HDR???

[shootermcgavin]

Im gonna try this! I mean I don't think anyone would try to do this shot in HDR even if they did bracket, but I think taking a single exposure of a scene that is exposed properly can be turned into an HDR like effect with that one image.

The window - HDR by Margall | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Nice! So I tried to convert your photo to an "HDR" look and its not working at all. It looks really bad I guess because of how underexposed the foreground is... so I see the point in bracketing.
Would I get the same result if i didn't bracket but just took a properly exposed image, and made a overexposed and underexposed copy in photoshop?

Probably not, you want to take a couple under exposed and a couple over... or in simplistic terms you just want to make sure everything in your picture is exposed in one of the shots... I still am waiting for the right opportunity to use HDR, if you push it you end up just getting a weird looking photo.

 

[480sparky]

Let's see you do the same thing with this shot:

Im gonna try this! I mean I don't think anyone would try to do this shot in HDR even if they did bracket, but I think taking a single exposure of a scene that is exposed properly can be turned into an HDR like effect with that one image.

Then your challenge will be to take it and make it look like this:

Let us know how you're going to bring out the details in the windowsill when it's 100% pure white.

 

[Bynx]

I wish you people who dont understand what HDR is or means please read up. Its expanding the visible image, giving details in overexposed areas as well as in underexposed areas. This cartoonish look you mention is NOT HDR it is tone mapping. You can tone map a single jpeg file to look cartoony but thats NOT HDR. At the worst a good HDR should look like you can reach out and touch it. Beyond that it is simply the ineptitude or purposeful actions of the photographer.

Excellent example Sparky.

 

[480sparky]

I wish you people who dont understand what HDR is or means please read up. Its expanding the visible image, giving details in overexposed areas as well as in underexposed areas. This cartoonish look you mention is NOT HDR it is tone mapping. You can tone map a single jpeg file to look cartoony but thats NOT HDR. At the worst a good HDR should look like you can reach out and touch it. Beyond that it is simply the ineptitude or purposeful actions of the photographer.

Excellent example Sparky.

My take on HDR is if a scene has more dynamic range than a given sensor can capture, then HDR is one of the easiest ways possible to capture the range present.

For instance, if the scene has 14 stops of dynamic range, and the camera sensor can only record 7 stops of range, then you'll need at least 7 exposures to record the entire range of the scene. Taking one 'correct' exposure will result in either shadows with no detail in them (0:0:0) or highlights that are totally blown out (255:255:255), or, mostly likely....both. In any case, there is no data present in the 0:0:0 or 255:255:255 areas, and therefore no amount of post processing is going to magically recreate it.