Category: HDR

Sunrise Over the Ohio River Bridges Project

Ohio River Bridges Project Morning
Ohio River Bridges Project Morning

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Today’s HDR image is from the Ohio River Bridges Project, Downtown Span, being built by Walsh Construction on the Ohio River in Louisville Kentucky; they are now working on the foundation for every pier across the river. This view is from the Indiana shore in Jeffersonville looking east. There are cranes on barges across the river; each one doing some piece of work essential to the foundation prep work. Looking south there are also cranes along the horizon where work is also progressing on the rebuilding of Louisville’s Spaghetti Junction which will tie the existing freeways into the new Ohio River Downtown Span.

I used my usual three bracket set of -2, 0 and +2 EV to capture the broad dynamic range in the scene. In my processing I first merged the three images in NIK HDR Efex Pro 2 where I tone-mapped it before bringing the HDR image back into Aperture and into onOne Perfect Layers where I used some adjustment layers to intensify and enhance to colors in the scene. I also applied my sharpening in onOne Perfect Effects before saving the image for the web from Aperture 3.

Be Back Soon

Caisson at Sunup
Caisson at Sunup

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I’ve had to add another 3TB hard drive  to handle my library again. It arrived on Friday and I was able to start the copying process yesterday afternoon. 1,715,000 photos = 1.73 TB  of data that has to be copied before I can get back to work. Looks like it will be finished in another 7 hours if all goes well.

Using HDR Photography to Create Your Own Personal Style Workshop

Nick Roberts – Using HDR Photography to Create Your Own Personal Style Tickets in Louisville, KY, United States.

Fourth of July Funnel Cakes
Fourth of July Funnel Cakes

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There is still time to join me for my HDR workshop in Louisville, KY, November 9, 2013. Learn how to use HDR techniques and NIK HDR Efex Pro 2 to create images that reflect your own personal style in this hands on workshop. You’ll be taught how to shoot for HDR along with what equipment you’ll need.

Ohio River Sunset Panorama
Ohio River Sunset Panorama

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We will also go over shooting handheld brackets, using single frames and software plugins to create faux HDR and applying plugins from Topaz Labs and onOne Software to get unique results without beating your brains out in Photoshop. My past workshop participants have all said it was well worth the time and money to attend and they still share images with me that show how well the class prepared them to build their HDR expertise.

Parkland Morning
Parklands Morning

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Learn how to create images that defy the cliched, halo riddled, over saturated, grungy look that many people think of when thinking about HDR. After this workshop you will have the knowledge and the tools to create realistic yet powerful HDR images that show your vision for the subject without drawing attention to the technique that you used. In addition to learning how to use HDR to improve your images we will also talk about composition and it’s contribution to successful and memorable images.

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I have an affiliate relationship with Topaz Labs and onOne Software, and earn a small commission, which helps support this site, on any sales that are made by using the links below. Even if you aren’t ready to make a purchase you can use the links to access a Free 30 day trial of any of these products to determine whether or not they will fit your own digital workflow.

http://www.topazlabs.com/705.html

http://www.onOnesoftware.com/affiliates/idevaffiliate.php?id=459

One additional thing to note is that both Topaz FX and onOne Perfect Photo Suite can be used as stand alone photo editing programs as well as plugins for Photoshop, Lightroom, Aperture and Photoshop Elements. Both Topaz FX and onOne Perfect Photo Suite have built in layering features that make it possible to combine their own plugins when using them.

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Excavator Teeth

Excavator Teeth
Excavator Teeth

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Sometimes the simplest approach to processing with plug-ins can yield good results without a lot of time consuming steps. A case in point is this image that I used Topaz Adjust on to create a faux HDR version. I worked with the zero EV frame and applied the Spicify preset. I then tweaked the sliders in Spicify to get the texture and contrast I wanted, then I returned it to Aperture 3 and sharpened it for the final image you see here. While in Topaz Adjust I also added a small black border that, to my thinking, helps isolate the image on the page.

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I have an affiliate relationship with Topaz Labs, and earn a small commission on any sales that are made by using the Topaz Labs link below, which helps support this site. Even if you aren’t ready to make a purchase you can use the link to access a Free 30 day Trial of Topaz Labs products to determine whether or not they will fit your own digital workflow.

http://www.topazlabs.com/705.html

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Sunset on the Ohio River

Sunset on the Ohio River
Sunset on the Ohio River

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This image was shot from the ramp leading up to the Big Four Bridge. Three shot bracket set merged in NIK HDR Efex Pro 2 and finished in Aperture 3.