Canon 5D Mark II, 14mm F/1.4, f/3.5, 1/4000, iso 320
Post processing with Topaz Adjust 4.0, HDR Pop Preset
A week ago in this post the ever wonderful and lovely Puna issued me an "HDR Challenge." She decided to try out Topaz herself, and one of her first subjects was a night scene.
Just in case you have not heard of HDR... It stands for High Dynamic Range. Dynamic range is the range of light that a given imaging device (like a camera, or film, or your eye) can capture at one moment. Digital sensors surpassed film some time ago. But they are no match for our eyes. Our brain renders a scene and we see an amazing range. When you take a picture you are surprised of areas that are either too dark or too light. HDR attempts to mimic what we see. But it can be overdone.
And it requires yet more software. And it requires that you take several shots at varying exposures, so that you have the entire range. And you then sandwich these 3 or 5 (or more!) shots. For someone that doesn't like to spend a lot of time in post processing, this doesn't sound like fun.
Topaz Adjust can create a lot of different looks, and one of them is an HDR simulation. I have seen it referred to as "cheap HDR." Whatever, you get an HDR look out of a single shot. And indeed this is much like the view I had when standing next to this building.
Click on the continue link to see the original and a bit more information on Topaz.
Original version with no adjustments
When you are faced with a scene like this - more dynamic range than your camera can record - you have to decide how you are going to expose the shot. If you expose for the sky, you'll prevent it from being "blown out" (overexposed so all you see is white). If you expose for the building in shade, you'll have a totally blown sky.
So my choice was to expose for the sky. And then you can see the magic that Topaz Adjust worked for us. Despite the fact that on the screen the shady areas just look dark, there is an amazing amount of image information in the file. Just waiting for some software to bring it out.
The newly released Topaz Adjust 4.0 is a real improvement, both in terms of the images and the user interface. And 3.0 users got the upgrade for free, how great is that? You can try out the software for free. And if you decide to buy, use this link from my buddy John Barclay for a 15% discount!
How's that Puna????
