This week we asked twitter users suggestions for our regular reader poll. Thanks to @timallenphoto who suggested a look at HDR. We asked simple if you loved, hated or didn’t care about HDR photography. The poll stirred a little bit of a response but here are the final results.
51% of visitors voted that they loved HDR photography and despite voting that I didn’t care much about the use of HDR I have to confess that I have dabbled with HDR post processing apps.
With mobile devices coming equipped with HDR capture there is little doubting that High Dynamic Range photography is here to stay.
Thumbnail photo credit : FlixelPix
I think oversaturated/cooked HDR is overused. Subtle HDR on the other hand, when used correctly can sometimes not be immediately noticeable.
I think in a few rare cases, it’s a useful tool for a more evenly exposed photography. Like @JonnyGardner said, I don’t want to look a photo and know someone used HDR. I always strive to capture the image I’m looking for in camera. Can anyone say ND Grad filter?
Yes you can say Grad-ND filter, but you can also say triangular-shaped mountains with no one horizon against which to align it, so HDR’s fine by me! 🙂
I’m not much of a fan of HDR and wouldn’t use it myself, although I’m sure some photographer’s use it well and hopefully sparingly. Unfortunately the HDR pics I notice scream, “HDR!! HDR!!!” at me and cause me to run away trembling…
I think its a good tool. However, if you can look at an image and tell its HDR, its a big fat FAIL.
It seems like a great tool to bring captured image closer to what the eyes see, or to create a striking kind of artwork, but the majority of people associate it with the results that lie in-between… which are neither a great capture nor a creative masterpiece.
The in-betweeners have given in a bad rap, because those are the ones we label “HDR” – “I don’t like that: they’ve used HDR (badly)”. When I see a great capture, I don’t see HDR; I feel the scene like I was there. When I see a striking artistic image, I don’t see HDR (or even Photoshop for that matter); I see art I like.
We don’t need excuses or labels for things we feel positive about; we just embrace them.
I voted that I don’t have a real opinion simply because there was no selection for “it’s another tool in the photographer’s virtual darkroom”.
I am neither pro-HDR nor anti-HDR. I very much agree with the comments so far, especially the first comment by Craig. He very much reflects my own perspective: it’s a tool, and as with any other tool, if used well can contribute to the end result but if used poorly, will just as readily detract from the viewer’s experience.
To me, HDR is a means for pulling out more detail and actually enhancing the dynamic range of the camera in the virtual darkroom to more nearly approximate the human eye. If I see a picture and it is obviously HDR…I chalk it up to “I guess that’s what the photographer wanted” and move on to the next photograph. If I see a photograph and really like it and later find out HDR was used, I applaud his or her use of the tool.
There’s a third group, to mymind, as well: those for whom HDR is not a photographic tool but rather an artistic tool. As mentioned by others, some users go too garish (for me though others like it) but others manage to bring out the artistic effect of, say, an oil painting: it pops and it’s definitely obviously not an untouched photograph but they’re presenting it as a work of art, not a photograph, and I respect that. Especially when I like the effect! 😉
Bingo, Bill. Best answer yet.
I was approaching this poll from the perspective that there are 2.5 terms to disambiguate:
a) HDR – an image (normally in a 32-bit format) (probably arising from a combination of several source images) where the scene depicted has greater dynamic range than any one frame off the camera could reasonably record (e.g 8 stops)
b) tonemapping: given a fixed range output (a JPEG, sRGB, gamma 2.2, with its 0…255 in each R,G,B channel), the result of cramming a greater input contrast into that range is simply going to be low contrast. Tonemapping is the process whereby contrast is improved, frequently by spatial transformation rather than tonal.
c) the degree to which the obviousness is acceptable; I quite understand the desire to keep a photo realistic, but also respect an artist using the camera as a tool might find a dramatic tonemapping makes a statement for them.
Not a huge fan myself, but there are some circumstances where it can yield nice results. Unfortunately a lot of what I see does not fall into that category.
I do HDR a lot and I love it. I do try to be subtle with it but sometimes I get a bit carried away. You have to be careful with the sliders and know what each one does. When I process an image in Photomatix, I`m only half way there. I usually apply several layer masks in Photoshop to get the contrast/tone/saturation balance right.
I use an HDR filter when editing my photos from my point and shoot camera and like others have mentioned above I only use this effect subtly to enhance the detail. Most of the time I just adjust the exposure, contrast and the colors manually, but in some cases the HDR filter is a simple shortcut to achieve my desired result.
Most HDR is like the black velvet painting of photography. Horrible.
Full on HDR where it is completely over saturated and you get halo artefacts appearing is ugly and anyone can achieve it.
I think the art of HDR is using it in a way that you can transform an image into something a bit out of the ordinary and add vibrancy and depth.
I do a lot of HDR and at first it was all sliders set to maximum but as I have progressed I get some really nice effects in detail and texture with minimum processing, as with most photography it’s trial and error.
[img]http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidbladon/5048235260/in/set-72157624962408049/[/img]
Not really a hater of HDR, but I don’t love it and I certainly have an opinion (on everything, just ask my wife :))
Overly done, tone mapped HDR makes me want to strangle people – pushing sliders around to extremes isn’t art (to little old subjective me).
There’s definitely a place for HDR in expanding dynamic range in an image – but personally I do it by way of layers, curves and masks – I like to be in control.
When HDR is created by appropriate tool, control is even greater than layers, curves and masks. There is ability to locally or globally adjust every single aspect of HDR-tone mapped image. You may imagine it as 3D curves tool (actually 4-or 5-D) where curves change from point to point on the image. So much control is of course dangerous and can be abused (HDRs all love to hate type).
As others have mentioned, when done subtly it is a great tool. It’s kind of like wasabi, a little goes a very long way. When first exploring HDR in Photomatix, I used it like a sledgehammer, but now I am a bit more selective on how I use it.
I think this poll question has been done at least one hundred twenty-seven thousand, three-hundred and five times…give or take a few.
Makes me sad to see a form of art and photography get debated so much instead of just enjoying expression from people.
Black and white, color, lomo, HDR…whatever…it’s all how people want to convey a vision to us the viewer…so who are we to judge or approve what they do?
I agree there is a lot of bad technique out there, but HDR can be done very well and a lot of amazing photographers use it as part of their toolbag.
It’s here to stay, I just wish we could move on from this debate.
Mike, it is now one hundred twenty-seven thousand, three-hundred and six time. I am not sure it is a debate other than public feeling but there is a purpose as we will be exploring the different levels of HDR to move away from the fact some people think it is simply those extreme looking over saturated photos you see with the title hdr.
That is fine…but the poll question is “What do you think of HDR Photography”, which honestly, people love to post because it always draws traffic to their website. It’s been posted and discussed a million times already.
Not trying to be insulting or mean…it’s just the truth.
My goal is to turn people to be more like Bill B. above. It’s just a tool. I use HDR, but I also do straight color, B&W, portraits, weddings, etc. I’m a photographer and HDR is a tool in my bag.
Let’s stop asking people what they think about it. Let’s just move forward and take pictures.
HDR as a principle is sound and worth doing. I do a lot of “Fake HDR” where I will bracket exposures and hand blend the photos but only if the pending result looks real.
The problem with HDR is that it’s over done and used to exaggerate the scene and the results are garbage even though the artist may be very proud of what they are doing.
If I can look at your photo and say its HDR you’re doing it wrong.
IMHO!
If I look at my own photo I did in HDR but don’t know it’s HDR, that’s kind of silly 🙂
I’ve heard that argument…HDR shouldn’t look like HDR, but then what’s the point? If you polish it down so much that it doesn’t appear to be HDR anymore and no one in the world knows it is…then you probably did it wrong since your scene has the same dynamic range as a single RAW photo.
HDR’s goal is to bring dynamic range into a photo that otherwise can’t be done with a single image…so it’s always going to appear a bit different than a normal photo, I THINK at least.
I really think it’s overused. And most of tmes badly.