Anyone doing HDR?

P

Picturequest

Well-known member
I've always wanted to try HDR like (stuckincustoms.com) Now I have my GH-1, I'm wondering if anyone is doing HDR?

I've seen the bracketing menu. What's best? I see up to 7 shots.

There is a feature that sets the first shot to normal exposure, then down stops and ramps up. or Underexposed first then ramped up? Which is best?

Also. can this be triggered via a wired remote?

And I'm not sure. When set to multiple shots. If I press the shutter once, does it execute all 7 shots? or must I hold the trigger until all 7 shots are taken.

Yes, I tried it but it went by so fast I couldn't tell by listening.

I'm familiar with Photomatix.

Are any of the picture modes better for HDR. Vibrant, Smooth etc? (or RAW just ignores those anyway)

thanks

Max
 
For photos?

I've done a bit of HDR video in post...for this shot I simply combined three different rotoscoped layers and altered the mix on my color correction to keep a good exposure. One source shot...would've been better with a few but this keeps the natural look, you can see birds flying by and it's a handheld shot, not totally locked down...more organic.

screenshot20101012at123.png


Sort of a pseudo HDR extended dynamic range thing...but for video. Rotoscoping is less than perfect but the shot already has sort of a surreal feel to it so I didn't take too much time trying to fix it...it's just a pass or so with the rotobrush in AE CS5.
 
For good HDR results in stills I find tripod a necessity. Micromovements, even at high shutter speeds, ruin the shot. Also, get a wired remote, because in bracketing mode GH1 expects shutter to be pressed after each sequence shot.
 
Hey Ben,

That's very beautiful.

For this method shooting in "RAW video" with the RED would be perfect, right?

This HDR video was done using two 5Ds. The article is in Dutch but you can see the clip that was made by American company Soviet Montage:

http://www.nieuwslog.nl/article_newdesign.php?article_id=111247

Edit: Vimeo:
http://www.vimeo.com/sovietmontage

Ben_B said:
For photos?

I've done a bit of HDR video in post...for this shot I simply combined three different rotoscoped layers and altered the mix on my color correction to keep a good exposure. One source shot...would've been better with a few but this keeps the natural look, you can see birds flying by and it's a handheld shot, not totally locked down...more organic.

Sort of a pseudo HDR extended dynamic range thing...but for video. Rotoscoping is less than perfect but the shot already has sort of a surreal feel to it so I didn't take too much time trying to fix it...it's just a pass or so with the rotobrush in AE CS5.
Click to expand...
 
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I think its important to note the difference between tone mapping and HDR. To me the 5D video in the previous post as well as the stills referred to in the original post are examples of tone mapping.

Ben_B's still is a much closer example to HDR than the other two.
 
Picturequest said:
I've always wanted to try HDR like (stuckincustoms.com) Now I have my GH-1, I'm wondering if anyone is doing HDR?

I've seen the bracketing menu. What's best? I see up to 7 shots.

There is a feature that sets the first shot to normal exposure, then down stops and ramps up. or Underexposed first then ramped up? Which is best?

Also. can this be triggered via a wired remote?

And I'm not sure. When set to multiple shots. If I press the shutter once, does it execute all 7 shots? or must I hold the trigger until all 7 shots are taken.

Yes, I tried it but it went by so fast I couldn't tell by listening.

I'm familiar with Photomatix.

Are any of the picture modes better for HDR. Vibrant, Smooth etc? (or RAW just ignores those anyway)

thanks

Max
Click to expand...


Shoot RAW

Shoot on a tripod with a cable release

Fire off your shots as fast as possible to avoid subject movement (you can always process an HDR from a single RAW to avoid this).

5 Stops is usually plenty of exposure latitude.

I ususally go under exposed , correct exposure then over as my sequence...makes it easier to remember for me.

And for goodness sakes dont overdo your photos like stuck in customs....Trey is a good photog but his heavy handed approach to HDR looks horrible in some of his shots IMO.

Digital blending using layer masks and blending modes gives better results if you want to extend dynamic range....check out Daniel Cheongs work on Flickr to see what I mean.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielcheong/

I have plenty of extended DR shots in my gallery too (including some HDRs) all with exposure settings and camera gear listed....but none of those shots are taken with my GH1 as I dont like this camera for still photography. Nikon is my preferred tool here.

Good luck.
 
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I used to do HDR for all my real estate photo work. Now I do something similar, but it's called exposure fusion. It uses a different process to merge multiple exposures. It's a lot more realistic, and you don't get the haziness or cartoon-y look that all my HDR shots had before. But yeah, get as much range as you can, and always use a tripod. My 7D will only do 3 brackets at up to 3 stop intervals--more would be better sometimes. I set the camera to high-speed burst and have to hold down the remote shutter release to fire all three. My only problem now is that I still have to mask windows, and that takes time.
 
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