HDR Tutorial Working With the Raw Files

Click here to download the files you'll need to work along side me in this HDR Tutorial.  There are 6 raw files that equal about 67mb so depending on your internet speed it make take a few minutes.  It'll be worth it though!  Once you have the files downloaded go ahead and start the video tutorial below.

What you’ll Need to Shoot HDR

Some Nice Legs!
Alright, so now that we know what HDR means it’s time to put the tools together to take the photos.  The most important piece to the puzzle is, of course, the.....wait for it....ah yes, the camera.  I’m going to go ahead and assume you have one of those!  So the the next tool you should put in your tool-belt is a decent tripod.  You can tell the amateur apart from the pros by whether he or she is carrying one of these.  There are some shots that just aren’t possible without a tripod.  With that being said it is still possible to shoot an HDR photograph  handheld.  I just wouldn’t recommend it. 

    Manfrotto makes a mean tripod!  Very stable versatile and light.  Mine is a 190XPROB and shown to the left here.  Almost the cheapest of the bunch which doesn’t say much for an italian made anything.  Ferrari comes to mind! 

        Were going to be taking multiple exposures of the exact same scene and you need to make sure the camera doesn’t move while changing the exposure.

Know Your Camera !

First Read your camera manual.  There are several ways to shoot the images you will need for your HDR photos.  Play with them and find the best way that suites you. 

     Second you need set your camera to shoot RAW files.  These are files that are left unprocessed by your camera.  Think of it as a digital negative.  If your camera cannot shoot RAW files then there are other ways to create pseudo HDR but for the sake of this tutorial we are going to focus on the real thing.

      Third you’ll need to set your camera for manual operation.  We are going to need to change the shutter speed several times during the shoot.

    Last you will need some software.  Unfortunately there isn’t much great FREE software out there.  Photoshop can do it from start to finish, however, I use both Adobe Photoshop and Photomatix.  Both are free to download demos at their respective websites.

Ever looked at those mind boggling, crazy colored, insanely detailed photos and thought to yourself, “how in the world was that affect created?” I know I have.
The first thing you need to know is what HDR stands for. That, my friends, is High Dynamic Range. That is, the difference between the black shadows in an image and the bright highlights in the same image.

When you calculate the amount of information the camera captures and compare that to the amount of data the human eye captures you realize you loose quite a bit of useful information when taking a picture. The difference between the Shadow/Highlights (Dynamic Range) in a standard photo and in what we actually see is staggering! HDR is way of closing that gap, and actually surpassing it completely in most instances. You can make it as crazy looking or normal looking as you want. I believe that most photographers that use HDR went through the same stages I did; when we first find a new technique it’s all we use and we tend to overuse it. Don’t be afraid of this. Explore your new way of taking photos. Go to the extreme and if you’re like me, you’ll swing back full circle to a more natural looking photo like the one to the left. Tomorrow we’ll get into what you will need to actually take the HDR photos and edit them. Comments Encouraged!!!