Make HDR Photos in Photoshop CC 14

Despite opinions to the contrary, high dynamic range photos can look natural, bringing you back to the realism you saw in the scene when the picture was taken. 

Proper HDR tools will ensure all shapes and lines remain sharp and colors look correct and realistic. We can create such images with the help of Photoshop CC 14. Two methods of making HDR photos with Photoshop CC 14 are shown below.

Create HDR using the Built-in Tools in Photoshop CC 14

Transfer bracketed exposures onto your hard drive and launch Photoshop.

Launch Photoshop. Click on the File drop-down, find Automate and select Merge to HDR Pro. Choose the brackets and click OK.

As you can see, the built-in tool can give you decent results, but they need further processing and enhancing.

Create HDR using the Aurora HDR plugin for Photoshop CC 14

Aurora HDR is a multi-purpose hdr software, but its primary task is creating HDR images from a single-exposure shot in Photoshop CC 14. It expands the default features and adds more artistic freedom to your workflow.

Launch Photoshop, open the photo and right-click on it. Find Skylum Software and select Aurora HDR Pro. Click Create HDR and Apply.

Once you are back in Photoshop, you are free to continue working with the new HDR image, save it in a number of file formats or share it with your friends.

Take Photos in RAW

The RAW format provides a much wider dynamic range than JPEG depending on how the camera creates a JPEG. The dynamic range is defined as the interval of light and shade that the camera can distinguish between absolute black and absolute white areas. 

Since the raw data of the colors did not undergo logarithms using curves, exposure in the RAW-file can then be subjected to exposure compensation.

Take RAW photos for creating perfect HDR images

Exposure compensation lets you correct the metering error, or can help draw out details that were lost in the light or in the shadows. The following example was made on a bright sunny day and shows the same RAW image-correction at -1, 0(no correction) and 1 stop.

Move your mouse over to see how exposure compensation affects the image: Apply exposure compensation: -1.0 +1.0

Note: step 1 and -1 means increasing or decreasing luminance by half, respectively.

Exposure compensation can also be written as eV, for example, +1 eV.

Note a large number of details in the light and shadow in the three images. Similar results could not be achieved by just burning or dodging tools for a JPEG file.