Saturday, January 19, 2008

Little Pond- a first attempt at HDR imaging




Little Pond
Originally uploaded by Tom Arbour

One the most interesting things about digital photography is the ability to produce things called high dynamic range images (HDR). I have seen this technique used on FLICKR and have always been intrigued. The images I see are usually quite strange looking. Recently, I have seen landscape images produced using HDR techniques that were quite appealing. After doing some internet research, I think I have caught the "HDR bug"!

Last night I created my first HDR image. I used a software program called Photamix Basic to combine two images of Little Pond into one image. The original images, taken within seconds of each other and with a tripod were under and over exposed. By themselves, the images did not look very good. However, put take the lights from one image and the darks from another, smush them together in a computer, and whala!, this is what you get. I like this image, although if I cropped it so that the light spot in the lower right was eliminated, I think it would be more pleasing and balanced.


Chris asked to see the starting images, and here they are. I think that the final picture takes more from the second image. Be sure to click on the final picture to see the image at FLICKR, where you can also take a look at the image at larger sizes.

Tom

9 comments:

  1. Neat, I've never heard of that technique before. It would be interesting to see the before photo's that you combined.

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  2. Hi Chris, ask and you shall receive! I have posted the original photographs from which I used to create the HDR image.

    Tom

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  3. These are wonderful and I have never really figured out HDR! Great job!

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  4. Thanks Tom,

    If you want to try, do a search for Photomatix. This software makes it fairly easy if you have several images that were taken with a tripod at different exposure levels.

    Tom

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  5. What a great technique!!! Beautiful photos.

    JJ :D

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  6. Hi, Tom,

    This is your wife Megan's cousin Katie's husband, Rashed. I found your blog through the link on Ben and Rachel's wedding website.

    First of all, I really like the blog and, secondly, these are great pictures of the lake from which Little Pond gets its name. I stayed at Little Pond (not knowing that that was its name) during a family reunion over Thanksgiving in 2003, and have fond memories of the Woods' hospitality and their house in the forest.

    You and Megan should come visit us in Montreal sometime; there's a lot of nice scenery out here, especially to the north of the city.

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  7. Hi Rashed,

    Montreal sounds like great fun. It is good to talk to you, will you be coming to Ben and Rachel's wedding?

    Tom

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  8. Hi, Tom,

    No, I'm afraid I probably won't be able to make it to the wedding, unless I get Canadian citizenship by then. People who need visas to enter the US (such as myself) can't travel to the US on non-immigrant visas (such as tourist visas) if they're married to Americans. They're only allowed in on immigrant visas, which take over a year to process. Since I don't want to apply for US permanent residency at this stage, I haven't been able to visit the US since Katie and I got married. :(

    I hope Katie can go to the wedding, though.

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