Trey Ratcliff, best known for his HDR work on his Stuck in Customs blog (and book), gave a talk last week at Google. It’s about an hour long and is a great overview of his take on photography, a look at quite a few of his photos, art and science, and attention as currency. Check it out:
These other posts might be of interest to you:
In the last couple of weeks there have been some great developments for photographers looking at interesting things to read. First, The Linked Photographers’ Guide to Online Marketing and Social Media
I also am reviewing a copy of iPad: The Missing Manual
On top of those, HDR guru Trey Ratcliff (aka Stuck in Customs) just released an eBook on digital photography workflow. As someone who has mastered a workflow to produce a large quantity of high-quality (and well-processed) images, I look forward to reading all about his process. There are two versions of the eBook, a standard edition and a bonus version for just a few dollars more that includes additional material and some information specific to HDR. I’ve just ordered my copy and can’t wait to dive in.
Whew! That’s a lot of reading to do. I’ll be sure to share reviews when I get through, but I wanted to make you aware that if you’re looking to learn and want to read, there are some great options right now!
Over the last couple of years, HDR (high dynamic range) photography has become more prevalent. Some photographers take it to the extreme and create pieces that are less photograph and more computer-generated artwork, while others use the technique in moderation and attempt to more accurately portray the colors, lights, and shadows as seen by the human eye.
The current process for creating and HDR image usually involves capturing multiple photos of the same scene while in the field, with each photo having a different exposure. The photographer then uses software to merge these photos and create a composite image which has a wider dynamic range of tones from light to dark than is possible from a single capture with today’s cameras.
A few compact (point and shoot) cameras have started to feature “in camera HDR”, where the device performs the merge in-camera so that only one file, and HDR composite, is the result. While this might be great in a point-and-shoot, I disagree with some predictions that pro photographers will start to use it on their DSLR. For the same reasons that pros don’t shoot in “P” mode, pros will want to control the details of the process so that the photographer can create the best possible image and potentially apply their own style to the photo.
In-camera HDR will be much like in-camera JPG: although there might be some ideal conditions where it’s useful, most pros will choose to shoot RAW and process their own HDR so that they can control the process completely… folks are paying for that professional touch.
What do you think? What’s the likelihood of you using in-camera HDR?
