UPDATE: Some additions from the presentation

Explore:
Flickr Group: flickr.com/groups/hdr/
Dave Hill photography: davehillphoto.com
Local photo group: phototricities.com

Learn:
Youtube tutorial (CS3): youtube.com/watch?v=CVuDbcAfN_I
Photoshop Cafe tutorial: photoshopcafe.com/tutorials/HDR_ps/hdr-ps.htm

Buy?
Adobe PS Lightroom 2: adobe.com/products/photoshoplightroom
HDRSoft Photomatix (free trial): hdrsoft.com

This month’s GeekSouth meetup will happen on July 29th at 7:00pm at the Thunderdome in Johnson City, TN (google map).  Come out, play a few games, and hear Ben Collins talk his adventures in dabbling with amateur HDR.

Ben Collins is a sometimes-photographer at The Bliss Agency, where taking his own images for web design projects has been a huge help.  A couple of his images have been used nationally in print publications for larger agencies.  His only training has been a mentoring under award-winning photographer Malcolm Wilson, a photo journalist and long time graphic designer.  Since then, he’s been exploring and learning as much as he can on his own, mostly in real-world situations where the internet and accidents are his primary teachers.  Lately, he’s been exploring something called “HDR” imaging and has begun to incorporate this technique in his work.

HDR stands for High Dynamic Range and the idea has been around since the 19th century, when Gustave Le Gray took two images, one of the sky and one of the sea at different exposures.  He then combined the two negatives to make one positive, and voila, a HDR image (source, Wikipedia).  The basic concept is if you take a picture, you have to choose an exposure amount.  If you expose an image for too long, any spot with a lot of light will be “blown out” or just white.  Likewise, any dark area that is not exposed long enough is just black.  The whole idea behind HDR is combining different photos using different exposure to make a single, “dynamic” image.

Ben uses two techniques to explore creating dynamic photos, manual and Adobe Photoshop’s automated process.  The manual process involves layering different images from the same scene with different exposures and then just erasing areas that are over or under exposed.  The automated process is a complex algorithm requiring 32-bit images which are then mathematically combined into a single image which you can then manipulate using special preset modes of HDR imaging.  Ben will demonstrate both processes for GeekSouth.

Please make plans to come out!  Big thanks to Thunderdome for hosting us, Ben Collins for the presentation, and Donna Dingus for getting us organized!