Am I asking too much.....or is it possible

[AndrewMcD]

Took this sunset shot 30mm, 1.5 crop camera, f/22, SS 1/500, ISO 1600. Probably not optimal camera settings. Am I asking too much to think that there is some way to shoot a sunset and still retain some foreground detail?
The first shot is the original. The second I did some post processing in LR5 to raise the exposure of the trees. What might I have done better with the original exposure to capture the sun and sky yet still have some possibility of something more than silhouettes in the foreground. I suspect without HDR or some layering techniques I'm asking too much but any suggestions would be well appreciated. I feel I'm going through a phase in learning photography where I'm losing track of fundamentals and ending up with crap images.



This one I've tried to improve a bit in LR5.

[Colin Southern]

When you have incident light entering the sensor directly and reflected light eminating from areas in shadow, it creates one hell of a dynamic range requirement -- one that's usually too large for a sensor to handle (in the capture) and for a monitor to display even if you could capture it.

So we need to employ some trickery.

One approach is to create an HDR composite like this shot:



Whereas another is to use a GND Filter, if appropriate for the scene, like in this shot ...



Other times it's just easier to use the silhouette to good effect though!

[AndrewMcD]

Thank you for your response. Simply being able to ask the question on this site helps enormously in organizing my thoughts when everything becomes muddled. Getting a response that further enhances my understanding is icing on the cake.
Andrew

[Colin Southern]

No worries Andrew - glad to help

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Andrew,

I feel I'm going through a phase in learning photography where I'm losing track of fundamentals and ending up with crap images.

We all go through them

Turning to the picture ...

If I have understood the EXIF data correctly on the first image; it appears to have been a jpg capture which for a scene such as this is a bad idea - now is the time, if you haven't already, to use RAW capture (which I assume the Sony NEX-6 can do).

If this was shot RAW, did you try a dual conversion to assist extending the dynamic range?
I appreciate this isn't "proper HDR" as Colin has probably used on the house, but it can help a lot.

Of course I may be wrong, perhaps you shot "RAW + jpg" and just used the jpg capture for the 'original' shot?

Anyway, I hope this thought helps,

[AndrewMcD]

Hi Dave,
Thanks for the response. I am shooting RAW and using Light Room 5 for processing. I will look into the concept of dual conversion; I've not heard of that previously. The NEX 6 has HDR capability that I've not yet tried; it also features what they call DRO, dynamic range optimization, which is on by default.
Andrew

[davidedric]

Hi Andrew,

Another simple approach is to use an HDR program to extract all the detail from your single RAW file. Maybe this is what is meant above, but since most people think of HDR as needing multiple exposures, I just though I'd mention it.

Here is a quick example. NOT meant for C&C, just to show what I mean. The first is straight out of camera, the second is after running though Nik HDR Efex. I was playing about - not suggesting that the second image is where I would end up, but just to show what I mean. Enough excuses........

[ajohnw]

I suspect you may have a problem using either HDR method due to the camera settings. It is possible to lift the dark end of jpg's rather a lot but not at 1600 iso. Colour shift can occur with what I did to this but a lot of the problem is noise. You may have the same problem developing 2 exposures from raw or even taking 2 separate exposures.

This one has been lifted too much



This one is lifted to where you might want to get it. Colour just apparent in the trees but the noise and colour shift is still there



That one suggests you might get a good lower light exposure from the same raw file but there is some doubt so if you run into problems you will know why. Basically manufactures tend to compress an awful lot of the dark end into jpg's. It's hard to say what iso to use without using a particular camera so it's something to play around with. Looking at the exif's on the other shots posted no surprise they indicate ISO 100.

On your camera you may find it behaves a little unusually if you set longer exposures. My EM-5 uses a Sony sensor and at some point it seems to decide to take an number shorter shots and then add them together. I'm not 100% sure of that yet as I haven't taken any very long exposures but at 1 sec it seems behave like another did at 10 secs. A long period of card activity. Pass on what ISO to use if a camera does that. I expected to get some milky way light from a 10 sec exposure but go none - I assume that is down to the individual exposures being too short. I saw some indication that Sony started doing this on some of the sensors some time ago.

Out of interest this thread shows what can be in a jpg and in raw. The 1st shot is the camera jpg and has selected areas that have just been brightened about as much as they could be. The other 2 are raw conversions - they used an extremely none linear conversion tone curve. The dark end tends to get compressed in raw as well so basically the slope of the conversion curve has to be increased in that tone region - by an insane amount on these. This may help you get what you need for the low light shot if you try 2 exposures from the same raw file. The other end of the curve can be used to control the high lights and make it easier to merge the 2 shots.

What do you meter off of when the scene is not evenly lit in landscape?

John
-

[AndrewMcD]

John - I am a little confused but I think I get the gist of what you are saying. Just to clarify on my part; the two images I posted originally are both RAW with the second having been processed in Lightroom5.

Dave - Thanks for taking the time to post a couple of images that demonstrates the range of change available with HDR specific software.

The more I learn the less I think I know; but I'm making progress with your help. Thanks to all.

Andrew

[chauncey]

f/22, SS 1/500, ISO 1600. Probably not optimal camera settings.

I haven't a clue how you can up with those settings...unless you're shooting macro f/22 should be around f/8, then drop the SS down as well as the ISO and shoot the same shot in RAW where you have more leeway to tune it up.

[ajohnw]

John - I am a little confused but I think I get the gist of what you are saying. Just to clarify on my part; the two images I posted originally are both RAW with the second having been processed in Lightroom5.

Dave - Thanks for taking the time to post a couple of images that demonstrates the range of change available with HDR specific software.

The more I learn the less I think I know; but I'm making progress with your help. Thanks to all.

Andrew

This should help with what curves type adjustments are. This is for Photshop but most packages have it some where. The same sort of control should also be available for processing raw and the effect is very similar so if you use it you may be able to get what you want from the raw file

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tu...hop-curves.htm

As usual on here it's a good tutorial and mentions everything other than clipping blacks or whites which is similar to the using empty tonal range other then the end points are moved the opposite way to clip them out of the histogram.

I used curves on the 2nd shot. I simply set a point mid way between the mid tone level and black and then lifted that up. If the 1st shot was the camera jpg I might have had more luck with that. The camera manufacturers use curves to cram more stops into jpg's. Most cramming is at the dark end which also compresses any noise. 10 to 12 stops in total isn't unusual and the dark end can be modified fairly easily. High ISO noise can mess this up.

When using HDR real separate shots or two exposures from the same raw file curves can be useful again. This set shows the idea

http://www.flickr.com/photos/4899461...7631399852866/

1st one is the camera jpg. The 2nd one is an exposure from raw to show the duck, a little on the light side. The 3rd is the water exposure. The 4th is the 2 blended together. Notice that each has had an effect on the other. In other words if I had made the duck and water darker the dark duck would have less effect on the light duck and the darker water would have more effect on the washed out water. These were just done by adjusting the default exposure time in raw conversion but curves can be used to play with the tone levels as well. For instance I could have made the duck darker in the water exposure and the duck more correct in the duck exposure. Some packages have the ability to adjust the contribution of each image. Underneath that is something along the lines of a curves type adjustment again so it can be done there as well. Hope I haven't got the adjustments of the bright dark ducks the wrong way round. Easier to do than write.

On the funny exposure just set your camera to a 10 sec exposure and press the shutter. Anywhere any how. If after the exposure has finished there is many seconds of card activity the camera is up to something. I think adding shorter exposures. If it just does what it normally does - brief period of card activity - it's taken a normal exposure. Then just delete the shot.

John
-