighting folder.

Im sure no one will read all of this blog but i put so much information because i want to show my whole photos in a litle bit bigger size at the page, see my photos one by one even if you do not read it :P :P :P :P

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Update:  Thx everyone who checked my blog and photos, it has been only 1 hour i published this blog and i got hundreds of smiles to my photos :) and looks like lots of people will ask postcards from me :) hope i can print all and send to you, dont know yet if i can make them all :(

Update2:  Wow thank you sooo much for the interest, i got almost 300 smiles on total to this blog and photos in afew hours :)

 Update3:  Thx for making this blog  featured,  i got tons of smiles for 2 days and kind words about my photography, thanks again :) i will upload my new photos soon, if i can learn some new techniques i will also explain them here :) enjoy your time,,,,,,