[Venturi]

Did a little experimenting this evening and thought I'd share my results as a complete noob attempting a little in-camera "hdr". Comments and criticisms are totally encouraged.

I was out bbqing chicken on the grill tonight and glanced over at the redbud in the yard. The spot from the house was lighting it up a bit and I thought "hmm, that might be a good opp to play with the multi-exposure mode and do some quasi-hdr...". So I rushed in and grabbed the camera, mounted the 18-55 and with the mini-pod in tow I dashed back outside.

I set up on the rail of the deck, set the shutter to 30s and metering said f/16 @ 200 ISO. Focused as best I could given the light available and snapped one off. This is the result.


Preview looked good so I pulled back the aperture to f/11 for the "hdr" attempt. Put the K10D into multi-exposure for 3 frames w/ EV comp turned on. I took the 3 frames at 3sec for -2EV, 6s for 0EV and 8sec for +1EV. And this is what came out...


I shot these in JPEG mode using +1 tick for both saturation and sharpness, bright image tone and auto WB. No post processing at all, just resized down to 1024 @ 100% quality for posting here.

For a rush job (there was bbq chicken cookin!!) I think they came out pretty good. I think either going from f/16 to f/11, or more likely I bumped the focus ring, caused the "hdr attmpt" to go a little fuzzy. I totally didn't see the piece of fuzz on the lens while I was shooting either *grr*.

[NYpHoToGraphEr]

I like the subject and lighting, I just think
the backround is a bit distracting.

[Keith]

I agree that there is something distracting about this photo but I tend to think that there is too much raw light used.

Experimenting is the way to go and hope you enjoy doing the HDR - I also play with it sometimes but have never been satified with my results

cheers
Keith

[Venturi]

Thanks to both of you for the comments. I definitely agree on the background distraction, I knew setting up that they'd be there but didn't think the neighbor would appreciate me taking liberties with my chainsaw and I'd have lost the (sky) light in the process. LOL

I also agree that the flood from the house overpowered things. I've seen some HDR shots that spread EV as low as -4.0 and will likely do a repeat of the shot (despite the background) and shift all 3 shots to see if that has any positive affect, if I get another clear night while the red bud is in bloom.

[krs]

Not that this is all easy to control, but there is more light at the foot of the tree than at the leaves higher up...

[Peter Zack]

Ignoring the background because I don't think that's why you shot this (experimenting), I don't find the multi image added much to the shot. The second image looks a bit soft in the upper tree possibly from camera shake and possibly from a slight breeze.

So overall the in camera HDR didn't do what HDR software can do. I think this feature is best for multi layer images where you might want to have a 'ghostlike' person in the shot or have the moon over a city skyline where it wouldn't normally be. I've tried this and Dynamic HDR software and you can definitely get much more dynamic range out of the software.

Edit sorry missed the bottom. Camera movement = blur

[Venturi]

Right, the in camera multi-exposure control isn't an HDR processor; doesn't do tone mapping, etc. It just makes the process of stacking frames easier and using it you can create some HDR-like effects.

[axl]

Yep, I don't think either that multi image added anything much to that shot. And more then background, what is distracting for me is that big hair, or whatever it is on the sensor on the right part of the frame, where the wires are...