Before the storm

Roger Sandvik, on October 21, 2007, said:

This is my first attempt of making a HDR (High Dynamic Range) picture. I had my camera on a tripod and used a long exposure time to smoothe the water surface some. Shooting RAW made it easy afterwards to bring out the colors on the beach. The reflection which gives a certain Aurora Borealis look was just a bonus I didn't anticipate.

Erwin Woenckhaus, on October 21, 2007, said:

Oh my God... this picture is outstanding, Roger!!!

The golden star goes for sure!

Best regards from Chile.

Syl de Canada, on October 22, 2007, said:

Hello Roger This is a beautiful picture, congratulation, I love it. It is so peaceful I would like to be there! Thanks for sharing, Greetings Syl

Marilyn Whiteley, on October 22, 2007, said:

Beautiful, quiet photo, Roger. Even the green moss on the rocks! Excellent.

Roger Sandvik, on October 22, 2007, said:

Thank you very much for your kind comments! I tried to do the HDR thing very subtle just to bring out enough light on the beach including the green moss on the rock. My efforts are highly rewarded by your comments. Thanks again :) :) :)

Marilyn Whiteley, on October 22, 2007, said:

I'm just curious: were you working from one exposure or more than one? Whatever you did I consider very successful.

Roger Sandvik, on October 23, 2007, said:

Thank you Marilyn :) I had several, and used two. First I produced two pictures from RAW with different exposure and used HDR technique on them. It produced somewhat less drama for the clouds than I hoped for so I put another picture with darker exposure on top as a new layer and removed most of that but leaving some for the darker areas. I had my camera on a tripod so all pictures was framed exactly the same way.

Normally I try to make the picture correct when shoting it, but sometimes it's impossible to get it right because of the large range of the light. Either the shadows get totally black, or I blow the highligts of the sky. HDR is therefor very useful for "corrections". I see others use HDR to such extent that it becomes artwork too. A lot of them are really beautiful. I think you'll find some in this forum with great results and well worth a visit.

Marilyn Whiteley, on October 23, 2007, said:

Thanks, Roger, for your clear and helpful description. I have not tried HDR, but I read recently on the forum that someone recommended it for treating scanned slides (diapositives?). I intend to do some scanning this winter and I may try.

From looking at photos on Panoramio, I am deciding that I like HDR shots like this that use the technique subtly to enhance the scene. (There is a forum titled "HDR shots that are Natural-looking... Post examples Here!" and I would encourage you to post there!) I can appreciate as artwork some that are more extreme, but as photography, they are not to my taste.

Roger Sandvik, on October 23, 2007, said:

For your last comment; I totally agree. That is, if tweaking it much it should be to the extent that it gets more graphical than photographical, if you get my drift :) Thank you for your info about that HDR forum. I'll try to find it and see if I can post it there. My regular, or most common post treatment is a little color saturation, a little contrast and a little Unsharpe filter usage, all dependent on what camera I use. The reason is that the so called Low Pass filter on the CCD makes images just a little duller than what you take photograph of is in real. Well, at least that is what I remember to have read somewhere :)

Syl de Canada, on October 23, 2007, said:

It is such a beautiful picture Roger I added it to my list of favourites for the panoramio elections Good luck! Cheers , Sylvie

Roger Sandvik, on October 23, 2007, said:

Wow. Thank you very much Sylvie! Appreciate it :)

T NL, on October 23, 2007, said:

Great shot!

Roger Sandvik, on October 23, 2007, said:

Thank you T NL !

PeSchn, on October 25, 2007, said:

Very good HDR, Roger, the colours are great and the "unsharp" reflection (usual at water surface using HDR technique) adds a lot to it. Added it to my favs. Greetings, Peter

Roger Sandvik, on October 25, 2007, said:

Thank you very much Peter. Your comments are very kind and inspireing. I want to explore more of this, as subtle as possible. My new camera also has the ability of shoting multiple exposures in one picture. Up to nine exposures, both as an average of picture and exposure, and one with average of picture with multiplied exposure. That means for instance blurry waters during daylight, and of course noise free night shots (noise is random and will therefor be annullled when noise free pixels knock out noisy pixels). It ought to be fun exploring as soon as I get some more time on my hands :)

Sigmund Rise, on October 29, 2007, said:

Very nice hdr picture Roger, You just got it right!

Greetings,

Sigmund

Roger Sandvik, on October 30, 2007, said:

Appreciate you comments Sigmund :) It was a bit difficult not over doing it and hence ruin it, since the colors are so subtle to begin with.

YBMW, on December 26, 2007, said:

A beautiful finished product after your hard work!

Roger Sandvik, on January 20, 2008, said:

Thank you very much Julie!