High Dynamic Range (HDR) photos allow you to capture good detail in the highlights and shadows when photographing scenes that exceed your cameras capabilities. Many Digital SLRs can only effectively handle 4-5 Fstops of scene brightness.

After Capture magazine has 2 articles in it’s latest issue (and online) detailing the shooting methods and software to do HDR photos. You can grab PDF files of those articles from the After Capture website. Read about Dan Burkholder’s photos taken in New Orleans and then check out their article on HDR workflow shooting and using the software.

Producing HDR photos is fairly simple.

1. Start with your camera on a tripod and use Aperture Priority mode.
2. Shoot bracketed photos with at least 1 Fstop difference. You can get away with just 3 images, but using 5-7 will net you better results.
3. Use the HDR function in Photoshop CS2 or CS3, or use the Photomatix software (mentioned in the articles) to blend the images.
4. When using Photomatix , the Tone Mapping function will bring your HDR photos to life and allow you to control the blending via various sliders.

On the left is a straight shot at sunrise. On the right is an HDR image of 3 shots processed through Photomatix.

You can download demo versions of the Photomatix standalone program or PS plugin at their website. The results are quite good.