I wanted to revisit my comparison of HDR software available to photographers – the reigning champion has been Photomatix Pro. And in the other corner weighing in at $599 dollars is Photoshop CS5 HDRPro.
Yesterday I had the opportunity to photograph Jam for the upcoming Pride weekend, and I wanted some really cool shots with the sun in the photograph – and this usually means I am creating an HDR. I created 4 HDR images – in both Photomatix Pro and in Adobe Photoshop CS5 HDRPro.
First difference? It took me about 8 minutes to create all four images in Photomatix Pro – I didn’t sit there with a stop watch so it isn’t very scientific. Once they were created I began creating the HDR images in Photoshop – THAT took me about an hour to do – so yeah – big difference.
The first two images are from the same photograph – and from Photomatix Pro. Yes, I know there is lens flare – when you shoot into the sun you are going to get lens flare and I left it in cause I think it is ok to have lens flare in this case. The second image is a crop of the photo so you can see the building has some noise – Photomatix Pro constantly has problems with added noise when there shouldn’t be any. The building has a bit of an inner glow – which is a bit of a surreal painterly look that is telltale of Photomatix Pro. And I rather like that look. At least I can control it.
HDR Created in Photomatix Pro and Edited in Nik Software Viveza 2
Zoomed in on the Photomatix Pro
The next image is Photoshop CS5 HDRPro’s best attempt – and the building is still just dark and muddy – this is my big complaint – I can’t get more detail out of the dark areas – not easily at least. Photoshop CS5 gives you so many sliders and they all seem to imitate the things that are bad about HDR. There is a slider to control the radius – I don’t want to create halos or glows at the edge of lines and detail – I want to avoid that – yet I have a slider that will add as much radius as I want.
I want to boost the shadows to get more detail – and there is no good way to do that. After enough slider movement then the whole image starts looking muddy, messy or just over sharpened. Ick.
HDR in Photoshop CS5 HDRPro and Edited in Nik Software Viveza 2
Zoomed in on the Photoshop CS5 HDRPro image
Photoshop CS5 does have the advantage that it does not introduce noise into the image. Photoshop also does not create a black halo around the sun – Photomatix Pro does that and that isn’t want I am trying to do. Photomatix Pro also creates images that are a bit soft in detail – Photoshop CS5 seems to maintain the detail in the images.
I consider Photoshop CS5 HDRPro a “beta” program that will hopefully get better and not ignored or cast aside down the road. I would recommend Photomatix Pro over Photoshop CS5 at this time.
I just found out that Nik Software will be introducing their own version of HDR software – and I love their other products. So I am excited to see what they can do in the world of HDR.
