We have created a tips guide to help you along the way.
How to Guide for HDR/Enfuse Photography
General Settings
Auto focus OFF – zoom in using the camera’s zoom with live view to make sure you have details in focus
No Camera movement or shake
- Sturdy tripod
- No people movement – slight movement along the floor can cause the tripod to move….so make sure the agent is not walking around close to you…and you keep still as well.
- Use shutter release cable, 2 second timer or trigger (see PromoteControl below)
Camera Settings
- Turn off auto white balance (if shoot jpeg. RAW n/a) so select a white balance for the scene (if you have it on auto, it could set a different white balance for different brackets which makes blending harder)
- Image stabilization off. Leads to soft images if on
- Live view on…mirror is out of way so locks it up in place. Use the zoom to ensure your focus point is in focus.
Use histogram and get the black and white before clipped to the edge, if manual.
Too many exposures can create flare – go ahead and take the 7 or 9 but you may not always use them in the multiple image blend.
Good Video tutorial on HDR, Lightroom and Enfuse http://enfuseforrealestatephotography.com/
It is paid but I think worth the money…
Interesting tip = shoot in RAW (or jpeg + RAW) and for really blown out scenes apply the negative Highlight adjustment to the RAW files to bring out detail for blown out areas. Then process. See the lamp by the bed as an example.
Controllers or Triggers.
PromoteControl. See www.promotesystems.com or buy on Amazon.
Allows you to shoot multiple (like 7 or 9 ) bracketed shots with any camera, including Canon that have a built in limit of 3 brackets. Generally get really good results and cut your post processing time way down using multiple brackets (vs say 3).
- You put your camera to Av, select a main focus point (usually the darkest area) and then take the shutter speed value and plug into the promotecontrol.
- Turn camera to M and then press the button on the promotecontrol. It does the rest.
- Works with any camera but you need the right connection cords.
App. DSLR Controller. Works with wifi cameras. See review with Canon 70D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssr_0tlqmZ0
Camranger – works with Canon and Nikon. Device that connects to your camera and can control wirelessly.
TriggerTrap, and others.
TriggerTrap dongle – see http://amzn.to/1GZxo0k works with Canon or Nikon and your iphone to provide similar functionality as Promotecontrol, for about $35. flash adapter http://amzn.to/1SyLPMM
see their tutorial here
Links
http://photographyforrealestate.net/2010/08/26/bracketing-with-flash-for-exposure-fusion-and-hdr/
http://photographyforrealestate.net/2010/04/11/shooting-brackets-for-exposure-fusion-and-hdr-part-1/
http://photographyforrealestate.net/2010/04/15/shooting-brackets-for-exposure-fusion-and-hdr-part-2/
https://www.flickr.com/groups/hdrforrealestate/discuss/72157624166114539/
MagicLantern. http://www.magiclantern.fm/
This is a program you install on your memory card for Canon to give you more settings than what Canon provides. It will not void your warranty and I have found to generally work, but not get as good of results as a promotecontrol. It adds featured to my 50D, like
- Video – 50D does not have video but this adds it
- multiple bracketing over the standard 3 – up to 9 or more is no problem
- lots of other settings.
http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php for their forum on questions.
Enfuse. An open source program for photo blending – not really HDR, but merges multiple photos into one.
see photographers-toolbox.com for the Enfuse plugin for lightroom….Install the plugin into Lightroom so you can import your photos right into Lightroom and then group them and use the plugin to batch blended photos – really speeds up the work flow and gets good results.
This photo was taken with a PromoteControl and processed in Lightroom.
Photomatix. HDR and exposure fusion software. Also has a lightroom plugin.