All posts filed under: HDR

Using HDR for architectural photography

While blending or merging several exposures into one final High Dynamic Range (HDR) image remains a popular creative option for landscape photographers over the years, its use in architectural and commercial shoots has some big benefits that are unique to the challenges of shooting these genres. In many scenarios, especially outdoors, photographers can normally rely on graduated filters to balance a scene by blocking large parts of the frame with a neutral density layer – evening up the brightness from the shadows to the highlights. But while this works well on large, sweeping horizons and foregrounds (i.e., landscape shooting), when it comes to making that process work for odd-shaped buildings and structures with various hotspots and dark areas, we’re often unable to use the same approach. And where using a filter isn’t an option, or where the sheer amount of “fill light” you’d need to balance the scene becomes prohibitive, that’s where Capture One’s HDR Merge function can now deliver the results you need. How It’s Used HDR Merge relies on you capturing two or …

HDR 101: Interior

How to Capture an Interior Space and All Its Charm by Christophe Bénard Despite the ongoing effort from camera manufacturers to increase the dynamic range of digital camera sensors, capturing the full range of tonal values in a scene remains a critical challenge for most photographers. But what is dynamic range exactly? In photography, dynamic range refers to a camera sensor’s ability to record details  both  in highlight and shadow areas. In other words,  dynamic range marks  the difference between the darkest and lightest tones in an image. The best sensor on the planet,  which is  the human eye  has an astonishing 21-stop dynamic range while the best cameras  available  today  can only  achieve approximately 15 stops. In order to broaden the range of contrast in a single image while maintaining details in both highlights and shadows, digital photographers, for years, have  relied  on a  post-processing technique called high dynamic range merging, also known as  HDR.  HDR  consists of digitally combining several images taken at different exposure levels by varying the shutter speed. Unfortunately, over the years …

The Brenizer Method

Imagine you’re in a situation where a lot of bokeh and negative space would benefit the look you’re aiming to create with your image. Typically negative space and bokeh are hard to achieve because both features negatively affect each other. Why? In short, to achieve a short depth of field, one needs a long focal length combined with a short focus distance. Conversely, creating negative space requires less focal length and more focus distance, resulting in less bokeh. So how do you attain both negative space and bokeh? For starters, a special technique is required, so that photographer can get close to its subject without sacrificing focal length. Usually, this approach results in a very tight frame with almost no negative space. But if a panorama technique is implemented, negative space can be created by stitching the images together in post. That way, one can create an image that boasts excellent bokeh and plenty of negative space. And that’s what’s referred to as the ‘Brenizer Method,’ also sometimes referred to as ‘Bokeh Panorama. For those …

Shooting HDR for Landscape

By Rachel Ross Introduction Very quickly it’s important to establish what HDR merging is and why it’s so useful for landscape photography – because it is. If you’ve ever picked up a camera you’ll know that what the camera captures often doesn’t quite match what you see with your eyes, especially in situations of high contrast. Your eyes and brain work in tandem to provide an image that is balanced through the entire tonal range, but cameras aren’t quite there yet. Cameras still struggle to capture the full dynamic range spectrum of darks, shadows, mid-tones and highlights in a single frame, as usually a camera will expose the shadow areas correctly or the highlights or takes some average of the two that doesn’t accurately expose any of it. HDR merging is the solution, as it captures the full range of tones in multiple frames of the same scene (this is ‘bracketing’), and blends them together to show the full range of light in a single image. So, HDR is really perfect when you want to …