The Lightroom Merge to HDR function returns an actual RAW file in the DNG format which is awesome and affords access to all of the full Lightroom tools. I understand that the entire world does not use Lightroom, but lots of folks do. Since lots of folks want a PSD returned this means several clicks, often forgotten and the work gets done and you cannot use the image within Lightroom. Moreover if you are round-tripping from Lightroom you have to change your PS preference settings to return a TIF, because Lightroom chokes on an HDR returned as a PSD. It's not popular because it is not preset based and lots of folks just want to slap a preset on and be down with it. It did not make major edits either, leaving control in the hands of the creator. It also delivers massive bit depth which means that you actually get to leverage the data in your images. This was my go to option for a long time for natural looking HDR images because it was very reliable and very consistent. The Nik Collection is a great set of tools, but nothing has happened in HDR Efex Pro for years and it is now way behind the curve, although I hope that DXO will improve it. Then DXO bought the remains and recently released their first version of the Nik Collection. But Google bought Nik, then charged for it, then gave it away free, then abandoned it. When Nik developed it and was working on it, it was awesome.
#Photomatix pro 6.0.3 software#
This wasn't the first HDR software but it was the first to really get the idea of natural looking HDR. I looked at five ways to use HDR post processing using only three images for this article and wanted to share my findings. There's nothing wrong if you like the nuclear look as some do. In fact learning luminosity masks with a tool like Lumenzia will help you capture more usable images because you will learn to recognize what zones different parts of your scene fall into.īack to HDR because this is a very simple route to get natural looking high dynamic range images. This is not like a preset where you are offered no clue as to what is happening. A far better alternative is to use Luminosity Masks, and while you can create your own, save hours of time and just buy Greg Benz's superb Lumenzia extension for Photoshop. Lifting shadows and pulling highlights sounds a bit like dodging and burning, but it really is not the same thing, so if you won't do HDR but want more control, learn to dodge and burn. Lifting shadows can absolutely reveal detail but also introduces a lot of digital noise in the shadow areas. Pulling down highlights works, but only to a point where you start to get weird artefacts appearing. That said, our exposures still need to be made with the proper intent, such that we don't clip the critical highlights and don't drive the shadows into the ground.
When HDR first arrived on the scene we were working, on average with about 6 stops of dynamic range and HDR has fallen a bit out of favour because a digital negative from a modern camera has a lot of latitude in a single image.
It's not unusual to find a current camera sensor with 12 stops or more native dynamic range. Since those days, HDR software has gotten better, and so have camera sensors. It also required us to take a great many images, sometimes 7 or more images of the same scene, necessitating a tripod and a reasonable amount of preparation. Back in the day, HDR software was not that good, and went nuclear very quickly. What's HDR Again?įirst off, HDR stands for High Dynamic Range, and the intent was to create an image with a wider dynamic range than a single image could deliver. Fortunately, those days are mostly past, and it might be time to revisit the entire HDR idea, this time with some history under our belts and a better understanding of what we want to achieve. You remember those days, lots of electric, oversaturated, haloed images that made your teeth hurt and your eyes burn? Yeah I thought so. It's been a couple of years since the boom time of HDR.
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