HDR Photography is a newer technique that allows the blending of images to achieve a large range of shadows and highlights. HDR photography is a great way of overcoming one of the common shortcomings of digital and film photography alike. Now with powerful digital tools like photoshop we can achieve more in this sense. General technique includes using a stable tripod and taking bracketed exposures to “blend” together all of the images into one that includes all of the light data. Generally it is best to use a constant aperture and mirror lockup if your camera allows. Generally you want to use at least three images taken one stop apart to make sure that there is no haloing or artifacts from the process. There is a lot of ways that you can achieve this effect but in this case I used a tool from Photoshop CS2 called Merge to HDR and extracted three versions from that 32 bit file it created. I then used masks in Photoshop to blend the sky together with the foreground. There was a lot of touchup involved with the sticks and twigs left over from the winter months.

I have a bunch more pictures to throw up on this website from softball games and dances and the like. Hopefully I can find some time off in the next few weeks and really work on my photography. I have a bunch of ideas that I need to get out. Wish me luck!