HDR That Looks Real

I don't know how much you all know about HDR, High Dynamic Range. They are images that have a high range of tonal values present that still retain detail. If you were to do a google search of HDR images you would find a bunch of sureal images that do not look life like. Those images have given HDR a bad name. HDR is a great way to multiple images of the same thing to get them to look how they are to the naked eye. Digital cameras are limited on the spectrum of light they can sense at any given time. Film is much better and our eyes are even better at capturing wider ranges of tonal value.

I took some photos at Montezuma Well (part of the Montezuma Castle National Monument in Arizona). I took these photos at varying exposures. As you can see from these photos they are too dark in some places on some and to bright in places on others. I took them and combined them together automatically and manually using Photoshop.  The entrance in the background of the photo was hard to see even to the bare eye but not impossible. I wanted and image that went beyond what my eyes could see but that looked natural.

Here is the final product of my work. If you look at it you could not have been able to tell that it was HDR unless I told you or you have been trained to see it. Not bad eh?

So when people are head over heals for HDR or against it you can know that it is useful, and can look completely natural.