Home · Register · Join Upload & Sell

Moderated by: Fred Miranda
Username  

  New fredmiranda.com Mobile Site
  New Feature: SMS Notification alert
  New Feature: Buy & Sell Watchlist
  

FM Forums | Post-processing & Printing | Join Upload & Sell

  

Archive 2018 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?

  
 
newjerseysurf
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


took both of these last night. these are the JPG's but i have the RAW as well.

i think there's potential here but i am lost as far as what to do in post (I have LR).

i am thinking a merge or something and then playing with some type of gradient. any advice or thoughts?






Jan 07, 2018 at 03:10 PM
Peter Figen
Online
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


A snap in Photoshop but you'll have to wait for Lr folks to chime in. I'm pretty sure that Lr doesn't do layers and layers and masking are the best tools for this.


Jan 07, 2018 at 04:45 PM
rdeloe
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


In Lightroom that's basically an HDR merge. Click on the two photos in the Library, and use Ctr-H (Cmd-H for Mac), or Photo-Photo Merge-HDR. It's not as sophisticated as what you can do in PS, but it might work fine.

Of course, make sure you do it on the RAW file.



Jan 07, 2018 at 05:02 PM
newjerseysurf
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


i do have the Adobe Creative Suite. if it's better done on PS, i am happy to do so - just unsure how.


Jan 07, 2018 at 05:18 PM
gdsf2
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


Search youtube for photoshop HDR.


Jan 07, 2018 at 07:56 PM
Tim Knutson
Offline
• • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


Have you just tried dragging down the exposure on the first shot? Maybe a gradient to pull the bottom back up a bit.


Jan 07, 2018 at 08:47 PM
OntheRez
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


Don't change sizes. Trying pushing exposure .25 or so brighter. Experiment. Do same with darker pix. Experiment. Select both and run Lr HDR (or Ps filter) on them. Adjust to taste. Working back and forth between settings allows you to tune. Experiment. There is no recipe for proper output.

A good approach, in this case, is to shoot 3: Dark, light, proper exposure. Then combine. There are several HDR plugins that work better than either Ps or Lr: AuroraHDR or the old Nik HDR Efex. People sneer at HDR, but used correctly, it is a powerful way to increase dynamic range which is actually what you're trying to do here.



Jan 07, 2018 at 09:12 PM
gdsf2
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


If you just want to learn how to do HDR that is cool, but I don’t think this scene is a great HDR candidate. You will end up with daytime on the bottom and nighttime on the top. The idea is to capture an image as you saw it, or envision it, that has large dynamic range (too large to capture in one exposure). This image is 90% sky. What look are you hoping to achieve in the sky?




Jan 08, 2018 at 09:34 AM
CanadaMark
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


1) Open both images in photoshop.

2) Hit "V" then shift-drag one image on top of the other.

3) Hold ALT and click the Mask button

4) Press "B" and paint over what you want to reveal underneath (reverse the order in step 2 if you want to reveal the sky instead of the trees or vise versa)

That's the quick & dirty way to do it. It might be a little tricky around the tree tops. This method is also really useful for group portraits where everyone has their best smile in a different picture, you can create one image where everyone has their best smile in just a few minutes.



Jan 08, 2018 at 12:13 PM
newjerseysurf
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


gdsf2 wrote:
If you just want to learn how to do HDR that is cool, but I don’t think this scene is a great HDR candidate. You will end up with daytime on the bottom and nighttime on the top. The idea is to capture an image as you saw it, or envision it, that has large dynamic range (too large to capture in one exposure). This image is 90% sky. What look are you hoping to achieve in the sky?



thanks for the response.

what i was hoping for was to keep the silo in focus while also capturing the stars in the sky clearly.

i am in a light polluted area and my technique isn't great so it might be a lost cause here?



Jan 08, 2018 at 08:23 PM
Peter Figen
Online
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


I took a quick hack at your two exposures and came up with this. It's pretty easy to cobble these two together, and since I wasn't there and don't know exactly how you see this, I took some liberties in Lab color space and, well, you'll see. Lots of room for subjectivity in this kind of photo.







Jan 08, 2018 at 09:12 PM
Ian.Dobinson
Offline
• • • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


All of the above
Yes HDR is often better done in PS or maybe even some dedicated HDR software/plugin but the beauty is your not restricted to only 1 go .
So first thing to try is to let LR have a go . It will take a minute or less to do . And will generate a DNG RAW file (not something any other method does ) so you can then play around with things till it is the way you like it .
Ok there are no layers in LR but you can generate multiple brushes / gradients etc that can be individually manipulated

If it doesn’t do what you want then take it into PS



Jan 09, 2018 at 01:41 AM
newjerseysurf
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


Peter Figen wrote:
I took a quick hack at your two exposures and came up with this. It's pretty easy to cobble these two together, and since I wasn't there and don't know exactly how you see this, I took some liberties in Lab color space and, well, you'll see. Lots of room for subjectivity in this kind of photo.


this looks pretty great. it appears you removed 2 streaks of light (airplanes, i think) - how did you do that?

also how did you bring out the stars?

thanks!



Jan 09, 2018 at 09:16 AM
newjerseysurf
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off
p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


additionally, if anyone wants to tinker, i can post the links to the 2 RAW files.


Jan 09, 2018 at 09:17 AM
Peter Figen
Online
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


newjersey - removing streaks and a few bright lights is a simple matter of using either the Clone Stamp tool or using the Healing Brush tool. Typically you want to add a new blank layer on top of your background layer and use that as a retouching layer. You can set the Cloning Stamp to a setting called "Use this layer and below" and the Healing Brush to a setting called "Use All Layers". That way, you can do you retouching on this new additional layer and never touch your original background layer, which makes it easy to go back if you screw up the retouching - which pretty much always happens anyway.

As far as bringing out the stars, that's mostly a matter of adding contrast to the sky - making the sky darker while actually making the stars themselves brighter. I used the Curves tool to do that, but I also made a copy of the the entire file and converted that to Lab color space and used Curves in that color space to affect the color changes forcing the sky to go much darker and bluer at the top and warmer at the bottom. At the same time, that left the snow cooler as well which seemed to fit the mood of the image.

Could this have been done in Lr? Others will have to answer that because I don't use that program, but it's certainly easy enough to do in Ps - with enough practice. I actually think that with this type of image, it might actually be fun for you to start learning how to do some of these moves in Ps and see your own images transform right before your own eyes on your own screen. And if one were working with the original raw files, appropriate processing of those in the beginning would make the post production faster and easier.



Jan 09, 2018 at 10:36 AM
OntheRez
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · So I have these 2 exposures...now what?


Jersey,

You've got great suggestions. Make copies. Go play. As Peter notes there are many possibilities - likely an infinite number. Do make copies of originals before you tear off. From here it's just you, the picture, your vision, and your tools.

Oh, good suggestion to take HDR sequences in this type of situations. Most cameras have a setting to do this automatically. I always try varying exposure settings and a few HDR strings. Hard to know what will turn out best. For sure, the more raw material you have, the more potential.

Have fun.



Jan 09, 2018 at 01:15 PM





FM Forums | Post-processing & Printing | Join Upload & Sell

    
 

You are not logged in. Login or Register

Username       Or Reset password



This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.