High Dynamic Range Imaging (HDRI)

I said a while back that I would make a few comments about HDRI. I am obviously no expert in this but the concept is fairly simple. High dynamic range is when the scene being photographed would not be well represented by a single exposure. That is, parts of the photo would be too dark or too bright if only a single exposure were taken. You can get around this by taking multiple exposures but with a single aperture setting. You change the length of time the shutter is open. Then using software that will combine the multiple exposures you can show all the details that would otherwise not be visible or would be washed out.

That process is then combined with what is called tonal mapping which I do not understand at all. However some amazing photos that are more like a painting than a photograph can be accomplished. Flickr has a great collection of them available. One of my favorites is this one.

I haven’t had the chance to really do much with this technique but plan to in the future.

I don’t remember if I have mentioned this previously but in anticipation of our upcoming tour of America which I haven’t talked about either yet I upgraded my camera from a high end point and shoot to a low end Digital Single Reflex (DSLR) camera. All the photos at Smugmug were taken with the new camera.

I also got a Sigma 55-200mm telephoto lens and a few accessories including a decent tripod.

I’ll talk more about our upcoming plans for the tour in another posting.