Image rights: Ohanaware Co.
When faced with a high–contrast scene
your camera may struggle to capture
detail in the brightest highlights and the
darkest shadows. One way to capture
more detail is to shoot three bracketed
exposures. One shot captures an average
exposure, revealing detail in the
midtones; a second shot over–exposes the
scene to capture shadow detail; a third
shot under-exposes the scene to capture
detail in the brightest highlights. You
then need an app to combine the correctly
exposed bits of each shot into a merged
image that boasts a high dynamic range
(HDR). HDRtist NX2.1 has all the tools you
need to create colorful and fully detailed
HDR composites from a series of
bracketed exposures. It also does a great
job of clawing back detail from a single
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who don’t shoot bracketed exposures.
The cleanly designed home screen
invites you to combine multiple shots. It
then presents you with a colorful and
detailed composite HDR image that you
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you might face after combining several
images is misaligned objects due to
camera movement, but HDRtist has an
auto Align box that produces great
results. But we did notice some ghostingon our test images (where a moving object
such as a car in one of the source images
appears as a semi-transparent “ghost”
in the HDR shot.) You can also crop the
composite shot using handy presets.
True HDR images contain more detail
than can be displayed on screen or in
print, so they need to be tone-mapped to
create viewable versions. This can lead to
artefacts such as lighter halos clinging to
the edge of contrasting objects. HDRtist’s
Polaris tone–mapper can reveal shadow
or highlight detail right up to the edges
without creating halos.
The Styles panel provides previews that
quickly enable you to experiment with
HDR looks. You can then pop to the Edit
panel to tweak the results using sliders.
You can also add extra functions to the
Edit panel to expand your control, such as
adding a vignette to your HDR image.
THE BOTTOM LINE. A quick and easy
way to produce colorful and detailed HDR
images. GEORGE CAIRNSHDRtist NX2.1
Combine exposures to reveal detail
$59.99 From Ohanaware, ohanaware.com
Needs OS X 10.11Combine and align
multiple exposures to
create a colorful and
detailed HDR image.HDRTIST NX2.1
Auto–align multiple
exposures
Reveals detail in
a single file
Add extra editing
functions
No anti–ghosting tool
GOODAdd extra adjustment tools for greater control over
the finished HDR look.Tough testing, trusted ratings
maclife.com FEB 2020 47