Hi Annie...

There is a bit of a difference between raw editing and HDRI... In HDRI you normally composite 3 or more images with varying fstops ( ie -.33, 0, +33) amd between them you can bring detail into darker areas and work back blown highlights to gibe a more balanced result availing of the high dynamic ranges...

As for raw editing it is quite similar to editing colour values in Photoshop but here really you are working with a digital 'slide' or 'ositive' because the lighting information has not yet been computerized, limiting the range to 16 million colours again you have a higher lights/darks range to play with. With apps like Adobe Lightroom and Camera Raw plug in you can fine turne these extreme range values.... like bringing back blown highlights and putting detail into the shadows but unlike HDR you are working on one image. YOu may not end up with such a richly textured or saturated image as you will find with some HDR images but you could significantly improve your darks/lights ratios...

Heres an exercise to do...

take an example like this one leave one copy in raw and save another out as a tiff ot High Quality Jpeg - In photoshop go to Image > adjust > highlight/shadows and switch on the advanced option box. Play with the ratios and thresholds and improve the image as much as you can just using that.

With the raw version open it with the camera raw plugin amd adjust similar values you should see that camera raw is more critical and will also allow you to balance your histogram as you can elect the brightest and or darkest part of the image which raw then matches as close as possible to an acceptable range

I may not have expained this as well as I can but I did quite a few fake HDR's using Jpegs. Notabley the series from Huaraz I uploaded a few months ago...The Salt Lake Hotel Interior is another example....

--
And it's one, two, three, what are we fighting for
don't ask me I don't give a damn!
- Country Joe and the Fish: Feels Like I'm Fixin to Die Rag

Member of *Tubaholics-Anonymous *vectorites ~chacruna *PsychedelicTreasures

Thank you for your help, I guess I am going to have to keep practising.
Anne

Hi Anne,
Aplogies that I did not comment earlier, I know you asked me to, but i read your note then forgot about it!

The comments below are worth reading. I think that before you worry too much about processing you should concentrate on taking nicely composed, well exposed and focussed images.

I find the foregrund here a litle cluttered and the exposure is a little too bright. I realise you have to find a compromise here between the sky and ground though.

I think this is quite an ambitious subject in the first place. Its difficult to find order amongst natural confusion like that, and as a result this image is unstructured.

Simpler subjects may be a better way to hone your skill. For example I spent a lot of time practising on the local river doing retakes of the same shot in different light etc until I had an better understanding. A lone tree wouold make an equally good subject and also ofer the potential of a good shot a the end of it. I have never seen a sucessful landscape using brambles as a foregraound!

Alex

I have to say thank you for your comments, many of which are very helpful. Did you see my updated version?
Anne