Oakwood Cemetery HDR

Here's an HDR from 3 shots, 18mm, tripod mounted (can't handhold with D3100). Experimenting with the Photomatix trial before I buy. Due to the lighting at the time, the best composition seemed to be head on which is not how I usually like to shoot. Let me know what you think, it's amazing how many directions you can go in with HDR. The first image is the unedited correct exposure so you can see the difference.



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One question I had was do you do any processing (like sharpening) before merging? I did the merger first on this image.

I usually don't do any processing before merging. I do all my processing in Aperture III after the Photomatix plug in HDR is complete and the HDR shot is saved and returned to Aperture. I find the adjustments in Aperture are more comprehensive and detailed than those in Photomatix. What I shoot for in Photomatix is a good clean finely detailed photograph without the outlandish art looks. On your photo I would add a shot with a longer exposure to bring out more of the details in the shadows. Other wise it's a good HDR. You can also adjust the shadows in post processing after the merger. Most of the time I find post processing before the merger, unless it's very minor, only tends to mess up the tonal range of the HDR and I wind up with the outlandish look I'm trying to avoid.

I really like the mood you were able to get with HDR Rick.
I also don't do any corrections before doing the merge. I will sometimes get the best I can with Photomatix and then save as tiff and re-open in Photoshop to further modify the tone curve, saturation and/or sharpening.
Ii usually sharpen last just before resizing for web but after having a saved copy just before sharpening. Photomatix is an amazing program, for me it's been worth the 99$.

Originally Posted by cnyram

One question I had was do you do any processing (like sharpening) before merging? I did the merger first on this image.

Don't do anything to your original bracketed photos before using Photomatix. Merge your files into a single HDR image, then do your editing afterwards.

Just a curious question: In your correctly exposed image, there is a single contrail, yet in the merged image, there are two contrails. Any ideas on how the second one arrived in your image?

Originally Posted by Essence of Imagery

Just a curious question: In your correctly exposed image, there is a single contrail, yet in the merged image, there are two contrails. Any ideas on how the second one arrived in your image?

I noticed that when I was composing the shot and should have waited for it to fade away. Since this was sort of just a test I went ahead anyway. Since the D3100 does not have auto bracketing I have to change the exposure manually between shots and I was using the timer on the shutter so I did not move the camera at all between exposures. In all it took about a minute for the three exposures, enough time for the contrial to shift.