This is one of the earlier images I posted on G+, a Winter sunrise reflection at Topaz Lake on the California/Nevada border. Shooting into the sun like this can involve a greater range of light than a digital sensor can handle, so I used Photomatix HDR software to recover lost detail in the darkest shadows and the brightest highlights. I've been using Photomatix HDR software for 7 years or so now, and it got a bad reputation earl on for being strange results which were relatively difficult to control.
A lot of the challenges with HDR have been resolved by two big changes:
1. In the past you picked an HDR processing method, then waited a while to see how it turned out. Recent versions of the software show you 32 different methods so you can select the one which best suits your goals instead of picking one blind.
2. The latest versions have interfaces to Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop, so you can pre-process an image first (adjust white balance and reduce noise for example), then select and move the desired exposures into Photmatix, then after you process the image, a TIFF file is brought back into your editing program such as Lightroom for more fine tuning. You have far more control over your results with this sort of workflow, adding a little pre and post processing in a competent image editing program.
I don't take the extra time and effort to use HDR software on a high percentage of my shots, but many of our most dramatic photographic opportunities come with extreme lighting situations like this, and if I can produce better results even 5 to 10% of the time, and in exactly the most challenging and stunning lighting conditions, the $99 or so it takes to deliver hundreds more images to my portfolio is well worth the price.
One of the amazing things about HDRsoft, the company which produces Photomatix, is that they've upgraded me across all new versions for all these years, so it has cost me only about $15/year. They updated their licensing a few years back and I thought my free upgrades were done when my original license code would no longer work, but I contacted HDRsoft and they said "no problem" and issued me a new license key. Now that's customer service!
I've written a lot of articles on HDR on my blog over the years. Here's one discussing what you can do to handle some of the more challenging situations:
Tame HDR to Produce More Realistic Images
http://activesole.blogspot.com/2007/09/tame-hdr-to-enhance-dynamic-range.html
And more:
http://activesole.blogspot.com/search?q=HDR
These days people sometimes ask me, "Is that HDR?" The latest HDR processing and the Lightroom – Photomatix – Lightroom workflow has gotten good enough that I often can't tell unless I go look at the file name. For me, that's a measure of my success. Photos have a subject, some reason the photo was taken, and if the processing gets in the way and distracts my viewers, they're off on a tangent and I've failed to communicate what it was which caused me to capture that subject in the first place. The story of that subject becomes a murder mystery instead… who killed sunrise? While there's no one "right" approach to how to process images, even Ansel Adams often re-worked a particular image over the years, at least with the latest HDR tools integrated with powerful editing programs, you'll have the control to influence the result, instead of having the tool impose a distracting stamp of process-driven sameness on the outcome.
Winter sunrise reflection on Topaz Lake, in the Eastern Sierra Nevada on the California/Nevada border.
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Comments
WOW! I'm loving the images from this place!
Beautiful!!!!!!!!!!
I think the secret will be out +Sairam Sundaresan. It's one of the few lakes in the Eastern Sierra that you can actually live right next to, and walk to the shore for sunrises like this (coffee up in hand).
El Universo es tan pequeño que hay cabida para todos, la Vida aquí es de paso y virtual. Paralelamente existe otro Universo de cuatro dimensiones que conocer. Juan Marco.
Fantastic shot by the photographer. Thanks for sharing mate
Mirror time! stunning !
Foto maravilhosa!!
Que bello!
Gorgeous!!!! Nice to live near such a beautiful place to photograph!
Beautiful ~
WOW!
wow
Beautiful
Wow.. amazing
Lovely clouds and it's reflections!
sin palabras
Beautiful!!
This is totally amazing
muy buena la foto!!
Great, liked a lot!
Gorgeous!! I love it!! 😉
Amazing
Beautiful :‘)
Fantastic work +Jeff Sullivan HDR is excellent for bring out reflections like this even if its just a blended layer on a traditional bracketed shot.
C'est magnifique !!
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Cool
wow
Cool,thanks 4 info..
omg subbahanallah
Bohat achhay.
Gorgeous!
so freaking
How long after/before the sunset/sunrise was that?
The best sunrise light +Andrew Zimmerman tends to occur in the 20-30 minutes immediately before the local theoretical (zero degree horizon) sunrise time. These clouds have direct sunlight on them, so the sun was just rising on the furthest horizon visible from up there. The sun was probably 5-10 minutes before official local sunrise time, about 10-15 minutes before the sun would clear the apparent horizon (that mountain range across the lake).
Jeff, I appreciate the information, thanks.
soo good
Wow
Man, just breathtaking…absolutely amazing. Thank you
Wouuww !!! increible!!
Ah, jus, whe, yay… speechless !!
so pretty
Colorful as always Jeff!
isn´t this Absolutely Great?
Good morning, thanks
José Luis
Breathtaking!
It is so beautiful and I am so amazed at this. 😀 =
O ;)Tuyệt đẹp !
WOW, awesome!
If i would be able to relocate in such a great place, the first year there a tripod would be set all the time! Thanks for sharing! I hope i can shoot some great shots to share! Have fun!
wery beatyful
Fantástic
WOW! Fantastic capture +Jeff Sullivan Thanks for sharing and a bit about the time and place.
I am not a professional photographer and I don't have vast knowledge about photography but still I am including it in my one of the best photography album. I am just an amateur photographer.
this is really something!
Good morning, excellent
José Luis
Wonderful
wonderful thanks
José Luis
I like it
Wow +Jeff Sullivan! This is incredible. Definitely one of the best sunrise/reflection images I've seen. Nice details in both the clouds and reflection.