Good website on HDR

Some kind person on Flickr gave me a link to a really good website on HDR photography. Enjoy.

Still having lots of fun - and still tinkering with HDR

The title says it all. I'm very impressed with my new camera - the Canon 450D. Even as a complete amateur I am able to turn out some very impressive (in my opinion) results. Night shots are crisp and the colours authentic without even having to do any post processing like I'd have to on my last camera - the Sony T7. I was also plagued by noise on just about any photo taken in low light conditions on my old camera BUT no more. The Canon 450D copes with night shots and low light quite spectacularly and way beyond my expectations. Being a ceomplete novice I am working my way throught the instruction manual and starting off with mastering the automatic functions before I move onto taking manual control. The automatic functions on this camera are amazingly intuitive in my opinion. Well worth every penny I spent on it so far.

View from the first floor of our house

Ok now I know the composition isn't great or anything but I was only testing the capability of the camera to reproduce something approaching realistic colours and lighting effects. Actually it was a very close match so I was well impressed.

I've still been tinkering about with HDR. Its improving but I would really like to find a scene that would lend itself well to HDR techniques. I'd also like a tripd to reduce the blurr though I wonder if (as an alternative) shooting in RAW form might help. Currently I'm using the AEB function and this takes 3 separate images which are later processed and merged in Photomatix. The problem is that its easy to get blur this way if your not using a tripd and things that are moving (like trees in the breeze) also turn out blurred. Shooting in RAW for you take only 1 image which you can process to give the 3 different exposures and thus cutting out the risk of blurr. I use an IS lens so blur tends to be a non-issue with single exposure photography.

Here is a HDR version of the same scene.

HDR attempt number 2

The results are getting better as you can see. Unfortunately I haven't been able to go out and photograph something more interesting or suitable yet as time (and daylight) has been running out by the time I've got home in the evening. Hopefully at the weekend I will find something more appropriate to photograph. I really do like the intensity of the colours in this first one even if nothing else looks so great about it.

HDR Photography

I just realised the name for the style of photography that I really love. I mean if you can say any kind of photography turns you on then this is what flicks my switch LOL. For those that don't know I'll explain a bit about what I found out. If your looking for a really cool article on HDR photography then I found a great one for you here.

Update - I just had a go at some HDR photography. Photos here - will update later.

before tone mapping

after tone mapping

before tone mapping

before tone mapping

after tone mapping

I still don't really understand quite what the tone mapping is and why in some of my attempts I actually prefer the pre tone-mapped image LOL. Oh well. I was just having a discussion with somebody about HDR photography. She was saying its artificial and rarely needed and she steers her clients away from it. I suppose it depends what your looking for. For my own personal use I like the HDR artificial look. Being a strong kind of style I guess its not to everyone taste. But then I only take photos for my own pleasure. If I like it that's all that counts to me. Obviously its the complete opposite to what aprofessional photographer would want. But I like the creative side of photography. To me its about alot more than creating a classic photograph but more seeing what you can do with it beyond that. if you get what i mean.

The dynamic look

I love the dynamic look of photos which have high contrast, high brightness and high saturation as I've already said before. Today I was tinkering with some photos I took yesterday. The first one is my car (registration plate edited though) and the other one is a pub we went to last night.

Some more comments about yesterday's pictures

Some things I never got to say about yesterday's photos.

I am still trying to figure out how to override some functions properly to give the kind of results I'm wanting but I'll get there. Most of the shots were taken with the landscape function but I think it has a problem getting the colours right (or I do LOL). The colours tended to look a bit more muted than in real life. And obviously I'm not wanting to do any post processing if possible. I also found many of the shots were overexposed but I couldn't figure out how to override the functions I needed to change within the landscape function. Maybe it wasn't possible. I'm still trying to figure out IF anything can be changed in those pre-set modes. I do like the portrait mode. I got a really terrible photo of Andy from a prettiness point of view but which showed the affect of the portrait mode really well - with the well focused subject and blurred background.

Took the new camera out for a spin

I decided to take the camera and instruction manual out for a spin today. Many of the photos were a bit disappointing but its only early days yet. There were a few noteworthy ones that I think were ok - if not from an aesthetic point of view but more from showing the camera capability.

Just a river at the back of a pub we went to. The light was starting to go really orangey as the evening came in.


I was trying out the flashless mode here. The instruction manual says it can be used indoors when you want to capture lighting in realistic colours. The colours came out really well but the sharpness would obviously of been better with something to rest the camera on. He was watching TV so I zoomed in close. I liked the cropped effect and the strong colouring.



Ok this was me trying to be arty farty. Not the most successful IMO but I'm sure you can see what I was TRYING to achieve. Hopefully one day I will pull it of LOL.


I find roads fascinating - ok I need to get out more. But this photo was more to show you the kind of area where we live. Its a small town but surrounded by hills and countryside.


Andy shot ahead and decided to try his best to look bored so I'd hurry up and stop it with the camera LOL


I didn't think this would come out at all cos it was shot strait into the sun really. But it was better then I thought.

Same goes for this one...
The next few were taken from the car as we were driving around. I was trying to sport mode which is supposed to be auto function for fast moving things. I think it did great. No blur at all.



A few others.



And this was were we ended the day

New Camera

So about this new camera....its a Canon Eos 450D and I'm loving it already. I only had half an hour to tinker with it last night so I just put everything on auto and stepped outside into the moonlight to see what it was capable of. The only willing subject was our cat Meg who was unusually patient while I faffed about. Here's the first 2 pics hot off the press so to speak. Not bad considering...

PB STILL NOT PLAYING SO WILL ADD LATER

I can see some amazing differences already between this and my old camera (the Sony T7 compact). Things actually look like they have texture.

I'm in bit of a rush right now so I'll just copy somehting from a message board I go to. I posted this there about the pics that I'll post later on.

Ok now that might not seem surprising. It is a cat after all. But if you've ever seen a photo of my cat taken with my old camera you would wonder if he was actually just painted grey and white. I haven't had chance to learn ANYTHING about this camera yet. I literally put everything on auto and just pointed the camera. I'm actually very pleased. Amazed in fact. Things now have texture. I'm so happy LOL.

I no these are hardly great but they were the first pics I took and I wasn't going for composition or anything.

EDIT: edited to add photos. Just look at the texture of the cats coat.

Scammonden Water

Me & hubby went for a walk around a local reservoir called Scammonden Water. I didn't know it when we set off but this was to be my last trip with the old camera. The walk started off nicely but there were so many flies and insects we were eaten alive. I can still feel them crawling over me. We've both been bitten alive and half way round we decided to turn back because the flies (and no joke there were about 100 buzzing round our heads) were to annoying. The weather was hot and humid and it was making me feel sick. So half way round Andy decides he's had enough of the flies making a meal of him and decides to traipse back to the car well over a mile away by this point. I opted to sulk under a tree and further get eaten alive by the flies. He fetched the car (still surrounded by flies) and we both decided to call it quits. I didn't even get any decent photo because I couldn't stand still long enough for the flies So it was a disaster really. But there was a silver lining to the dark cloud when Andy received a text from Jessops saying my new camera had arrived. So we decided to go for some retail therapy at Jessops and then some liquid therapy at Wetherspoons.

I'll post some pics later but photobucket isn't playing at the moment - grrrrrr.....

EDIT: edited to add photos

Flikr and 60 sources of inspiration

I opened a Flikr account today to store some photos and also because you can browse other people's photos there. Its pretty good. Go have a look.

You can see my page here.

If your lacking inspiration you might want to take a look at this article on 60 sources of inspiration.

Special effects

Due to a shortage of cooperative people subjects and not much going on round here I have been looking for some inanimate objects to photograph. Well this morning Andy's model of a character from the movie Saw caught my eye. For anyone whose seen the film you will recognise the character straight away. I photographed it from a few different angels against a white background and then I set to work doing some post processing. The following few shots are what I came up with.

Looking for opportunities

I've spent the time since the last update just looking for photo opportunities but not really getting any. I haven't had anywhere to go and when I've tried to take photos round the house I've lacked the weather and also the inspiration. I did play about post processing some photos I already have on my computer but that's about it. Here's a couple. One is me thinking. the other is cheesy but I kind of like it.

My blog make-over service

Did you know that I also do FREE blog make-overs?

Check out my Make-over blog for more info :)

Contact Me

About Me

My name is Louise and I've been married to Andrew for 6 years. We live in Yorkshire, England and we have 1 cat (no kids).

By day I am a mechanical engineer working in a role which is probably best described as forensic-like.....looking at metal failures and finding the cause of "death". Its an interesting and varied role and keeps me busy....just the way I like it.

In my spare time I run a dyslexia message board and enjoy blogging and creating graphics. I have a number of blogs- my most popular blog is Adori Graphics (my blog design blog where I offer free blog makeovers.

Check out my profile for all my blogs