Colorful Sunset HDR

[DezM]

We had rain for 2 days at the start of the weekend in NYC & and I figured that on the next clear day, we would get a gorgeous sunset & we did.

Here's a view from Manhattan facing West to New Jersey using HDR. 9-bracketed frames at -4.0, -2.0, 0, +2.0, +4.0 EV. Exposures merged & Tonemapped using Photomatix and a minimal Levels tweak in Photoshop. D300 & 17-55mm lens using Mirror Up.

This one below was bracketed in 9 frames but I subtracted frames # 1, 3, 5 & 7 and only combined the remaining 5 frames at -4.0, -2.0, 0, +2.0, +4.0 EV for better dynamic range, as suggested once by member diegonyc.

[1/40sec at f/11], the tower to the left is the Erie Lackawanna Train Station



These two below were 9-bracketed frames at -4.0, -3.0, -2.0, -1.0, 0, +1.0, +2.0, +3.0, +4.0 EV

[1.3sec at f/11]



[1/6sec at f/11], facing Southwest



More HDR here: http://photos.dezmix.com/hdr
--
Dez

http://photos.dezmix.com

 

[Digitalguy2]

Beautiful images, I love #2 a wonderful silhouette with dramatic sky colors! Nice job of processing - very little noise is evident! Amazing how the birds are so sharp at this shutter speed. Thanks for sharing,
W.

 

[Humanoid]

Excellent Dez!

The last two are exceptional.

--
Ray

 

[Raider70]

Great pics, Dez. I like all 3.

Did you run any noise reducer? They look really clean.

Skip

 

[gl2k]

As we had to read in this forum Nikon gear is not suited to produce decent HDR. How can you dare showing us such good stuff ? Shame on you ...

btw. I love #2. A lot to look at.

 

[Gale Bizet]

I am hard pressed to pic a favorite.
Beautiful colors.

Favorite light is morn and eve.

Only way to really appreciate images like this ,is Huge - framed..lol
--
Best Regards
Gale

http://www.pbase.com/techwish

 

[Chris Walden]

all three are pretty sweet with #2 being my favorite. Funny to see that with all the talk in the other thread about bracketing that you took 9 shots and removed a few from the final merge. Just goes to show Nikon can make some improvements to the way bracketing is done.

Seems to me the easiest fix if Nikon doesn't want to spend much time making improvements to the whole system would be to leave the bracketing as is and increase the max stops from 1 to 2 that would give some serious DR.
--
Chris
http://www.33g.com/photos

The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will.

 

[CliffB]

Nicely done, Dez. Your compositions are pleasing, and you did a good job of maintaining a strong black in the HDR merges.

Cliff

http://www.pbase.com/cliffb

 

[Richard G T]

Number two does it for me Dez. Nice work.

Best wishes,
Richard
--
Equipment: 1 camera, 1 lens, 38 years
http://www.pbase.com/rgthompson

 

[sandy b]

Something about NY, always and interesting different shot to be gad

 

[Shutterbugin]

Beautiful stuff. The 8-stop HDR with the pilings is impressive - 'not HDR-like' at all.
--
'87.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot'

ShutterBugin

 

[Bright Angel]

You ought to live in the UK, we've had 2 years of rain.

Beautiful work Sir, especially shot 2

--
http://www.MarkSykesPhotography.co.uk

 

[Marker]

Sweeping composition, great exposure and color. I'd love to see this large and on the wall. Great work!
--
http://www.pbase.com/gsaf

http://www.dphoto.us/forumphotos/showgallery.php/cat/500/ppuser/2371

 

[sean000]

no text

 

[Fletch147]

lovely colours...............

number 2's my fave nice compo.

Good job.

Jon.

--



Cheers,
FletchUK / Fletch147
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30649408@N00/

 

[jhorse]

Hi,

Love number 2: great composition and no aircraft trails. Incidentally, we have not had two years of rain in the UK! I believe we get – on average - less per annum that Vancouver.
--
J.

http://jules7.smugmug.com/

 

[Shutterbugin]

Hi,

Love number 2: great composition and no aircraft trails. Incidentally, we have not had two years of rain in the UK! I believe we get – on average - less per annum that Vancouver.

lol that isn't that great since Vancouver is surrounded by Temperate Rain Forest ;-)

--
'87.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot'

ShutterBugin

 

[DigitalJay]

First and most important, very nice images. I like them all.

The question I have is, with no meaningful detail in the blacks (at least as shown on my monitor), was HDR really necessary? It seems the sunset skies could be resolved easily by a -1 or even -1 2/3 stop exposure compensation.

Again, on my monitor it seems like a whole lot of exposure work (9 frames!) for relatively little in return.

This is absolutely not a put down in any way - I just don't quite see the need for HDR, unless noise reduction was a goal, here.

Regards, and great shots!

Jay

 

[skyisfalling]

1. 2 is the best. It has nice leading lines. You should shoot more like this.

--
Sky is Falling... Thats the Truth....

 

[DezM]

First and most important, very nice images. I like them all.

The question I have is, with no meaningful detail in the blacks (at least as shown on my monitor), was HDR really necessary? It seems the sunset skies could be resolved easily by a -1 or even -1 2/3 stop exposure compensation.

Again, on my monitor it seems like a whole lot of exposure work (9 frames!) for relatively little in return.

This is absolutely not a put down in any way - I just don't quite see the need for HDR, unless noise reduction was a goal, here.

Regards, and great shots!

Thanks Jay. The buildings were far away and I did expose to the left a little. My important regard was maintaining detail in the skies and showing the colors that I saw, hence the reason why I went with bracketing. The return for me, was to get one of these printed on my wall

As you can see, the resulting HDR merges above helped me maintain some detail. Here are some single frame shots at 0 EV from that same evening. Straight out of the camera with NO processing:







--
Dez

http://photos.dezmix.com