Stacking Exposures (contrast blending) Methods?

[Murray Fredericks]

Hi All,

as I work almost exclusively with existing light, I find myself 'stacking' bracketed exposures on almost every shot, either for highlights (the contrast is very strong here in Australian light) or to reduce noise in the low end.

Doing this on 20 shots a day is really stretching my time(and stamina) in post...

I would be very interested to hear what others are doing. Are there any good applications out there that are 'controllable' to keep the images looking natural (I hate HDR)? Are people using actions (I saw some on other forums)?

Cheers

Murray

[Graham Mitchell]

Isn't that exactly what Photoshop's HDR feature does? It should not look unnatural.

[rainer_v]

(I hate HDR)

[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=186971\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

you dont have to make this typical "hdr" effects to use 32bit images. anyway, processing 20 images to 32bit is a lot. image stacking to 32bit needs its time, more so  because in post it needs a lot of work to look natural,- but its possible and allows you to work under nearly every possible contrast conditions. i do it a lot.

[marcmccalmont]

Try Photomatix, highlights and shadows
Marc

[Murray Fredericks]

32bit is a lot.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=186977\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Sorry Rainer

am I missing something here - I work in 16 bitt, why/ how do you work in 32 bitt?

Murray

[AndrewDyer]

Sorry Rainer

am I missing something here - I work in 16 bitt, why/ how do you work in 32 bitt?

Murray
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=186979\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Hi Murray.
16 bit (1 RAW exposure) will not necessarily be able to hold details in both shadows and highlights...
especially in the harsh Aussie sun!
So when multiple exposures are combined in Photoshop or Photomatix it generates a 32 bit file.
This will then need to be compressed or tone mapped with either application to get the 'best bits'
from each image and combine it into a new 16 or 8 bit file.
The whole process is time cosuming.
Good luck.
A

[Murray Fredericks]

So when multiple exposures are combined in Photoshop or Photomatix it generates a 32 bit file.
This will then need to be compressed or tone mapped with either application to get the 'best bits'
from each image and combine it into a new 16 or 8 bit file.

[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=186984\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Thanks - did my research in the mean time and got it

My question though is to the extent of 'controllability' of these programs - do you accept what they give you or can you fade layers and adjust the effect etc etc?

Murray

[clawery]

Murray,

Take a look at this Multi-Pop/Multi-Exposure adapter that works on Phase One backs.  There is also a link to Jeffrey Totaro's article on how he uses it.

http://www.captureintegration.com/solutions/featuredproduct/

Chris Lawery
Sales Manager
chris@captureintegration.com
Capture Integration, Phase One Dealer of the Year

877-217-9870 | National
404-234-5195 | Cell  
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[lbalbinot]

Hi!

Take a look at this:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorial...-blending.shtml

It's right here from LL and it works REALLY well. This is the easiest way I found to get better details on a single exposure (from a RAW file). It looks natural and the blending is almost perfect. Just be careful to use it on a good RAW file (well exposed, etc). If you RAW file is way under or overexposed there's not much left to do on those areas.

Hope it helps!

Regards,
Luis

[Ken Doo]

Photomatix has a "Basic" version of their software which is freeware.  It has a pretty simply exposure blending feature in a standalone program.  Easy to select two or more image files to "blend" or "average" the highlights and shadows.

see, www.hdrsoft.com

Their download page is:  http://www.hdrsoft.com/download.html

Scroll down and look for the Basic program download which is freeware.  

Just another tool that may help!

ken

[Paul2660]

Does anyone know if Photomatrix will open a Phase One raw file?  Often times when generating a HDR composite image, I prefer to let Photomatix open the files as raw.  It's very dependent on the situation.  

Paul C

[buzzski]

It's worth taking a look at the highlight/shadow function in latter versions of photoshop. Working from one file over two layers with a layer mask can achieve what I believe are very satisfactory results. I personally always use it with a 16 bit file then for submission, put it down to 8. Worth a look anyway, Craig

[Plekto]

It's right here from LL and it works REALLY well. This is the easiest way I found to get better details on a single exposure (from a RAW file). It looks natural and the blending is almost perfect. Just be careful to use it on a good RAW file (well exposed, etc). If you RAW file is way under or overexposed there's not much left to do on those areas.

There is a discussion here about blending pictures.  It's the most useful thing that I've seen in any digital camera forum, actually - very amazing app that he's written.

http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index....showtopic=17775

Data goes in, data goes out.  And you can blend up to ten images if you want.(3 seems to be optimal, from what I could see, he just programmed 10 as the maximum)   This is basically just manipulating the raw data and spitting it back out as a merged image.

Then you can drop that in Photoshop and do your other effects if you want.  From what I've seen, though, the image is pretty much good to go as-is.  You might not even need a program like Photoshop except to maybe resize it.

Free as well.

[pixjohn]

The LADig group (Los Angeles Digital group) has an event next week on this subject.

High Dynamic Range Photography

http://www.ladig.org/

[JeffKohn]

I've recently started experimenting with TuFuse (http://www.tawbaware.com/tufuse.htm). It seems to produce pretty natural-looking results, none of the excessive local constrast and saturation that tools like PhotoMatix produce.

There's a front-end called EnfuseGui that you can use with TuFuse on Windows, and it can make batch processing pretty easy. (Don't have the link handy at the moment but it should be easy to find in Google).

[rainer_v]

I've recently started experimenting with TuFuse (http://www.tawbaware.com/tufuse.htm). It seems to produce pretty natural-looking results, none of the excessive local constrast and saturation that tools like PhotoMatix produce.

There's a front-end called EnfuseGui that you can use with TuFuse on Windows, and it can make batch processing pretty easy. (Don't have the link handy at the moment but it should be easy to find in Google).
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=187108\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

this excessive local contrasts and saturations are a question of the settings you use. you can set photomatix in a way that the results look completely natural, however you can use it also only to bring together your multiple exposures to 32bit files and afterwards compress these 32bit files  to 16bit files using curve settings in photoshop.
the HDR/ 32bit file prozess works different in photshop than in photomatix. there are motifs where ps does a better job and others where photomatix brings better results.

[Plekto]

however you can use it also only to bring together your multiple exposures to 32bit files and afterwards compress these 32bit files  to 16bit files using curve settings in photoshop.

I'd like to add that from a programming perspective (I do CIS type stuff for a living), this is the best method of all.  Each time you touch the original data, you add in an ever increasing and usually exponential amount of degradation.

Mix with no modifications, *then* toss it into the program of your choice to clean and adjust it.

Tfuse does look like a wonderful app.  Also note the focus merge function.  Often you have a great shot but the depth of field is impossible with your lens.  I don't know how many DSLRs have bracketed focus(some apparently do, but not many it seems), but if your does, you have an amazing tool at your disposal that is potentially even more useful than HDR merging.

ie - want Ansel-like depth of field?  Presto.  No 4*5 or similar camera required.

[Guillermo Luijk]

16 bit (1 RAW exposure) will not necessarily be able to hold details in both shadows and highlights...
especially in the harsh Aussie sun!
So when multiple exposures are combined in Photoshop or Photomatix it generates a 32 bit file.

I read this constantly and still don't see the point. Real high dynamic range scenes hardly ever reach more than 12 or 13 f-stops of DR. With 16-bit linear integer numbers, to properly encode 12 f-stops of DR is truly possible. And if we apply some expansion curve (like a gamma) in floating point during the blending of the different shots, the final 16-bit non-linear enconding can hold easily more than 13 f-stops.

Why is it so common to hear that 32-bit or floating point formats are needed?

Moreover using 32 bit floating point images is useless if we bracketed {-2,0,2}, since the captured DR will never be higher of about 12-13 f-stops. To obtain the benefits of those large numerical formats shots more EV apart are needed.

BR

[Jann Lipka]

http://www.pangeasoft.net/pano/bracketeer/
is a mac option / a bit like Tufuse .
batch processing is possible .
So you can process your 32 files during a lunch .

IMHO - there is no simple solution to all scenarios.
and to avoid overcooked HDR look , manual approach is
( in combination with some auto tool ) the best .

I prefer myself Photomatix exposure blend  more then PS 32 bit approach .
 

[feppe]

I've recently started experimenting with TuFuse (http://www.tawbaware.com/tufuse.htm). It seems to produce pretty natural-looking results, none of the excessive local constrast and saturation that tools like PhotoMatix produce.

There's a front-end called EnfuseGui that you can use with TuFuse on Windows, and it can make batch processing pretty easy. (Don't have the link handy at the moment but it should be easy to find in Google).

Tufuse seconded. The pro version has a decent UI and it is quite easy to get good results with little experimentation. I've used it successfully on several shots with bracketed night time exposures by 4 stops.