Dundurn Castle, Hamilton, ON

[Bynx]

Still processing all the shots I took but I hope someone knows the answer.......
How to eliminate the glare from the windows. The light was terrible. Just the light through the odd window and a couple of 60 watt bulbs to light up large rooms. In the 4th shot the glow of light is really bad.

 

[MLeeK]

Very cool! I'd love to see more. LOVE "homes" like this!

 

[Jrmdb3]

I feel like there's a bit of a halo effect on the first picture.
The second and third you could have captured more high exposure pictures to take care of the blown out lights.

Otherwise i'm digging them

 

[Bynx]

Not so Jrm. The rooms had very dark areas and the light coming through the window was very bright. Trying to capture the shadows made the white exceed the window frames and caused ridiculous glowing areas. I might put the shots online for anyone to play with.

 

[Majeed Badizadegan]

Not so Jrm. The rooms had very dark areas and the light coming through the window was very bright. Trying to capture the shadows made the white exceed the window frames and caused ridiculous glowing areas. I might put the shots online for anyone to play with.

Did you try manually blending?

 

[Bynx]

Im going to give that a shot Rotanimod.

 

[vipgraphx]

#1 - there is a little bit of haloing, the angle of the shot is not working especially with that black flower pot or what ever it is right smack in the middle. I think the building is downward right. Greens seem a little vibrant from what you usually post. There is ghosting in your clouds.

#2 - is hazy it feels flat in some areas like the left side. The darks on the right lower stair case has lost detail along with that coat/blanket. not sure if its processing or not enough info. floor seems to be tilted downward right

#3 - the light is blown out and the reflection on the ceiling is pretty harsh. The Reflection of the light on that left paintings glass is also blown out. Better details in this one but, the picture itself is not that flattering to me.

#4 - I would have liked to have seen a wider angle shot that what is here. It would have been nice to get the whole chandelier in the shot,,,but, then you need a really wide distortion. There is a heavy haze coming through the window and falling off onto the table which has a blue hue. Nice to have blacks in the photo however there is loss of detail in areas because its to black. I would assume you needed more exposures on both ends.

#5 - IMO is your best shot. Nice detail in the dark areas as well as having some black that makes it pop. The processing is great!


To help eliminate haze/ glare you need to be able to have enough shots so you can lightly mask in most all the exposures little by little starting with the lightest to darkest in that area to where it is not noticeable. You may not need the lightest but you do need to paint each layer in lightly so they blend nicely.

Other option is not to use photomatix and manually blend in your exposures so there is no tonemapping occurring.

Other option may work is to play with the lighting slider. I would start with the default button in photomatix and adjust sliders from there rather than using any presets. I know you like the painterly preset however, it uses an alternate light source that messes with the lighting in a sometimes weird way.

I have also used the ghosting tool in photomatix even though there is no movement, in bright areas and right clicked and selected a darker exposure for the bright area which sometimes really does the trick in
situations like this.

 

[FanBoy]

I like the use of foreground color in the first shot. The rest feel warm and inviting, especially the last one.

You're right--the diffused lighting of the sheer curtains in #4 is a tough one...

 

[Bynx]

In the first shot the line of grass at the top is the top of a small hill so the building is actually sunk down a few feet. My only thought as I took the shot was I wanted a tall ladder to climb so I could see the bottom of the building and get that bloody vase out of the way. I had an hour to take all my shots. No time to think, just shoot shoot shoot and keep up with the tour. The whole place was incredibly dimly lit. Ive brought out lighting brighter than was seen by the eye with longer exposures. If something is dark in the pic then it was like that in the room such as the dark area around the bottom of the stairs in the second shot. I didnt have time to take a minute per shot. The lousy glow in the fourth shot is a problem I had with a couple of other rooms. I will try manually blending the images, but to overexposure to get the darker areas, that bright window light really gets blown out over the actual window frame area. It spills over things and turns them blue. What a pain. And I thought HDR was flawless. Its not.