Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
Step Seven:
A trademark look of the surreal HDR is a
very heavy edge vignette, so go to the Lens
Corrections panel, click on Manual at the
top of the panel, then go down to Lens
Vignetting, and lower the Amount to -93
to get the vignette as dark as possible. Then,
lower the Midpoint almost as far to get the
heavy darkened-edge effect you see here.
Step Eight:
Here's a side-by-side with the original (the
normal exposure) image on the left, and
the maxed-out HDR tone-mapped look
on the right. Now, if you want to create
a more realistic-looking HDR image, it's
actually much easier than what we did here.
It all starts the same, with you selecting the
three images, and going under Lightroom's
Photo menu, under Edit, and choosing
Merge to HDR Pro in Photoshop. When the
dialog appears, there's a preset in the pop-
up menu at the top called Photorealistic.
It's a great starting place because it doesn't
enhance the detail greatly or pump up the
colors; it just combines them into a single
image capturing a wide dynamic range.
Don't be surprised if the image that it
creates doesn't bowl you over—it's not
supposed to. It's supposed to be more
representative of what your eye would
see (if you had taken the photo used here,
when you took it, your eyes wouldn't have
seen all these wacky colors or the crazy
detail we created in this project, but it
would capture the range between the
brightest parts of the image and the
darkest shadows, and that's what the
Photorealistic setting does).
