ManRay 1 wrote:
I'm a professional photographer and I sincerely doubt that it's is used as often as you think. Yes, it's fine when used properly. The problem mostly lies in it's over use, which is rampent.
First... one key to success on UHH is to not say you "sincerely doubt" something somebody says when they may be in that industry and are telling you a truth but you don't know what they do for a living. There's at least one member here who is a Hollywood still and video photographer who has shot many celebrities and knows more about his industry than all of us combined. He owns a plethora of lenses and many of them cost more than a residential home. I wouldn't dare to doubt anything he says. You're either here to learn something or to argue trivia and learn nothing.
You seem to be a drummer, so I sincerely hope you wouldn't walk up to Steve Smith, Mike Portnoy, or Gregg Bisonnette and say you doubt what they just told you in a clinic.
If you are using a Windows 7 PC, for example, you are provided with a series of nature desktop photos. ALL of them are clearly HDR'd although you may not notice it until you actually have worked with HDR and see the signs of subtle tone-mapping.
Use "Photoshop" or other editing software in moderation and it can look natural. Use HDR or Fusion with bracketing in moderation and it also can look natural. Overuse either one, whether intentionally or by not knowing any better, and it's not natural.
There are two schools of photography apparently: those who are old school minimalists and those who use new technology to overcome the limitations of the camera and digital sensors. There is no perfect digital camera and fixing the imperfections is not a sin against the gods of photography. I suspect Ansel Adams would be a top user of digital post editing if he were alive today and might even thoroughly enjoy HDR.
If you want to be old school and limit yourself to what the camera and its sensor can do - that's your choice. If others want to expand the the dynamic light range of their photos with HDR, go too far and edit to surrealistic for art's sake or remain moderate and have a natural realistic result, that's their choice. There's no argument required because both are acceptable.
There have been discussions on here where posters feel that photo competitions should have separate categories for "straight out of camera," "post-edited," and "HDR/Fusion" and that's true. I agree. I do all three and I can see that as totally fair for everyone.
Editing and HDR can make a photo "pop" in viewers' eyes in ways that straight out of camera cannot. Personally I find about 25% of HDR creations I see to be attractive for me because, like you, I enjoy natural and realistic.
Creating Eye Candy has been done with post-editing since the film days in darkrooms so any form of post editing is nothing more than the digital version of that.
You need to have an open mind about this. Again, if you are a drummer as your avatar indicates, you know that a guitar player can't just plug an electric guitar into a mixing board and sound like Frank Gambale or Steve Vai. There needs to be post-processing of the initial natural instrument sound with distortion, chorus, reverb, a tube amp, etc. to reach what the player wants to hear. That's no different than post-process a photo with several techniques to reach what the shooter wants to see.
Maybe you don't know this since you just pound slabs of plastic with chunks of wood! (standard musician joke for ages) :wink: