To the HDR learned: judge if you will

I am researching the topic of HDR photography for a college paper and I am pleadingly expectant of having a few questions answered pertaining to its influence on and acceptance in the photography community. Though I doubt I will come across an HDR professional, I am optimistic that the responders will live up to the ideal in which I hold for a great deal of DPReview, and offer an expertly reply.

Perhaps you own a certain bias as to whether this is a fundamental advancement in the field or rather a cheap mutated process and failing of an art. There are those whom believe that the “reflective images with a roughly 300:1 dynamic range” IS photography. Do any of you dislike the idea of this imaging technique become a standard to photography? And I know it was applied to photography quite a few years ago, but it seems very consumer-ready now.

I’d also love to hear any and all of the extensive information that you have on HDR itself, as this additional background information would benefit me greatly.

In fact, any discussion on this subject or the future of photography would be much appreciated (as I am plenty ignorant), and I’d love to hear where people stand on this topic.

If you are willing to add a post, please withhold links to other threads, as this is essentially an interview that I need to obtain. Thank you for everything you are willing to contribute, objective or otherwise.

I realize a lot of this information is already on the boards so I apologize for the senseless cluttering.

example123 said:

Perhaps you own a certain bias as to whether this is a fundamental
advancement in the field or rather a cheap mutated process and
failing of an art. There are those whom believe that the
“reflective images with a roughly 300:1 dynamic range” IS
photography. Do any of you dislike the idea of this imaging
technique become a standard to photography? And I know it was
applied to photography quite a few years ago, but it seems very
consumer-ready now.

Click to expand...

I expect people getting used to it, as they did with sound film or colour photography.

--
cheers, Peter

Germany

example123 said:

Perhaps you own a certain bias as to whether this is a fundamental
advancement in the field or rather a cheap mutated process and
failing of an art. There are those whom believe that the
“reflective images with a roughly 300:1 dynamic range” IS
photography. Do any of you dislike the idea of this imaging
technique become a standard to photography? And I know it was
applied to photography quite a few years ago, but it seems very
consumer-ready now.

Click to expand...

Can you explain what you understand by HDR photography? Do you have specific techniques in mind? As far as I recall 300:1 exceeds the dynamic range of most (if not all) reflective photographic media.

Representing the real world on a medium that has a limited dynamic range has been a standard aspect of photography for decades. Are you suggesting that Ansel Adams was not a photographer?

Cheers.
--
Alan Robinson

this site http://www.hdrsoft.com shows HDR techniques.

--
cheers, Peter

Germany

Peter Berressem said:

this site http://www.hdrsoft.com shows HDR techniques.

Click to expand...

Thanks Peter. I am aware of these techniques, and often use manipulation of the tone curve and local contrast enhancement in my own work.

Does "HDR" refer exclusively to blending multiple differently exposed images, rather than manipulating a single wide dynamic range exposure?

Regards
--
Alan Robinson

alanr0 said:

Does "HDR" refer exclusively to blending multiple differently
exposed images, rather than manipulating a single wide dynamic
range exposure?

Click to expand...

Alan, I'm by no means an expert on this matter. To my understanding the term stands for images whose dynamic range exceeds that what the (actual) sensors deliver - about 8 f/stops?

No single exposure comprises the overly wide 'HDR' dynamic range, hence the need for this 'manipulation' (shooting lighting fixtures I do so routinely by adding layers).

--
cheers, Peter

Germany

Peter Berressem said:

alanr0 said:

Does "HDR" refer exclusively to blending multiple differently
exposed images, rather than manipulating a single wide dynamic
range exposure?

Click to expand...

Alan, I'm by no means an expert on this matter. To my understanding
the term stands for images whose dynamic range exceeds that what
the (actual) sensors deliver - about 8 f/stops?

Click to expand...

OK - I have also seen this applied to single wide dynamic range raw exposures. I was wondering if there is a consensus on the meaning.

Peter Berressem said:

No single exposure comprises the overly wide 'HDR' dynamic range,
hence the need for this 'manipulation' (shooting lighting fixtures
I do so routinely by adding layers).

Click to expand...

Agreed - I would not expect good results from a single exposure for that type of subject.

I am still curious whether this is precisely the "very consumer ready" "fundamental advancement" or "cheap mutated process and failure of an art" that the original poster intended. I guess digital processing can cope with shifts and distortions introduced between multiple hand-held exposures, which would have been much more difficult to process chemically.

To answer the original post, I consider it a useful development of a well-known technique rather than either a ground-breaking advance or a heretical perversion of photographic ideals.

Regards,
--
Alan Robinson

There's a little fuzziness in the useage of "HDR" - hdrsoft.com makes a distinction between HDR as encoding of high dynamic range data from one or more exposures and "Tone Mapping", squeezing HDR info for display on low dynamic range devices/media.

I find modest HDR (like 12-14 bits) tonemapped for display looks very good in some circumstances - like interiors with windows in daytime.

Our eyes are used to seeing about that dynamic range in real life.

I'm looking forward to having tonemapping built into a camera's firmware someday; for now I'm happy with external software. I use Photomatix from HDRsoft.com on my mac.

These are all my personal opinions, not any sort of consensus view:

I think the comment that it will be eventually be accepted, just as colour photography has been.

I assume you're talking about compressing high dynamic range data into a range that a monitor can show? If so, I think it can be done well and can be done VERY badly.

Images that are taken as multiple exposures that give a dynamic range closer to that that the human eye would have perceived at the time can be amazing but I find overdone ones, which look 'hyper-real', either dull or ugly.

The first one you see looks different and exciting. The second one looks similar and the third one just boring. Taken to extremes, they look too synthetic to .

Just like the use of traditional filters or photoshop special effects, I think that the technique can be a useful creative tool. As such it can be used well or badly. Heavy-handed use of photographic filters or photoshop effects can look terrible, just as, when well used, they can really enhance an image. With HDR, it can be used to enhance an image or produce some absolute, overblown trash.

I'm not suggesting that an image must be 'realistic' to be good, (Perhaps it must be fairly realistic to count as a photo, but that's another arguement), but that any tool can be used or misused.

Some look stunning, others make my skin crawl.

In panorama land it is used as a general practise. Many times it can give you a "cartoon" look. For high end work most of us virtual tour photographers prefer to blend by hand in photoshop. There is a flickr group http://www.flickr.com/groups/hdr/ you might want to check out.

For me it is the only way of working if you wish to shoot a VR of an interior and capture detail in the windows as flash is not really an option.
Have fun
Dylan
http://www.dylansurridge.com

Though I was aware of tone mapping, I hardly knew what it was so when asked to give a definition of what HDR use I was referring to, I really suppose I mean to include all techniques. I realize that each technique renders varying results, which some of you support and others don't, but it seems (perhaps I am wrong), that it's use is supported overall when not used incorrectly.

On a separate avenue, I still am unclear as to what is causing the very 'animated' or surreal look to some of the HDR images. What are they doing or not doing? And does anyone find this types of manipulation appealing?

It seems I have quite a bit of research still to do on the mechanics (I’ve been slacking on photography studies lately)

Thank you as well for your replies on this topic.

Seurat's famous painting has the look of an HDR image that's been taken to the point of looking "un-natural" because the shadows are too bright and the sky is too moderate.

You instantly know it is a sunny day but it doesn't look right because the artist has rendered details in shadow much lighter than they'd appear in "real life".

Our retinas respond to something like an 8EV* brightness range plus another 4EV or so by Iris (aperature) for a total of maybe 12EV for normal vision's dynamic range.

Painters typically look in the shadows of a scene (and their iris' open to see detail) and they paint what they see - then they look at a bright area & after their eyes adjust paint what they see.

The resultant painting is a Tone Mapping of a High Dynamic Range image onto a Low Dynamic Range display.

If one tone maps a 10-12EV image it can look natural. If one tonemaps a 16EV image it'll probably "look like a painting".

Anyhow, that's my understanding of what's happening.

Dave

• I'm using EV here in the sense of a brightness power of two.

even if you reprocess the same raw at various settings you r results will not be optimal

of course it depends upon how wide you want to go but the whole point of hdr is to go wide - really wide dr range - thus multiple bracketed exposures are a basic requirement
--
My blog http://stock-photo.blogspot.com

Here's a example of tone mapping a modest dynamic range image. It compares the results from photos in my kitchen. The top image is the jpeg that came from the camera & the bottom image is the RAW data from the same exposure massaged by Photomatix Pro 2.3beta (software defaults used.)



The top image shows how the camera's firmware mapped the sensor's original internal 12-14 bit raw image into 8 bit jpeg space & the bottom image is a mapping of the same data mapped into an 8 bit jpeg outside the camera by Photomatix Pro.

The middle image shows that a single RAW HDR image gives about the same results as 3 jpeg images bracketed by + - 1EV when tone mapped by Photomatix Pro.

I think the tone mapped images look "more natural" than the original. Certainly they give a better idea of what the kitchen looks like.

No other post processing was done.

Dave

Peter Berressem said:

alanr0 said:

Does "HDR" refer exclusively to blending multiple differently
exposed images, rather than manipulating a single wide dynamic
range exposure?

Click to expand...

Alan, I'm by no means an expert on this matter. To my understanding
the term stands for images whose dynamic range exceeds that what
the (actual) sensors deliver - about 8 f/stops?

Click to expand...

The sensor in my FZ30 seems to cover about 10-12 f-stops, at least I get at least 12 bits of good brightness data out of it with the RAW format.

I've been happy with the results derived from one exposure.
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=20054240

Dave

That is a good example and is the reason why HDR images often look like paintings. The eye is able to focus only on a very limited area at one time. When you are looking at shadows everything in the bright areas is out of focus and you not really in your field of view. An HDR photo may actually be a more accurate representation of what we experience when we see.
--
Tom

http://www.flickr.com/photos/25301400@N00/

Although the software works marvelously well, judging from the original lighting in the kitchen (the two lights above the windows) and the fact that the ceiling fan light is not turned on, I would be more apt to think the human eye actually saw the original image straight out of the camera (or something close to it). I think it's a hard call to make and a very interesting sample. Nice kitchen, by the way.