P#18 Q4A: What Are the Most Common Mistakes People Make When They Begin Exploring HDR, and How Can They Be Avoided?

Avoid Over Processing

Tony Sweet: The one mistake that I commonly see (and there are several) is over processing.

I tend to like things that are a little bit super real. That's why I use Photomatix -- to go beyond the totally natural and get into a more super realistic type of look where it's natural but got a little extra edge to it.

Some people will take you way over the top -- a little haloing and it doesn't look right, just over processed. I think that's an issue with any kind of software that people use. They tend to want to get in there and wring it out right away.

Audri Lanford: This is like when desktop publishing came out many, many years ago. You had people who went in there and starting using every font under the sun and 27 colors.

Tony Sweet: You got it. There is no difference. I find in my own work, the more that I use Photomatix, the less tone mapping I do. I wound up doing more of that stuff in Photoshop.

I encourage people to get in there and wring everything out, rash it up, see what it looks like but still look around at really high-end HDR. Just aspire toward getting that look. I think the more that you get in there and shoot this stuff, you'll find that you gravitate away from the gimmicky look.

Just use the exposure blending that the software does and do your color adjustments, just like a tiff file. When you process an HDR file as a TIFF, then like any other TIFF file, you take it in Photoshop and you do your contrast, color adjustments, layers, etc.

I'm finding that people tend to overuse the software. They also tend to not expose enough. They won't actually save all of their highlights.

What you need here is one exposure where all your highlights are included inside the histogram, where nothing is clipping the right side of the histogram, no matter what it takes -- five exposures, seven, nine. You just keep dialing those exposures down until you have one exposure that is completely inside of the right side of the screen.

Does that make sense at all?

Audri Lanford: Yes. Do you turn on the blinkies to make sure about that?

Tony Sweet: We can look at those, but the histogram also tells you that. Either way is fine, but you want one shot where there is no clipping, no blinking, none. Just keep dialing it back until you get that. When you do that, you will have all of the highlights on the control.

People tend to stop short of that and some parts are still blown out when they process.

Audri Lanford: When you're doing that, do you go a full stop for each of your shots or does that depend on the situation?

Tony Sweet: The software likes one stop increments. If you don't do that, it will give you a box saying, "What do you want to do here?" You can adjust it, but the software likes one stop.

That's why I shoot aperture priority because one stop is really one stop. If you're on manual, that could change.

Audri Lanford: Right. Do you do the same thing on shadow side -- of going until you get the deepest shadow?

Tony Sweet: Basically yes. If you think of it like the histogram and look at the right side, if you're pulling all the highlights in, you're going to be blocking up the left side. The whole thing is moving to the left. If you go the other way, like totally blowing out the right side, the left side will be just inside of that line. It doesn't matter.

What you want is both sides to be fully included in your series of pictures. Say minus three might be what you need to bring in your highlights, and you might need plus three to bring in all of your shadows. That's a seven stop HDR sequence. That's what it might take.

It normally takes five but when you have all of that, that's your whole dynamic range. That's when you get the maximum out of your HDR image.

In Conclusion

Over-processing is a very common problem when people start out in HDR photography. When you begin your HDR exploration, make sure you get the proper exposures and don't over-process your HDR images.