My HDR Images...please critique

[ryan2451]

I am new to the forum and I have always wanted people to honestly critique my work. Here are a few HDR images I have done over the past year or so. Let me know your thoughts. I did them as thumbnails because I wasn't sure how big they would actually post in the thread.

 

[Light Guru]

They are all extremely over processed and cartoony looking.

 

[ryan2451]

Ok, thank you. Any suggestions to tone them down?

 

[Parker219]

Ok, thank you. Any suggestions to tone them down?

Yes, take one single image with the best camera settings for the scene and edit the photo as needed.

 

[ryan2451]

Ok, thank you. Any suggestions to tone them down?

Yes, take one single image with the best camera settings for the scene and edit the photo as needed.

Haha ok, so stay away from HDR! Got it. Ok, well it's good to know. Sounds like I have my HDR processing work out cut out for me and stick to my "normal" processing techniques.

 

[Light Guru]

Ok, thank you. Any suggestions to tone them down?

I don't think any of those scenes had a broad enough dynamic to need HDR treatment in the first place.

 

[ryan2451]

Ok, thank you. Any suggestions to tone them down?

I don't think any of those scenes had a broad enough dynamic to need HDR treatment in the first place.

Ok good to know. It was something I always wanted to try so it's great to get feedback on that. Thank you again. I do appreciate it.

 

[SCraig]

HDR most assuredly has its place. In a low-light situation, for example, you can take multiple photographs at differing exposures and blend them into a composite that will look better than any single image. We used to have a couple of members here who created really great HDR composites.

The first thing to do, in my opinion, is to look at a photograph and ask yourself if it's an HDR image. If you can answer "Yes!" without any doubt then it's overprocessed. Likewise, if the colors are blazing there is zero question about it being overprocessed. If you have to think about whether it is or not then it was pretty well done.

 

[Derrel]

I sure do like the composition of the scene in shot #1. WOW! What a lovely, lovely and amazing scene! Where is that? Is that a lake, or the ocean in the background? Gosh, I would love to see that place for myself!

 

[weepete]

Actually the last is pretty cool, it's been pushed so far it actually looks more like a painting than a photo and I've seen an artist who paints trees like that though their name escapes me right now.

The rest are way overcooked. Oversaturated, crazy colours and your masks need refinement so you can take the sky exposures down but retain the midtone exposure on trees, buildings etc

The chipmunk shot makes me wonder if you've just tone mapped these rather than used seperate exposures.

I'd highy reccomend looking into Luminocity masking for producing HDRs, this guy does some pretty nice tutorials that I've found useful and even has a downloadble free photoshop actions https://iso.500px.com/luminosity-masks-in-digital-blending/

 

[yaopey]

All your images have good composition. However, I'm afraid I do agree that these are overly processed.

Not every image needs to be turned into an HDR - the top middle and the lower left image could be done in a single shot because it didn't look like there is high dynamic range.

The first image - I really like it. The colors complement each other but there are very noticeable halos around the trees.

The bottom middle and right - Both are nicely composed but too saturated for my taste.

I assume you're tone-mapping with an HDR software? It's very easy to go overboard with the slider adjustments in HDR software to produce surreal images. Try to go easy on the HDR effect the next time

Another way of creating HDR is to use exposure blending. It gives you a more natural result but it does have a learning curve. But I can promise you the effort is well worth it!

 

[The Barbarian]

Try this first:
Make a layer with your HDR, and one with your original image.
Then slowly reduce the opacity of the top layer until you get something that looks right.

This usually works to get an acceptable image.

 

[joecap]

I like the last one best...a beautiful path!

 

[scotts2014se]

I think the first one would be great a little toned down.

 

[Destin]

I think they're all overprocessed, to be honest. The best HDRs are the shots that don't appear to be HDR.

Here's an example of an HDR I did at a wedding recently, one shot for the scene, one for outside the windows. Note that I kept the exposure outside the window somewhat bright intentionally to make it less obvious this was an HDR.