hawaii

[myshkin]

do you already have a hotel booked?

Buy this book it has directions to all the hard to find beaches and is just a great overall travel guide
Amazon.com: The Ultimate Kauai Guidebook: Kauai Revealed (9780981461014): Andrew Doughty: Books

 

[mishele]

do you already have a hotel booked?

Buy this book it has directions to all the hard to find beaches and is just a great overall travel guide
Amazon.com: The Ultimate Kauai Guidebook: Kauai Revealed (9780981461014): Andrew Doughty: Books

LOL I have that book memorized!! lol I used it on Maui, too!! It's an incredible book!! I guess you are saying if I have that I know everything...lol
I'm staying in the mountains west of Kapaa for about 10 days. I can't wait!!!!

 

[myshkin]

yes if you have the book you know most things you need to know. Kapaa area is good cause its centrally located but its not the prettiest part of the island. there is a couple nice waterfalls in the area.
If you feel like camping you can camp for $3 a person at anini beach on the north shore. the beach is one of the calmest on the island and has very nice colors.This is the cheapest way to stay on Kauai
I also recommend spending one night watching sunset on the lawn of the regis hotel. When your there the sun should be going down over the ocean which the lawn gives a great view of

 

[mishele]

I'm staying in a house in the mountains west of Kapaa. So I'm hoping I'm far enough away from the messy city life. We are planning on going to the canyon and the north shore. March can't come fast enough. Did you do any cruises of the north shore? If so which one?
If you don't mind I might e-mail you any other Q's so I don't ruin your thread...lol

 

[Josh220]

Amazing shots. I don't normally like HDR's, and tend to avoid them because I can't make them look as realistic as you have.

Any tips on the processing? (i.e., which sliders do you use or avoid in Photomatix?) Do you use any filters, or is everything done in PP with the 9 exposures?

 

[myshkin]

Amazing shots. I don't normally like HDR's, and tend to avoid them because I can't make them look as realistic as you have.

Any tips on the processing? (i.e., which sliders do you use or avoid in Photomatix?) Do you use any filters, or is everything done in PP with the 9 exposures?

Thanks josh

#3 I used a GND filter when shooting the brackets, the other 3 I had a cir polarizer on. I basically leave my CPL filter on all the time if im outside before dark

Every pic is different so the sliders change. I say put strength at 90-100 , microcontrast at 9-10
Then the 3 big sliders for me are
luminance - depending on the lighting on the pic this can either just make it brighter or can effect specific areas of the pic. I change this every pic quite a bit normally

SMoothing - I keep this in the 4-6 range normally for outdoor but thats not set in stone. This can make them real bad if you don't find the right spot for this. indoor shots I feel you have more freedom with this slider

Highlight smoothing - this is crucial for the sky in outdoor pics. Normally when you load files in photomatix the sky will look dark and odd. taking this slider to the right will bring it back to reality

The rest of the sliders are more small changes and once you find the area you like you won't touch them all that much

I almost never go over 55 saturation unless the pic is void of real color and im trying to get alittle pop. I prefer to do saturation in PP

 

[simonydes]

ah amazing!!

 

[Josh220]

Amazing shots. I don't normally like HDR's, and tend to avoid them because I can't make them look as realistic as you have.

Any tips on the processing? (i.e., which sliders do you use or avoid in Photomatix?) Do you use any filters, or is everything done in PP with the 9 exposures?

Thanks josh

#3 I used a GND filter when shooting the brackets, the other 3 I had a cir polarizer on. I basically leave my CPL filter on all the time if im outside before dark

Every pic is different so the sliders change. I say put strength at 90-100 , microcontrast at 9-10
Then the 3 big sliders for me are
luminance - depending on the lighting on the pic this can either just make it brighter or can effect specific areas of the pic. I change this every pic quite a bit normally

SMoothing - I keep this in the 4-6 range normally for outdoor but thats not set in stone. This can make them real bad if you don't find the right spot for this. indoor shots I feel you have more freedom with this slider

Highlight smoothing - this is crucial for the sky in outdoor pics. Normally when you load files in photomatix the sky will look dark and odd. taking this slider to the right will bring it back to reality

The rest of the sliders are more small changes and once you find the area you like you won't touch them all that much

I almost never go over 55 saturation unless the pic is void of real color and im trying to get alittle pop. I prefer to do saturation in PP

Thanks for the in-depth response! How many stops is your GND? I've got a 3 stop ND but no GND's yet.

 

[myshkin]

My GND is a 3 stop. I need better ones. I picked up a 1 stop and 3 stop plus 77mm holder at a photo show for 10$. They are old cokin plastic ones. I just wanted to try it and see if I liked using them. I really like it but the plastic ones have some serious issues. I can't really use it during the day because it makes the sky have a weird tint. That same weird tint can actually help colors at sunset
I plan to pick up some glass ones when I get back to the states

 

[thingsIsee]

fantastic shots. frame and hang

 

[UGD]

Absolutely stunning!!!!!! I like #3 the most. The rocks and trees in the foreground frame the whole scene well. Fantastic pictures. Also...Thank You for sharing all the great info. One more question: how long were the exposures....and how did you handle movement in the shots? TY

 

[Drake]

#3 from the first post is great, but the second series is just spectacular.

 

[myshkin]

thanks drake,thingsisee, and UGD

UGD - exposure length(shutter speed) really doesn't matter as far as info for HDR
Of cours eit matters overall for any pic but the better thing to concentrate on when shooting a HDR is do you want to get the best exposure possible(balanced) on the 0 exp or do you want to over or under expose the 0 exp. This will obviously effect the whole bracket. I would say that I normally try for the best exposure for my 0 exposure shot, but there is things that make me change this.
Any scene that has extremes on the dynamic range I lean toward the extreme I more want handled. For example shooting into the sun. I don't want to blow out the sun so I give the sky and sun priority over the foreground. So I will underexpose my bracket. #2 and #3 are examples of this where I had to sacrifice some brightness and detail on the dark areas to get a better exposure on the sky and sun
The flip side if you really want to get the most out of a real dark area in a pic then you would over expose your brackets

None of these pics have alot of movement to worry about except water. I find photomatix will normally do a good job with water in auto mode

 

[UGD]

Thanks for the great info. TY

 

[manaheim]

Simply... Wow.