Do You Capitalize Philosophy

As good photos with the iPhone

Photography HDR [High Dynamic Range, more info here ] is not exactly a new technique. Has been around since 1850, but until the advent of high-quality digital cameras, remained as limited to professional photographers and enthusiasts. Around 2003, software composers as Photomatix HDR photos made their way the general public. In 2005, Photoshop CS2 functionality to compose adopted HDR photos basic form. The current version has a sophisticated integration for HDR photos and even a feature that allows you to simulate HDR effects in single photo.

Sydney City Skyline HDR. HDR photo taken with a Nikon D90 for John Davey

Returning to 2005, then Microsoft started talking about a new image format, HD Photo (aka Windows Media Photo or WMP), which was specifically focused on HDR images based on the hope that digital cameras will implement that capability. HD Photo format was announced in March 2007 but had to go through a hard time trying to gain traction. Eventually, the format became JPEG XR, which was launched in April 2009. However, we have not seen much of JPEG XR mass products yet, "Even the HDR himself had occasional trouble passing the public lover of photography, the general public.

Apple took a decisive step in this regard and is currently offering its iPhone HDR Photography 4. This can sound great at first, but if we think that the HDR processing requires a certain quality photos in the first place so they can achieve decent results, one can not help but wonder if the HDR capability on a camera phone is really a good idea. Megapixels do not really matter in this case, but the concern goes through how limited is the light sensitivity of CMOS sensors that are in the chips of mobile phones with cameras and the unusually high level of distortion that is in their photos.

Up here, this was some good information to know in what context it comes as HDR Photo iOS property. Were the words of Daniel Bailey, who knew of photography, he wondered if the HDR feature would be really an improvement to the iPhone's camera 4, or if it was just a smoke screen. You can read his article in English here .

For my part, I take as initial foot Daniel indication about how to get decent results with the HDR process and show you step guidance on how to get that "certain quality" required.

Photo by Gizmodo people with an iPhone Camera 4

HDR Photos solve two problems in the iPhone 4: Most digital cameras tend not to have a good dynamic range, and the iPhone 4 in particular has no controls to set exposure beyond being able to select the area you want to focus. This can cause problems in light scenes on the outside, forcing us to choose between heaven completely white, or darkened figures (see image above). With HDR photo, theoretically, would be able to capture and properly expose the complete picture to see the result, as we saw in the iPhone's screen before take the picture.

Stay still, pancho

Photo by Gizmodo people with an iPhone camera 4

In " HDR mode, the iPhone 4 captures three photos of different exposure to combine: one overexposed, one normal and one underexposed. Even considering that these three photos are taken in quick succession, this is not instant. So, if one moves, moving equipment, or if any element of the scene is moving, the results are mutants to be friends with three arms, or ghosts in the background elements, product mix three photos that have one or more objects whose location is different in each shot.

Focus, focus, focus

Photo by Gizmodo people with an iPhone camera 4

Having the goal in focus is the key to making everything right when the iPhone 4 combine everything into a single image, since it is easier for the software to mix the results of three well-focused photos, and so we avoid getting a blurry shot or enquilombada as a result.

When it is worth making use of HDR?

Photo by Mark Labitzky with an iPhone camera 4

The key is to make sure there is plenty of dynamic range to capture first. In other words, it is to find scenes with areas where the incidence of the light varies. Photos that are relatively uniform lighting (such as low-light scenes) do not show any improvement in the best, and at worst, are worsened after the HDR process.

Photo by Gizmodo people with an iPhone camera 4

Given the basic capabilities of the iPhone HDR 4, good results when you try to do simple things like giving adequate exposure to someone's face without losing the merits of a decision made in the outside sunlight. With a picture of the wooden planks of decking on the beach that is already properly exposed, final results will not be good. (When not sure what to do, the iPhone tends to adopt an outcome overexposed or washed. And with the HDR in general, this trend is lost in favor of higher contrast and saturation, which turns out to be preferable, provided and when the effect is applied on scenes rich in variety of lighting).

Testing around

Photo by Gizmodo people with an iPhone camera 4

The best of the ability of the iPhone 4 HDR is that it preserves the original photo along with possibly new-and-improved version, so one does not cost anything to experiment. If you do not like the result, it can be deleted.

Photo by Mark Labitzky with an iPhone camera 4

The iPhone camera 4 and was in itself quite good. And while its ability HDR is not a miracle, manages the photos of the new iPhone look even better, so it's hard to complain too much.

Up here, the guide made by Matt Buchanan to Gizmodo *. You can visit the original article in English here . As for me, I want to return to the words of Daniel Bailey to see what you think someone you know about photography on the results of HDR built into the iPhone 4.

"There's really no big surprises. The iPhone HDR 4 can provide subtle enhancements, but it is what it is: the HDR from a digital camera, so it is far from achieving the results-based HDR shots taken by powerful DSLR. While these effects do not expect a surreal and a wide range of colors, the HDR makes iPhone 4 done a decent job, even if the shots themselves are not enough good to be printed on photos of no more than 5x7. In the examples that I have received, the palettes were significantly higher in the HDR shots, resulting in greater weight of the files as well. While normal shooting usually weighing between 900KB and 1.2MB, HDR shots weighing between 1.3MB and 2.0MB. "

In other words, what Daniel says is that the iPhone 4 HDR really work as long as You do not expect miracles the HDR does in photos taken with cameras more powerful (and can take the first photo of this entry as an example of the miracles ). Apparently, the ability to do HDR shots, found in the new Apple Mobile general public outreach've been waiting. The question is to consider the advice above and encouraged to practice good hand to take a photo of the iPhone feature 4, which also may be coming to the iPhone 3G.

In any case, they can also try one of these applications that perform processing HDR photo in case you have an older model iPhone, or just to try something different.

TrueHDR

Pro HDR

HDR Camera

HDR for Free


* This is not a direct translation, I made some minor changes when they thought fit.

[ UPDATE: for those who have wanted to see professional HDR photos, I advise you to visit this link . Thanks to Pancho Vilaseca to pass the data.]