First a trip to Blue Pool, Dorset...

flyingseale · Mar 3, 2007

We had some wonderful weather today so Jane and I went to Blue Pool on our way to Kimmeridge. At the moment just playing with photomatrix to see if I like HDR's, but I can already see that this is a 'must have' piece of s/w. What do you think?

Mike

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

ashfordphoto · Mar 3, 2007

i like 4 a lot. There's a lot of good color/light in 4 in combination with the composition of the trees that get me going good.

The curve in the large tree on the left of 5 ruins the picture for me. But nonetheless, good work!

lostprophet · Mar 4, 2007

very nice

df3photo · Mar 4, 2007

I love all but #4. Great work!

LaFoto · Mar 4, 2007

These look so good .... I will really give this HDR another try, hoping that the threads of my flimsy tripod will hold more than they did on that dark, cloudy, wintery day when I first tried to create photos for HDR that in the end became these total_bloopers . (True fact is: I would actually need to have a GOOD tripod first of all... :roll: )

The colours here are wonderful and I really love the wide angle on your Photo 3 where we can look right into the lake and through the water. Wow.

Hertz van Rental · Mar 4, 2007

These pictures bring back a few memories. I know Blue Pool well. I lived in Bournemouth for a while and had friends in Corfe. Always stopped at Blue Pool on the way.
Picture 3 really captures the spirit of the place.

Tantalus · Mar 4, 2007

These are very nice shots, well composed, you might want to brighten them a bit, they look too dark for a sunny day

JIP · Mar 4, 2007

I agree with the too dark comments it seems to me the whole point of shooting an HDR image is to get a good exposure throughout but it seems like the water is nicely exposed and the rest is too dark

flyingseale · Mar 4, 2007

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions. Regarding too dark...I just went back into photomatrix to try a few changes and noticed something that I missed before. When you create an image and play with the sliders to get the look you want they stay there for the next image. I had assumed they were returning to default each time, but no. So, in my rush to create a bunch of images they are all a bit wrong. However, I won't be going back to change them for a while because I'll wait until I can afford the license.
What I've learnt from this is:

if you've got the tripod set up it makes sense to take bracketed exposures so you can create an HDR later if you want because making one from a single RAW file does not work anywhere near as good.
Bracketing -2, 0, +2 works better than -1, 0, +1
Taking a 4th shot -3 or -4 really helps when the sky is bright.

Regards
Mike

flyingseale · Mar 4, 2007

LaFoto said:
total_bloopers . (True fact is: I would actually need to have a GOOD tripod first of all... :roll: )

Thanks for sharing. Yes, you need a new tripod. When I got hooked a few months ago I read that everyone said you needed a good tripod, so I got the Manfrotto 190CL. It's probably the cheapest of the good tripods so I'm pleasantly surprised how much you can 'poke' the camera when you change settings and still have it perfectly lined up.

Mike

Hertz van Rental · Mar 4, 2007

I think you got the exposures spot on - at least they look right on my monitor. Any lighter and they would look washed out and ruin the mood. Blue Pool is slightly mysterious.