I want to head out and take some photographs of objects to use for texturing in Maya. For such a task, I'd probably set the camera fairly far away and use a 100mm Macro lens for minimal barrel/pincushion distortion.
When it comes to the final result, you typically want an image that has no shadows (as though it were photographed using a diffused light source). This allows you to make your own shadows down the line. However, when photographing subjects outdoors, there's a good chance the subjects are going to be in direct sunlight or near bounced light that produces shadows.
I wanted explore all possibilities for photographing the subject without a lighting rig attached to the camera.
My current thought is using HDR: Would I be able to photograph a subject, such as a brick wall, create an HDR image and eliminate the shadows using a tone mapping program?
My guess is that if you can, the result won't be convincing. I think you'd be better off using layer blends in Photoshop, perhaps using luminosity masks.
