High dynamic range is hurting my eyes

[Louis_Dobson]

If you mean stuff shoved through an automated program like Photmatix and boosted to the stops so as to show huge halos around things, yes, it is a fad, yes, it is getting boring.

If you mean zoning photos, as Adams did and anyone who can use a darkroom properly has been doing ever since, no, it isn't a fad, all that has happened is that more people have learned how to do it. It makes photos look much more like what you see, though less "authentic" to people whose concept of "authentic" is something that looks like it was taken on Kodachrome in 1976.

If you don't how to manage it, I'd stop sneering and learn!

--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acam

 

[smokeyjoe]

First off, photographs NEVER capture things the way we 'see' them. They are fictional representations of images.

We see things not only with our eyes, but with our brains as well. An image to us is a composite of everything that is in our frame of view.
Our eyes are constantly changing 'aperture' and focus as we scan a scene.
That's what makes a painter like Caravaggio



or Vermeer



interseting to look at.

There are beautiful transitions between extreme whiteness all the way to (almost) black.

Some folks here would say that in either of these paintings the whites are 'blown', or that there's not enough detail in the shadows.

With the beauty that is the internet, you are now able to copy and paste these images -as well as anything else, and run them through your favorite hi-def software to correct for such poor exposure on the artists part! ;-)
--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/-smokeyjoe/

 

[Louis_Dobson]

Which brings us back to the original question I asked, what do YOU mean by HDR?

Certainly current obsession with never having a black or a white in a photo is quite funny, I'd agree with you there.
--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acam

 

[LLS1]

To me, HDR is just an attempt to show what the human eye actually
sees at a scene.

If you see the way HDR images look then there's something wrong with your eyes. There's nothing real about them (well, most of them). The problem is that most HRD images mess with the relelationship of the different brightness values. Even if your eye can see a wider range, you can still see the difference in brightness between bright and dark parts. The sun is brighter than the ground. With HRD people make every part of the picture equally bright (or quite often even reversing the relationship). If the ground is brighter/equally bright than the sky in a sunset photo there is definitely something wrong (assuming there isn't some artificial light on the foreground). You can never truly capture what your eyes see. Either you lose some detail in the shadows/highlights or you completely mess with the tonality. I'd say it's more important for the realism of the photo to retain the brightness/darkness relationship than to reveal some extra detail in the highlights and shadows. Not to say that it's impossible to retain them with HDR, but you certainly have to apply it very conservatively.

 

[smokeyjoe]

Exactly what you just said. The fear of actually having blacks/whites in one's photo, and processing your shots so much that everything becomes midtones, and perhaps oversaturating everything just for good measure.
And no, Lois, I wouldn't call those paintings HDR.

Maybe HDR is supposed to be about clarity and balance through the entire spectrum of light to dark, but that's not what it's come to mean here to some photoshop users.
--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/-smokeyjoe/

 

[Louis_Dobson]

High Dynamic Range, and it means many different things to different people.

I zone my photos, which to many people means they are HDR. It is a look I like. On the othert hand, blasting everything through Photomatix to put huge halos round things is an effect that has now been done often enough to be actively horrible.

If you want to talk about HDR, I think you need to provide some examples of what you mean, because almost any picture where the shooter has taken any care at all is "HDR", by some definitions.

For example, look at the shot below. Now bees are more or less black compared to flowers which are more or less white, so if you don't zone you either lose the flower as a detailed subjet, or the bee, and for me they are a pair, so I've zoned - the other way to do it would be to tone down the colour and contrast, but I'd rather bring out the brightness and cripsness of the lairy Algarvian light early on a spring morning.

So if that's what you mean by HDR, keeping the contrast up by lightening and darkening areas of the photo, then I strongly diagree with you, as would Carravagio, who has done much the same in his paintings.

If you mean a deliberate HDR effect where what has been done is not merely obvious but actually featured, then yes, I agree.

Time you defined your terms.



--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acam

 

[LLS1]

I'm pretty sure HDR refers to extreme dynamic range compression that requires several exposures. Since the bee in the photo is moving I doubt you have used several exposures. I guess the general rule is: If it's overdone and looks horrible=HDR. If it still looks realistic despite some manipulation= something else.

 

[windsprite]

When my first thought is, "Wow, look at that image!" it is generally a Good Thing.

When my first thought is, "Wow, look at that PP!" it is generally a Bad Thing.

Julie

 

[smokeyjoe]

...or are you just making up my side of the conversation so we can argue -uh- I mean....... discuss.
I have mentioned several times what I am referring to.

Yes, I agree with you that to a certain extent, all photography -which is reasonably well exposed- is in essence HDR.
Yes, zoning, for the most part, is a reasonably well thought out variant of HDR.
Obviously, that's not my point. That's not what's hurting my eyes.
This is:
http://www.paulhealey-photography.com/hdr.htm
--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/-smokeyjoe/

 

[Actrurus]

An excellent book by Christian Bloch. He describes the subject in great depth, which is very technical and maybe a bit too much for some.

In a nutshell you capture all the light in a scene with 5 or 6 exposures 2ev apart. Up till now I've only used 3 exposures -2, 0, +2. Mr Bloch calls this 'Medium Dynamic Range' !! He also explains why trying to produce HDR from one Raw image isn't really worth the bother.

You can use Photomatix or Photoshop to merge the different exposures and end up with a 'Radiance' .hdr file. This is an automatic process with little creative input.

A Radiance file is a bit like a Raw file in that you have to 'Tone Map' it into a LDR image you can print, etc. You can think of it as a 32bit image, but it's a lot more complex than this, apparently there is enough capacity in the file format to record all the light levels in any scene.

Again you can use Photomatix or Photoshop to do this. The book has lots of 'how to' tutorials with lots of creative control to achieve an image that is pleasing to your particular taste. It straightforward to produce quite normal images with just a bit more detail in the shadows, with reduced noise too; or go for a more surreal style - its up to you.

I've only just discovered myself that Photomatix can merge/blend Raw images. So the workflow for Panoramas (or single images of course) is now very interesting. Shoot your bracketed Raw images, merge them in Photomatix to get the Radiance .hdr image then spend as long as you want tweaking the Tone Mapping in the programme of choice. Easy!

--
http://www.fachwen.org
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fachwen/sets

 

[quetico]

I like some HDR that show another aspect to what we see or that we capture in most photographs. My favorite HDR gallery is by Kubica and one example is http://kubica.deviantart.com/art/St-Joseph-s-Church-71274811

 

[R Stacy]

What most of the viewing (Joe Public) audience sees is entirely different to what you may as an experienced photographer see ... or seek. And the extremes go both ways.

Most, and I do mean most of any photographers' audience will not notice the differences even between a 4x5 negative on, say a 16x20" print to the same scene from a 4/3 camera same print given both are exposed and processed properly and similarly. You may (should), but largely they won't. Fact.

The differences become even less important between APS-C, 4/3 and 35mm in the final result, and no, I"m not saying some equipment isn't better suited and capable for situations than others - that is not the point.

On the other extreme, some (not all) photographers are never satisfied unless their photo (.jpg image) will stand up to extreme close scrutiny - which rarely matters in the real world but does matter seemingly more so with digital photography .......

Dynamic Range is a result of both pre and post processing (skill) and given decent equipment and skill should not be a huge issue in general. If you overprocess you blow it, if you under expose you may not be able to pull enough detail back without blowing it.

Digital DR has always seemed to be less forgiving than negative film, much like positive film was and is.

Ok, there is probably an easier way to say it. (lol)

But nonetheless, I love the image Louis !

Louis_Dobson wrote:
High Dynamic Range, and it means many different things to different
people.

I zone my photos, which to many people means they are HDR. It is a
look I like. On the othert hand, blasting everything through
Photomatix to put huge halos round things is an effect that has now
been done often enough to be actively horrible.

If you want to talk about HDR, I think you need to provide some
examples of what you mean, because almost any picture where the
shooter has taken any care at all is "HDR", by some definitions.

For example, look at the shot below. Now bees are more or less black
compared to flowers which are more or less white, so if you don't
zone you either lose the flower as a detailed subjet, or the bee, and
for me they are a pair, so I've zoned - the other way to do it would
be to tone down the colour and contrast, but I'd rather bring out the
brightness and cripsness of the lairy Algarvian light early on a
spring morning.

So if that's what you mean by HDR, keeping the contrast up by
lightening and darkening areas of the photo, then I strongly diagree
with you, as would Carravagio, who has done much the same in his
paintings.

If you mean a deliberate HDR effect where what has been done is not
merely obvious but actually featured, then yes, I agree.

Time you defined your terms.



--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acam

--

 

[craig w garland]

I've looked at the examples posted here as HDR images, and I couldn't disagree more. Those examples are Photo Art, not HDR images. This is part of the trouble w/ i-net discussions, i.e. (in this case) there is no commonly accepted definition of HDR. In person, this could be quickly sorted out.

It doesn't have to be complicated. If a real life scene has say 18 f-stops in it, and digital cameras can only capture 7-9, then anything used to bring out some extra detail in shadows and highlights is HDR in "my definition"-- and no, I'm NOT talking about overdoing it-- just improving the "realness" of the image, i.e. what the eye/brain see.

And I'm not talking about extreme PP here-- just relatively simple techniques available in any decent PP program. Don't misinterpret this to mean cramming everything into a limited DR-- just the opposite-- opening up the shadows and bring out detail in highlights to make it look more natural, more real, more life like.

HDR (to me) simply means improving on the DR of a typical digital camera. This isn't rocket science.

I like Louis' bee, but don't know if that scene was within the normal range of his camera-- it doesn't look far off-- and if he tweaked it, it was nicely done.

Cheers. Craig
--
'Shoot freely and edit ruthlessly' me, November 2002-- after purchase of E-1.
Equipment in profile.

 

[Louis_Dobson]

and to talk about HDR when you (apparantly) mean multiple exposures through an HDR program is sloppy (and you still haven't ACTUALLY said that's what you mean).

If that IS what you mean, I agree. It was a very interesting effect, but they're hacknied now.
--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/acam

 

[Raist3d]

goes against what you said actually.

But Ill make this clear- I am not even talking about what I think is photography and not (which I have alluded and talked about in the past). I am talking about something I consider BAD ART because the techniques are not used well or to good effect.

And of course, yes, that's just my opinion

--
Raist3d (Photographer & Tools/Systems/Gui Games Developer)
Andreas Feininger (1906-1999) 'Photographers — idiots, of which there are
so many — say, “Oh, if only I had a Nikon or a Leica, I could make great
photographs.” That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard in my life. It’s
nothing but a matter of seeing, and thinking, and interest. That’s what
makes a good photograph.'

 

[Raist3d]

really what you just said? What makes those paintings great is the way they used their mastery of their skills/medium for effect.

That Golden Gate Bridge with the Clouds in HDR does not. So if I get a canvas, and paint randomly on it, making sure I have "overblowns" and "super darks" that doesn't make for much art in my book. That's how I see that golden gate HDR shot.

--
Raist3d (Photographer & Tools/Systems/Gui Games Developer)
Andreas Feininger (1906-1999) 'Photographers — idiots, of which there are
so many — say, “Oh, if only I had a Nikon or a Leica, I could make great
photographs.” That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard in my life. It’s
nothing but a matter of seeing, and thinking, and interest. That’s what
makes a good photograph.'

 

[Raist3d]

if I could drink that is

--
Raist3d (Photographer & Tools/Systems/Gui Games Developer)
Andreas Feininger (1906-1999) 'Photographers — idiots, of which there are
so many — say, “Oh, if only I had a Nikon or a Leica, I could make great
photographs.” That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard in my life. It’s
nothing but a matter of seeing, and thinking, and interest. That’s what
makes a good photograph.'

 

[thebard37]

. . the human iris has about six stops of dynamic range. That is less than highquality black and white printing paper.

It can continuously adjusts and push the eye - DR around by a few stops. But when you look a a large scene in the day, there are deep dark shadows the eye cannot penetrate no matter how hard you try without cutting out the rest of the bright parts of the image so the eye can release rhodopsin. Likewise, you can never adjust to light of the sun and see it for what it is.

Moreover, those photographs don't really show "dynamic range" in stops. All those wacked out photos exemplify is the ability to flatten a large gamut into a small space. That is why it looks so bizarre. Areas that should be dark or bright are pulled into the area of middle gray giving a large hump to the histogram.

--
--
Comments are always welcome.

Zach Bellino

'Nothing, like something, happens anywhere.”
-- from 'I Remember, I Remember'
Philip Larkin (1922-1985)

 

[GURL]

First you have to capture HDR images. Several ways to do that exist. When the followed method is appropriate nobody will be able to guess which one was used.

Here comes tone mapping.

As everybody should know, HDR images can't be printed nor displayed on (ordinary) screens. Their contrast is much too high for that.

Tone mapping is alway used before displaying or printing HDR images. Tone mapping defines a correspondence between the huge amount of tonal values recorded in the HDR image file and the restricted palette of tonal values of (all) printer inks and papers or of (ordinary) screens.

--> You certainly don't say you dislike painting when you dislike the way a particular painter (or school of painters, etc) uses his restricted palette to describe some part of the world on the canvas.

Since, among the many existing ones, I found the tone mapper which corresponds to my own taste, I'm happy with HDR!
--
GL

 

[phauksson]

This is how i see HDR these days, it's split into two different uses.

What you guys refer to as bad HDR, the goth looking halo infested stuff, is what people are using as an effect on their images. It is HDR, but used as a post processing effect, that some people seem to like. I am not one of them. It's kinda like when people discovered Dragan and everyone tried to duplicate the effect and put it on all their images.

The good HDR, is proper HDR, used as a tool to enhance the dynamic range in your image, and is what HDR was meant to be in my opinion. The reason you probably like this type of HDR is because it looks natural in the image, it's subtle, but makes a difference. I like this.

So, different strokes for different folks. Effect vs. Tool.