[gb] Studio

Let’s talk tools. I’ll try to keep this one short because the point really isn’t to dump on HDR in general, but to remind everyone of a simple concept: just because you have a tool at your disposal doesn’t mean you have to use it.

“But this one goes all the way to 11!”

Remember the early days of Photoshop, back when artistic filters had just arrived on the scene. It was pretty nifty. You could take any photo and make it look like a fake watercolor painting or a pseudo-like a pastel drawing. Naturally, people were enamored with the new technology and, often, began to overuse it.

One of the biggest aspects to any creative job is knowing… when to use a certain tool… also… how much to use it.

One of the biggest aspects to any creative job is knowing not only when to use a certain tool, but also, in the case of of a lot of digital tools, how much to use it.

Enter: HDR. I actually love HDR – both the technology itself and the creative way it has influenced some aspects of photography (and by extension design).

The problem is that when I talk to people about HDR, the image that pops into their head is not what I’m thinking of.

Good intentions

From Wikipedia: “This method [HDR] was developed to produce a high dynamic range image from a set of photographs taken with a range of exposures.”

Cameras are getting better and better, but they still don’t expose an image the way it is seen by the human eye. We see a much broader spectrum of light. The intention behind HDR technology and process is create an image from a series of images (at different exposures) that more closely resembles what we can see.

An unintended consequence is that by increasing the number of images you combine, you can actually begin to capture things in the image that the human eye couldn’t even see. Used appropriately, this can create some amazing and stylistically surreal images like the one below.

by Tony Eckersley. View on Flickr.

A new style of photography has been born: the HDR effect. All in all this really isn’t a bad thing. I’ve seen some excellent HDR photography (like the photo I highlighted above). But the temptation is always to take a good thing too far. And then you get a different kind of surreal. The overdone.

by MorBCN. View on Flickr.

The Word of the Day: Subtlety

Pick your tools carefully. Know the rules: what is the tool intended to do? Now, feel free to break the rules. But do it with a level of subtlety and finesse that leaves your viewer intrigued. But don’t state the obvious. In my opinion (and I recognize fully that it’s my own opinion) the best HDR images leave you wonder, “how’d they do that?”

Blue Bus, by myself. View on Flickr.

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