Hi,

I have a big interior photo job to do ver soon.
I can not use lights on this job (don't even like to much of it).
So i was thinking about the HDR way.
I have already played with photomatix, and know how to make a good hdr photo.
But for interior work its very new to me.
I like NATURAL looking photos, not to fake.

Is there anybody out there who can give some tips on how to master this.

Regards,

RAoul.

I wrote a program to blend images with different exposure which is ideal for high dynamic range situations (typically lights or windows in interiors for instance).

I also wrote a tutorial to show how I apply tone mapping to that the results look natural.

Zero Noise download (download both zip files)

Zero Noise tutorial. I think with an on-line translation you will manage to understand.



BR

If you find Photomatix too garish try this as an alternative:

convert the lightest and darkest images from raw as required to manage shadow clipping (if any) in the lightest and highlight clipping in the darkest, the middle images aren't as critical;

stack the images as layers with the most over exposed (lightest) at the top;

use auto align to align the stack (but not merge);

for each layer hit ctrl alt ~ (PC) which selects all the pixels in the right half of the histogram

invert the selection and convert the selection to a mask

You can tweak the masks and continue basic processing from there

Don't forget to at least look a the most promising image in a bracketed series to make sure it can't be successfully processed on its own. I can often extract an unexpected amount of DR from a single image from the 1ds3.

This is another option:

http://wiki.panotools.org/Enfuse

I have been using the PTgui implementation and it works great.

Cheers,
Bernard

Photomatix 3.0.x does more than HDR. It can also do exposure blending which might be more to your liking for interior shots. Its easy to use and does a super job.

IMO, I have tried Photomatix a couple of times and went back this afternoon to play with it again just to see if I missed anything.......it always seems to generate some pretty funky artifacts. I have never done an interior/exterior view with this program that I could even think about giving to a client. I do much better with ACR and luminosity masks.

Of the many hdr/fusing/averaging options available, I find the Tufuse is my current favorite. If is very similar to Enfuse but seems to offer much more natural looking highlights, and allows considerable adjustment to suit the user's tastes.

Photomatix can actually produce fairly natural looking results. Try the "Details Enhancer" mode with the "Strength" control turned down to 0, and "Micro-contrast" (in the Micro tab) set to 10.

With all these programs your degree success depends a lot on the set of input images you select. For instance, if the "Tone" sliders in Photomatix can't give you a satisfactory result, your input set may have too many excessively light or dark frames. Picking the right input set is part of the art.

You can also work in layers. This would require masking, then moving areas into your base photo, but it does give better control when you are working with three to seven layers. I came across a good HDR tutorial on You Tube today http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVuDbcAfN_I check this out as well. If you are not familiar with layers, HDR might be a better choice. The attached photo was done in 4 layers with no supplemental lighting.

I shoot a lot of interiors. I often use a lot of lighting gear because I wish to create a look or a mood. For me, using lighting is often the critical difference between a boring and an interesting shot.

The problem with shooting existing light interiors is not simply of the dynamic range but if it will look good with just the existing light even if it has detail everywhere. Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't. There is no simple answer.

What I have found is that I can get a very nice exposure quality by using DXO to hold the highlights (as best as possible) and boosting the shadow detail with its "DXO Lighting" (simulating fill lighting as in other raw converters.) When that won't do the trick, I'll shoot another exposure or two to hold the highlights. I'll layer them and manually retouch just the areas I want to the degree that I need and still preserve a natural look.

Here is an interior I shot last week in a commercial building. I first shot it earlier in the day with just the ceiling lights and diffused window light from outside. I had to do two exposures and then combine them. The image was pretty nice but nothing special. (I'm sorry but I don't have it handy to post. - I'll try to see if I can add it tommorow. Note: I just added the earlier shot but it has not been retouched for the window detail nor is it color corrected - just a quick conversion from my laptop to show the flat lighting.) But later in the day, I saw the sunlight streaming in and re-shot it for this much better photo that captured everything on one shot with no retouching. It pops so much more than the first one.

So my point is we are capable of recording a lot of information with various techniques, but that doesn't always guarantee the image will look so great.

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