D70 Exposure Follow up

Hi All

This post is just to follow up my last one regarding Exposure issues and white spikes with my D70

after the suggestions on the previous post, i've done some hard testing and now i'm getting to grips with the lack of Dynamic Range in DSLR's

After suggestions of taking a look at www.fredmiranda.com i've purchased the DRI Pro plug in for CS2.

This little plug in as it say's gives a welcomed tool to increase the DR of your camera when we try to capture difficult lighting situations which the camera just cannot capture without creating WHITE SPIKES

Simply the process i know has already been a suggestion by Alex M and others, this is to blend 2 images together to end up with a more suitable exposure of the enitre image.

The process being

Shoot a RAW image exposing for your highlights.

open up 2 images from the RAW file in PS,

1x exposure for the highlights.

1x exposure for you midtones and shadows.

save these files

using the DRI plug in, Simply tell the software where each images is stored , set your blending pref's and hey presto !!!!

A WONDERFULLY Exposed image with detail throughout the entire range.

It does feel like cheating however " so my wife says"

but i'm telling myself that i'm making amends to what Nikon cannot provide.

regards

craig

SORRY ABOUT THE LACK OF UNDERWATER IMAGES BUT I LIVE MILES AWAY FROM ANY DIVE SITE, SO YOU'LL HAVE TO MAKE DO WITH MY GARDEN AS AN EXAMPLE.................SORRY

HIGHLIGHTS EXPOSURE

MID'S EXPOSURE

FINAL RESULT WITH INCREASED DR.

Very interesting....tell your wife that it's just darkroom work

Karl

I thought CS2 already had this feature in the form of the Merge to HDR (High Dynamic Range) function under the File>Automate menu? Luminous-Landscape has a pretty good description.

Is this a different process from Fred's plugin? And will it work when images are not shot from a tripod?

Guys

Before some minutes I was att Luminous-Landscape and have read about High Dynamic Range. I say to myself: Take a look att wepixel forum to see what is happen and what i see... a new tread about High Dynamic Range!!

Now THATS is Telepathy :-)

Hi Guys

ok firstly , you dont need a tripod, just a RAW image.

this is just a discription by fred.

i shot the first image metering for the sky.

then processed it in PS to make myself 2 images , As shown then DRI them

for advanced PS user's , i guess its already in the package however for an idiot like me i'd have to have someone to do it for me :-((

i've tryed it on most of my last weeks Bag of shots which most of them were blown out at the surface but with good balanced fill in.

i can see that its going to work just fine, as its user tweakable.

i'll test this somemore next week underwater at post the results.

regards

craig

Unfortunately CS2's HDR function will not work on One raw file developed into multiple TIFF's. It requires more than one original source with a greater Dynamic range than this can give. Therefore is only suitable for tripod work and a non-moving scene.

This Fred Miranda plug-in sounds interesting though.

To add....

Hi Mark

I've never tryed to use any functions directly provided with photoshop with regards too increasing DR.

My example shots where taken at 9.15pm using Iso 400 Aperture Priority Hand holding the camera.

i made one RAW exposure, then made 2 x Tiff files from that exposure as discribed then converted the finished Tiff to a Jpeg for the post.

with fred's DRI Pro you can set the amount of radius blending or let it work the exposure out itself which i've found to be 95% to my taste.

I've tryed it with balanced light exposures as well using flash "obviously" making my exposure for the highlights and balancing with the flash.

i found that it still worked, creating very nice images with an extremely wide dynamic range.

the underwater testing is yet to be completed so will post later next week.

craig