Is HDR a trendy gimmick? Do you care?

[unpopular]

it almost looks like the stack is unaligned in the Photocrapix version. Post the stack and I'll run it through Enfuse.

 

[TheUniverse]

Every trick (gimmick) has its usefulness. And then, every trick gets abused. Just like alcohol I guess.

Can't believe I just said that...

But I'm surprised nobody has mentioned that HDR has been around since the 1930's or 40's. I have not been following digital photography in a while but, a few years back, I had not seen a single gimmick that didn't exist in the time of dinosaurs.

Although there may be some, most software writers are not artists and, when it comes to photography, processing softwares like PS have done nothing more than recreate what was done in the darkroom or at the time of the shoot. But only to some extent.

The polarizing filter has never been recreated that I know of, for example.

As for trends, they come and go. Why some come back is beyond me.

But HDR (the non-comic book version) can be a great tool and used in that way is neither a gimmick nor a trend.

 

[wanderer86]

Oh noes!

The dreaded HDR hole!!!

LOL! That is an AWESOME explanation. I agree that I think HDR has its purpose and I've seen some amazing HDR shots. I experimented with it a little when I was still shooting digital, but haven't done it with film.

This was my attempt at HDR

chevrolethdredit by Aimee Lower, on Flickr

Plus, the benefits with HDR include alot of really breath taking nighttime shots that we see around lately. A friend of mine does HDR merges of dozens upon dozens of shots of the same scene at different exposure rates to create stunning nighttime photos. Sometimes shots like that would not really be economical with film (at least in my case)