It’s been quite a while since I’ve dabbled in HDR processing, probably 3 or 4 years.  I have mostly tried to shoot photos and process photos in straightforward yet appealing manners.  My personal credo is always “get it right in the camera” and “study the qualities of light”.  I do think putting the utmost effort and quality into any form of photography is very important.  With that in mind, I was out shooting today and bracketed my shutter speed slightly for five frames to see what extra dynamic range I could pull into a scene with an apparently wide gamut.

Side by side comparison of individual RAW with straightforward processing and a five exposure HDR merge.  Click on photo to view larger version.

An overcast day in New Jersey contained a washed-out sky and a flatly lit foreground. My main goal in #HDR processing was to see what detail I could add to the sky, while avoiding halos. Photo taken with the Tamron 16-300mm VC All-In-One lens and the Canon T5 DSLR.

One of my concerns with processing is often the retention of fine detail in the photo.  I’ve uploaded crops of the single exposure and the HDR merge below.  There is a perceivable amount of softness in the HDR crop, but overall I still like the end product.

A central crop from the frame of a single exposure and an #HDR merge. Slight ghosting and detail smearing can be noticed on close inspection. Both photos taken with the #Tamron 16-300mm VC All-In-One lens and the #Canon T5 DSLR.

I will let the viewers decide which (if either) of the photos they like.  I think even my HDR photo is on the drab side, but I can live with it.