I’ve been continuing my experimentation with HDR imaging, having spent an evening last week up at the park during sunset. My goal was to dedicate a session to the technique and try figure it out better. Like I said in the last post on this topic, my experience with HDR has been hit-and-miss; sometimes I make a great image and sometimes it looks like the camera vomited. I’ve yet to discover the formula behind either – what I really want to know is, what exposures make a good image?

So the other night I sat down with the camera tripod-mounted and shot several scenes. For each of them I was very careful to balance the multiple exposures, meaning that I kept each exposure a consistent amount different from the previous. The very first image came out like this:

HDR experiment that came out natural looking.

This is the best of the bunch in my opinion. It looks the most natural and I feel that it could have actually been a single exposure, carefully measured, using filters. The only issue I have with it is the clouds – they were moving just fast enough to “stutter” across the sky between exposures. I tried both of the motion compensation modes in Photomatix, but neither got it quite right.

This image was a composite of four exposures, each one stop apart.

This next image goes right to the other end of the spectrum. This is an example of the over-processed style that I usually dislike. This is one of the rare instances where it appeals to me – probably because I at least managed to avoid the typical over-done haloing that’s usually present.

HDR image with artsy processing.

The interesting thing is, I shot the exposures for this image the same way I shot the last batch; 4 exposures each 1 stop apart. Now you see why I have trouble with this – two photos made by the same method, with radically different results. The only conclusion I can draw – and I think it’s a logical one – is that the lighting conditions really matter, same as with a regular exposure. Even though HDR expands the dynamic range of the scene, it still comes down to whether it is well lit to begin with. Compared to the first photo, this scene was not as well lit.

Moving to a new location in the park, atop the hillside overlooking the sports fields, I wanted to capture the last of the sunset. The next two photos show part of the same scene, taken in different orientations moments apart:

HDR image - not quite right in the sky.

HDR with sky adjusted.

In the first, the foreground appears about right, but something went wrong with the sky – it’s far too bright, with an unnatural glow to it. In the second image, the overall balance is correct and I like what I ended up with, although again the motion of the clouds stuttered a bit.

05 is four exposures, each 1 1/3 stop apart; 06 is three exposures, each 1 1/3 stop apart. The only other trick is, on 06 I applied a “Shadow/Highlight” layer in Photoshop to tone down the highlights and bring the cloud detail back into the sky.

One final image, with the same settings as 06:

HDR with minor adjustments.

Again, this one required a “Shadow/Highlight” layer to bring the sky down a bit.

So at the end of this experiment, I’m still left without a clear result. There were a couple of other scenes that came out looking terrible. Of these five, two are natural, one is so-so, one is blah, and one is obviously processed into an artistic look.

The only thing I did learn for sure is that any movement in the sky is going to cause problems with how the clouds match up.

Gotta work with this some more.