Need Advice - Took some shots + HDR - CC please!

NeutralNovice · May 15, 2008

Hi all... today, we had over here one of the most beautiful sunset skies that I have been in a long time. When I got out of class tonight and looked up at the sky, it took my breath away. It was a weirdly HOT and cloudy day, which is unusual here.

Location: San Francisco Bay Area - San Mateo County - My Neighborhood
Time: Between 8:00pm & 8:30pm PST

Picture 1-3: Unedited Shots of the Sunset Sky around my neighborhood. The sky was wicked tonight... Tell me what you think! Does it look grainy to you? At full size they are grainy/noisy... ISO was sub-800 I believe.

Picture 4: HDR Composition... I'm not entirely sure how good it is. My intention was to fix the problem I had in "Picture 1," with the houses being darker than it was. That was my second-ever attempt at an HDR... I realized that its really hard to learn official lessons and what not so I am taking it as trial and error. Please give me some pointers if you have any!

Picture 5: Middle shot in the HDR Composition. 0 EV... I don't know why it came out so crappy.

Picture 6: Picture of the moon @ 12x Zoom, fast shutter speed... I thought it was sort of pretty. Maybe someone can give me some pointers on moon-shooting?

I'm open to all Constructive Criticism, please don't hesitate to tell me what I did wrong or need to do with the photos.

PICTURE 1

PICTURE 2

PICTURE 3

PICTURE 4

PICTURE 5

PICTURE 6

NeutralNovice · May 15, 2008

Anyone?

SBlanca · May 15, 2008

they're ncie but theres the whole grainy thing....

also, whats with the photomatix thing?

the moon one's awesome though

DadeCountyAnthony · May 15, 2008

I like #1 but the light pole gives the whole image a side tilt.

I like how the pitch black background with the glowing moon on #6.

NeutralNovice · May 15, 2008

SBlanca said:
they're ncie but theres the whole grainy thing....

also, whats with the photomatix thing?

the moon one's awesome though

I haven't decided whether or not to purchase the software... and I'm not very good at HDR right now anyway.

Yeah, I was trying to figure out how to make it not grainy or how to take ungrainy pics

THanks about the moon!

ann · May 15, 2008

how many images did you merge.
the process itself lends it self to grain and so it would be better to keep your ISO low, put the camera on a tripod so you can take several exposures at different fstops, or be rock solid and fire off some bracket frames. which means you will need to put the camera into the mode that will let you bracket quickly. check for the BKT function.

to be good these take practices it is not a one click operation.

Garbz · May 15, 2008

There's no dynamic range in the scene to begin with. IMO this is a poor choice for a HDR photo. The original looks much better.

NeutralNovice · May 15, 2008

ann said:
how many images did you merge.
the process itself lends it self to grain and so it would be better to keep your ISO low, put the camera on a tripod so you can take several exposures at different fstops, or be rock solid and fire off some bracket frames. which means you will need to put the camera into the mode that will let you bracket quickly. check for the BKT function.

to be good these take practices it is not a one click operation.

I used 3 and 5 exposures and and experimented with each set. I did use a low ISO setting, like 200 or 400 and the camera was on a tripod. I just got this camera so I haven't yet learned how to use the BKT feature... I;m taking it slowly.

I personally liked the turnout of the first few unedited pictures...

Garbz:

Yeah I agree with you that it didn't turn out too well, the HDR that is. I am just experimenting with it for trial and errors sake. I also agree with you that the unedited shots were better... but I need more pointers on how to avoid/reduce the noise or graininess.

Thanks for everyones opinion so far!