RAW to Photomatix to Photoshop

[Claudio Branch]

I thought I would show what most of my images look like typically before I process and post them.

 

The first shot shows the various light levels captured over 7 exposures.

 

The second image is what the image looks like straight out of Photomatix after tone-mapping.

 

The final image is what I post.

 

This image has alot of post work done on it in Photoshop. I use curves, saturation, noise-reduction (Noiseware), sharpening and glow. I also experiment heavily with blend modes and masking.

 

I use the software in an attempt to recreate the light my eyes saw while I was shooting. I also try to give the shot a little more atmosphere and emotion, but that task is quite subjective...

 

EDIT: I re-uploaded the photos.

 

(The first set were a bit blurry as jpg. so I went with .jpeg.)

Edited June 22, 2009 by Claudio Branch

[Stephen Thomas]

Interesting, thanks for sharing Claudio. Though personally I think where the technique really comes into it's own is in your night shots where you pick up the colour casts from artificial lighting etc.

[Claudio Branch]

I would probably agree that hdr is better suited for night shots. There are some daylight situations where it comes in handy as well. Such as shooting a subject when the sun is directly in front of you.

 

The biggest problem I see with daytime shots are overprocessed images with super oversaturated colors. If a little bit of effect and color is good, then a whole lot of....

 

less is more!

[AJLynn]

Damn. That's quite a workflow.

[Claudio Branch]

Damn. That's quite a workflow.

 

Not too different from rendering work really. I used to spend alot of time trying to get my render to be "final quality" perfect out of Max. I really didn't understand the "post" process at all. Needless to say, I get it now.

 

Post work has really become my favorite part of the process. Whether it be photography or rendering...

 

Experimentation + Imagination = Personal Style

 

[Crazy Homeless Guy]

The second image is what the image looks like straight out of Photomatix after tone-mapping.

 

What are the options when tone mapping in Photomatix? Does i force you o go automatic, or can you adjust the amount of exposure and/or exposure areas for each image?

 

I look at the seven exposures, and see a lot of potential for how I could incorporate something like this into my work flow, but the results coming out makes me wonder if I could use it like I am thinking? Basically, as an advanced tone mapper for images that are blown out in certain areas, or over exposed in certain areas.

[Claudio Branch]

What are the options when tone mapping in Photomatix? Does it force you to go automatic, or can you adjust the amount of exposure and/or exposure areas for each image?

 

Here is a shot of the Photomatix interface so you can see all of the controls and settings I used for this particular image. You can also demo the software for free. It will put a watermark across your image though.

 

The 2 primary options are Details Enhancer and Tone Compressor. I pretty much use DE exclusively because it is very useful for giving my images more of an illustrative look.

 

There really isn't such thing as "automatic" with Photomatix. However, you can load settings you have used on previous image through saved .xmp files. This can be very useful if you have a certain look you are trying to recreate for a new shot. I have done this alot.

 

You can load individual images and Photomatix will process it as a "pseudo-hdr", but my results with this have been less than ideal. I prefer to use somewhere between 3 -10 images. Basically what the program is doing is pulling out detail from the lightest/darkest regions of all the exposures and smoothing out the transitions from exposure to exposure...kind of like masking in Photoshop.