New Location Shoot, HDR Followup

30 Mar 2010

With all the crazy March snow storms Denver has had this past week, it was an excellent turn of conditions for today's photo shoot. The light was great both inside and out. Here are two favorites:

Behind the Scenes

Ok, I don't have any behind-the-scenes shots--I was working solo today--but for a little info about the photos...

If you're wondering, "Are these HDR?", the answer is absolutely yes! Although they don't have the giveaway HDR "look," as we discussed in the HDR talk this past month, the mere fact of the images lacking any blown highlights, and so much detail across the entire tonality is the giveaway. And that's the fun of HDR imagery--it still looks 100% real, but captures detailed otherwise impossible.

Color Temperatures, Mixed Lighting

Situations I often encounter in interior/property photography is mixed lighting and varying color temperatures. Other than shooting with all the interior lights off, working with only ambient (i.e. window) light and making the home look like it doesn't have working electricity, the only option is to shoot with the lights on and deal with the color "mixture". Sure you could bring strobes, gel them with CTOs and CTBs, but that's not the point here.

Sometimes the lighting mixture doesn't show up all that bad and can be quickly dealt with in Photoshop. A little desaturation here, a little color adjustment layer there, and viola! But however long you get away with that, one day a shot is going to sneak up on you with a mixture the usual tricks just can't handle.

And that, readers, is where my previous book suggestion post comes in. The LAB color space will revolutionize your correction and post-production techniques when this type of situation shows up. Dive in and get a copy of "Photoshop LAB Color" and find out the tricks the book has to offer, or look for one of my next postings showing some of my own tricks for handling tricky color lighting problems.