[Petey44]

Anyone have success shooting real estate with HDR on their K3? I'm just looking for some tips to improve the already incredible performance in this mode. I usually shoot HDR 1 with +-2EV. Today I hand held all of my shots as low as 1/20 of a sec. They're sharp!! I shoot with the DA 12-24mm. I can post some of my images later. I hope the new full-frame will have this feature!! I'm not aware of any other DSLR that does this in camera and produces a RAW file. Any input or tips would be appreciated. Thanks in advance!
Peter

[Adam]

Anyone have success shooting real estate with HDR on their K3? I'm just looking for some tips to improve the already incredible performance in this mode. I usually shoot HDR 1 with +-2EV. Today I hand held all of my shots as low as 1/20 of a sec. They're sharp!! I shoot with the DA 12-24mm. I can post some of my images later. I hope the new full-frame will have this feature!! I'm not aware of any other DSLR that does this in camera and produces a RAW file. Any input or tips would be appreciated. Thanks in advance!
Peter

Well, the HDR raw file still has to be processed in post if you want to leverage the added dynamic range, but for most applications I would just apply the same preset to the raw for an entire series. Could you post your results? Sounds like a perfect application of the HDR feature.

[macman24054]

I have done commercial real estate in HDR with the K30. I shot on a tripod. The photos really turned out nice and the customer was very happy.

[Dipsoid]

Take it from me, create your own HDR, it takes very little time with Photoshop and Lightroom, plus you have complete control with how it looks. Take 3+ photos, the first and last photo in the series barely clipping in highlights/shadows, then load the images in to the hdr merge pro tool in Photoshop, hit okay and save the image as a 32-bit tiff file. Bring it in to Lightroom and edit as normal. Be amazed at the quality retained and extra dynamic range when pushing those shadows and highlights sliders.

[kadajawi]

Take it from me, create your own HDR, it takes very little time with Photoshop and Lightroom, plus you have complete control with how it looks. Take 3+ photos, the first and last photo in the series barely clipping in highlights/shadows, then load the images in to the hdr merge pro tool in Photoshop, hit okay and save the image as a 32-bit tiff file. Bring it in to Lightroom and edit as normal. Be amazed at the quality retained and extra dynamic range when pushing those shadows and highlights sliders.

This. Though I use all 5 exposures (2 EV between them).

[Petey44]

I do import the RAW file into Lightroom. I tend to underexpose most of my shots and use the dynamic range power in post. Especially with kitchens. Here is a before/after example.Also notice the lens corrections.

[Petey44]

Some more. These are all hand held.

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[Driline]

Looks almost as nice as the inside of my Iowa "Double Wide" Trailer. You know.....double wide is for rich folk

[wombat2go]

Hi Pete,
Here it looks like the gamma (mid level contrast) is quite a lot wrong.
For example the brickwork on the first photo, and the shadows above the chair on the second.
On the second image, our eyes don't see downlight reflections like those at top of archway ??

[macman24054]

When I do HDR in post, I just take one normally exposed raw image and save it. Then I go 1 stop under and 1 stop over exposed and save both those files. Then I use Photomatrix to process the HDR image. It is simple, fast and I get natural looking results. I can't stand the over the top super saturated unnaturally looking HDR images that are about 95% or more of what you see on the web. IMHO this is a cheat and makes photographers who focus on proper exposure and creative composition appear to be less talented. Sorry for the rant!

[Mikesul]

When I do HDR in post, I just take one normally exposed raw image and save it. Then I go 1 stop under and 1 stop over exposed and save both those files. Then I use Photomatrix to process the HDR image. It is simple, fast and I get natural looking results. I can't stand the over the top super saturated unnaturally looking HDR images that are about 95% or more of what you see on the web. IMHO this is a cheat and makes photographers who focus on proper exposure and creative composition appear to be less talented. Sorry for the rant!

Nice, appropriate, rant! If that is what it is.

[kadajawi]

When I do HDR in post, I just take one normally exposed raw image and save it. Then I go 1 stop under and 1 stop over exposed and save both those files. Then I use Photomatrix to process the HDR image. It is simple, fast and I get natural looking results. I can't stand the over the top super saturated unnaturally looking HDR images that are about 95% or more of what you see on the web. IMHO this is a cheat and makes photographers who focus on proper exposure and creative composition appear to be less talented. Sorry for the rant!

How is that a HDR? You don't extend the dynamic range, and I don't see the point in doing what you do. The reason I do HDR is because the scenes that I shoot may have 20 stops of dynamic range, and the camera captures 12 stops? Also, it's IMHO better to do the actual HDR processing in Lightroom. Photomatix is only good for combining the photos, and saving them into a 32 bit TIFF that Lightroom can process.

[macman24054]

How is that a HDR? You don't extend the dynamic range, and I don't see the point in doing what you do. The reason I do HDR is because the scenes that I shoot may have 20 stops of dynamic range, and the camera captures 12 stops? Also, it's IMHO better to do the actual HDR processing in Lightroom. Photomatix is only good for combining the photos, and saving them into a 32 bit TIFF that Lightroom can process.

HDR - High Dynamic Range. The purpose (for me) is to make the photo look as it appears to the human eye. Since the camera has a limited range of f stops compared to our eyes. That is why you bracket the photos even exposure, under and over exposed to allow the detail in the highlights and shadows to appear as they do to the naked eye. This is what HDR is all about for me. It really has nothing to do with adding "unnatural" color saturation in the way I intent to use HDR. For me it is to have the photo appear as it actually looked to my eyes at that moment in time. HDR can apply to color saturation, contrast and f stops. So my braketing is done on my Power Mac instead of the computer in my camera. Same end result.

[Dipsoid]

HDR - High Dynamic Range. The purpose (for me) is to make the photo look as it appears to the human eye. Since the camera has a limited range of f stops compared to our eyes. That is why you bracket the photos even exposure, under and over exposed to allow the detail in the highlights and shadows to appear as they do to the naked eye. This is what HDR is all about for me. It really has nothing to do with adding "unnatural" color saturation in the way I intent to use HDR. For me it is to have the photo appear as it actually looked to my eyes at that moment in time. HDR can apply to color saturation, contrast and f stops. So my braketing is done on my Power Mac instead of the computer in my camera. Same end result.

That's still not HDR, you're not extending the dynamic range of the image, you're bumping up the exposure in the shadows and highlights, and if it's a very contrasty image, you're going to get terrible noise in the shadows and highlights. If you combine multiple exposures, you're going to have more accurate color information than what a 14-bit raw file can possibly provide, hence the use of a 32-bit tiff file. By braketting on your PC you're trying to invent detail that wasn't captured by the camera. Cheesy, unnatural color saturation is not what anyone is arguing. Try capturing an environment during the mid-day, then try braketing your exposure on your PC, see how that turns out compared to an actual HDR image.

Also, HDR Photography's purpose is not to extend contrast or saturation, it's to reduce the contrast of a scene to what your eyes can see.

[macman24054]

That's still not HDR, you're not extending the dynamic range of the image, you're bumping up the exposure in the shadows and highlights, and if it's a very contrasty image, you're going to get terrible noise in the shadows and highlights. If you combine multiple exposures, you're going to have more accurate color information than what a 14-bit raw file can possibly provide, hence the use of a 32-bit tiff file. By braketting on your PC you're trying to invent detail that wasn't captured by the camera. Cheesy, unnatural color saturation is not what anyone is arguing. Try capturing an environment during the mid-day, then try braketing your exposure on your PC, see how that turns out compared to an actual HDR image.

Also, HDR Photography's purpose is not to extend contrast or saturation, it's to reduce the contrast of a scene to what your eyes can see.

Here is link that does a great job of explaining dynamic range in photography. I use Photoshop to process the raw image and then use Photomatrix to combine the 3 processed raw files into an HDR image. No matter if is a light or dark scene the key is you must have one of the image file properly exposed. If this is the case this is a sound and effective way of doing HDR.

Understanding Dynamic Range in Digital Photography

---------- Post added 09-21-15 at 11:49 AM ----------

How is that a HDR? You don't extend the dynamic range, and I don't see the point in doing what you do. The reason I do HDR is because the scenes that I shoot may have 20 stops of dynamic range, and the camera captures 12 stops? Also, it's IMHO better to do the actual HDR processing in Lightroom. Photomatix is only good for combining the photos, and saving them into a 32 bit TIFF that Lightroom can process.

Here is a link that does a great job of explaining dynamic range in photography.

Understanding Dynamic Range in Digital Photography