False HDR

[jjeling]

I recently have seen an image on the Pentax forums which was a false HDR. He took a standard RAW file and saved adjusted it to -2 and +2 along with saving the original 0 image. From these three files, he created what looks to be an HDR image, but in reality, is not. I thought it was pretty creative PP process. I figured I would share the idea here in case anyone else wants to try it. I havent been taking many pictures, so Ive been digging through old ones to work on my PP.

[kat]

I've done that to a couple of photos that were taken before I knew about the process. Maybe it was just me, but I always found it didn't seem the same. LOL..then again..maybe my exposure are done wrong :p

[kat]

Should add that that way is great if you are on a windy day and woried about moving objects so you don't get ghosting.

[Marko]

I played with this exact technique a few times and it works reasonably well for many images and it's way faster than real HDR (though not as striking).

[Mad Aussie]

I played with this exact technique a few times and it works reasonably well for many images and it's way faster than real HDR (though not as striking).
Ditto. Been doing this for years in various ways and it's excellent for getting a more realistic image. Better to take the 2 or more separate images of course but sometimes you just couldn't, especially with moving objects.

[nomad358]

I normally use Bracketing between 3-5 exposures for HDR shots.
I believe the correct term here is called Pseudo HDR. There is a really inexpensive plugin for Photoshop called ReDynamix that basically does this as well as tone mapping from a single image. http://www.mediachance.com/plugins/redynamix.html

I have tried this and it's not bad. Other than a few noise and grain issues, it does the job rather well and can also be used for portraits.

[Matthew]

Hi, I have also used this technique on several occasions when the subject matter (grass or leaves in the wind), prevents more than one separate exposure. IMHO I think there are a few keys to doing the "Pseudo" or regular HDR technique successfully (my view point is always towards a printed image):

1) CS3 HDR seems to lack, I use Photomatix, it was $99 USD at the time but gave far superior results to CS3.

2) Ensure that the original image is not clipped in the highlights or can be recovered using Camera Raw.

3) I would use 5 files each a 1 stop separation, using more files as smaller exposure intervals. Depending on the scene there may be three below normal exposure and one above plus indicated exposure - don't just automatically use 2 over and 2 below.

Lastly as with most other techniques, experiment.

Good Luck!

Matthew