11:59 PM
On my Mana marina trip my main aim was to try and make the most of the late afternoon sun. I deliberately shot multi exposures on the day, mindful that I may need the help of some slight HDR to get the most of my pics.
For shots like the one below, where the sun was just off the shot, I've found that contrast and color saturation was OK, but still not to my liking and tweaking the images in Lightroom also did not get the result I was after. For shots where the sun was in the shot the situation was even worse. Through the help of HDR I could take an average looking photo, and turn it into a version with slightly more detail, saturation and contrast, with highs not blown out like on the original.
So the lesson learned is that if you intend shooting in difficult light, set your camera to auto bracket at +-2 stops. If the shot at normal exposure disappoints, you can pass the three (or more) bracketed shots to your favorite HDR tool, for some slight image processing. So, yes, HDR can be a nice tool, to create some stunning effects, but it can also be very useful in getting the most of subject matter not typically used for HDR processing.
Posted in: 
