Originally posted by Maffer Here a short checklist which I have found useful:
- [Great stuff found in the original post]
I would add to that these tidbits from my experience.
On the technical side:
- Use lower ISOs (100-400) whenever possible, and no "D-Range"!
- Vary the shutter speed, not the aperture or ISO.
- Shoot more brackets than you need (exp. comp. by +-3 to get 8 unique brackets)
- Spot meter a shadow and the biggest bright spot that isn't a light to know the range needed for detail in both (think of a shooting a black car on a white sand beach).
- Use Photomatix to generate your HDRs, even if you have Photoshop CS3 - Pshop CS3 (and CS2) have some bad HDR flaws, and even the "free trial" of Photomatix Pro can generate and save HDRs for tonemapping in Pshop or elsewhere.
- The "auto-alignment" and "ghosting removal" of Photomatix can only do so much for hand-held HDRs, so if you don't have a tripod, use fast shutter speeds and brace your arm.
On the artistic side:
- Avoid swiftly moving subjects (windy days, cars, crowds, fidgety people) unless you are prepared for kinda weird results, with blurs, unremovable ghosts, and stairstepping.
- An HDR file has way more dynamic range than your monitor can display - never trust what you see on screen until you tonemap it.
- When tonemapping, be gentle: remember that *this is still a photograph* so viewers expect some contrast... and maybe even black shadows and blown out highlights.
On the "way-too-much-trouble" side:
- Try basic exposure-blending that *isn't* HDR! Photomatix has 4 ways to do this... and the killer tip is to try "Enfuse" (google it) which will do fancy exposure blending with as many brackets as you throw at it.