Finally... An Actual Post About HDR Photography

Not that you were eagerly awaiting it, but on a couple of different occasions I've tried to write about my interest in, and the general awesomeness of, HDR photography.  During the first attempt, I was beaten over the head with a broken PS3.  The second time, the great owl god swooped in and pecked my eyes out as punishment for the murder of one of his subjects.

Or, I just got sidetracked.

This time, in honor of April Fools' Day (which I abhor), I present you with something serious.  Oh, the irony...

The HDR in HDR photography stands for High Dynamic Range.  Which means that the widest possible contrast of lighting and color is represented and even exaggerated.  It's like everything in the photo went out partying and got jacked up on PCP.  Or something.  I wouldn't really know.

I'm not going to give you a full tutorial.  That's already been done elsewhere on the net, far better than I could do it.  What I will give you are some resources you can use if you want to try some HDR for yourself.

True HDR photographs are created by the blending of three bracketed photos (one underexposed, one properly exposed, and one overexposed).  I don't have the best camera in the world (Kodak Z740 digital) and my photos come out just fine, so you don't need the best equipment, but you do need a stable tripod to take the three exposures from the same viewpoint.  If you have a great photo in digital form, but didn't take three exposures (perhaps because, like me, you didn't know squat about HDR when you took the photo), that's okay too.  Just use photo editing software (I'm getting to my two favorite products in a moment) to create the over/under exposures yourself.  This is referred to as "fake HDR" but can look pretty good with the right manipulation.

There are two open source products which are necessities if you plan on doing any HDR photography.  The first is the appropriately named Qtpfsgui.  This software allows you to apply tone mapping and various filters to your photographs.  No matter what the tutorials say, go ahead and experiment with all of the filters and features of this software.  The other piece of software that I have found indispensable for any and all photo editing is Gimp.  I use it for all of my photo editing, including my site logo, gaming props, etc.  It is, in my opinion, just as good as much more expensive products.

Here's an excellent tutorial on how to create HDR photographs using these two products.

In addition to exaggerating the dynamic range of a photograph, you can also create some other neat effects with this software.  Go ahead, try it out.  Let me know how it works for you.  I'm interested in seeing what others who are more talented photographers than me can do with this stuff.

I leave you with some (more) examples of my work (term used loosely):