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Microstock Photography Forum - General => General Stock Discussion => Topic started by: ljooc on February 09, 2009, 10:11

Title: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: ljooc on February 09, 2009, 10:11
Just curious how many of you do HDR and what are your sales channels?
micro? midstock? macro? if yes, could be share which sites accept them? I read BigStock takes them but do you indicate as such (HDR imagery)

I recently did some HDRs, like them, they remind of me color quality of Velvia slide film (in some ways). I don't tweak them much but just pull the three bracketed shots together - See them on my blog. (http://socalislandgirl.blogspot.com)

To me, one should indicate it is HDR imagery if it has been tone-mapped, what is your thought on that? In HDR, the line between art and photograhy does get a little blur.

Thanks in advance. JC

A footnote, to all who passionately participated in my "Mac vs PC" debate question, I ended up getting an Acer laptop with 3GB RAM 250 HD, 14.1 screen, for $500 after all that rebates - amazing- 1/5 of what I paid for my old laptop 4 yrs ago and 5x the specs
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: anton9 on February 09, 2009, 10:49
HDR is something I want to start doing soon. A friend of mine on istock sells a lot of his hdr images and they do look fantastic but from doing searches on different sites I dont think they are big sellers
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: WarrenPrice on February 09, 2009, 13:03
I've had a few HDR images accepted but none have sold yet.  I've had several rejected for "over-filtered."  I guess they are like any other image, depends on subject matter and quality.

Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: Xalanx on February 09, 2009, 13:58
Yes I do, occassionally. Don't recall of one being rejected so far. And they sell - as many other shots. When they get online they have a burst of sales and then settles.

Here's a few samples:

(http://69.90.174.247/photos/display_pic_with_logo/113008/113008,1215551617,1.jpg)

(http://69.90.174.247/photos/display_pic_with_logo/113008/113008,1230933889,1.jpg)

(http://69.90.174.248/photos/display_pic_with_logo/113008/113008,1210801008,1.jpg)

So I'll say - yea, it's worthy. Do it if you like, they'll sell if they're good. Almost like any other photo.
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: WarrenPrice on February 09, 2009, 14:03
Nice images.  I know that alignment can be a big problem in HDR.  That made me wonder about the image of the young boy.  Was that a bracketed exposure?  Some photographers like to tone map a single exposure as HDR.  Just curious?
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: Xalanx on February 09, 2009, 14:51
In fact, I made bracketed exposure very rare. When it comes to HDR, you can never be sure about alignment. If the subject is a tree  and there's wind, then you can have branches moving in split of a second and so on. Therefore I am an adept of single raw file HDR. Fortunately, Canon is pretty good with noise so I can raise exposure without worries from raw.

The little dude (my son - very curious if there's a bird nest in there) - of course, single raw file. However, that photo has something more than just hdr.
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: Magnum on February 09, 2009, 16:28
Everything will sell if itīs really good. Doesnīt matter if itīs HDR or not.  The name "HDR" wonīt sell anything.  And why "specify" how it  was done?  Thereīs no cheating in microstock...
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: eppic on February 10, 2009, 01:21
This one sells fairly well for me:

(http://69.90.174.248/photos/display_pic_with_logo/83390/83390,1228870358,13.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: Magnum on February 10, 2009, 04:48
A good example on " Invisible " HDR editing.    Many HDRīs just look like someone found the shadow/highlight tool in PS :-\
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: anton9 on February 10, 2009, 09:32
Just uploaded my first hdr to stock we shall see if its accepted anywhere :)

(http://photos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-ak-snc1/v2216/86/44/504838280/n504838280_1318966_8445.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: travismanley on February 10, 2009, 15:41
I dont know of any sites that specifically dont accept HDR photos. I think you might have a hard time getting HDR images accepted just because its hard to get them to look really good at 100% and a lot of sites might think they look too "unnatural" or not "stocklike" enough.

I have done a few with limited success. I guess what im doing isnt really true HDR, im using one raw file and generating different exposures from that file. I tried taking multiple shots of the same subject but had lots of problems with artifacts and alignment (probably because I was shooting nature stuff that wasnt being totally still).

Here are a couple of mine

(http://www.dreamstime.com/olympic-national-park-thumb7440109.jpg)

(http://www.dreamstime.com/olympic-national-park-thumb7512181.jpg)

Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: Magnum on February 10, 2009, 22:21
Hereīs some inspiration...

http://www.davehillphoto.com/
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: eppic on March 20, 2009, 17:56
You can also do an HDR blend out of a single image, which is a technique I employ more often than doing multiple exposures.
My general method is to take a single RAW image and generate 3 images; one underexposed by a stop, the original exposure, and one overexposed by a stop and toss the three into my Dynamic Photo HDR software.  That's what I did with the above semi image as well as this one which will be hitting flame status on Istock soon:

(http://www2.istockphoto.com/file_thumbview_approve/7192634/2/istockphoto_7192634-compass-being-held-out-to-determine-direction.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: Magnum on March 20, 2009, 19:14
I belive you get the same effect by adding some Highlight/shadows adjustment in Ps.
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: null on March 20, 2009, 19:53
Quote from: Magnum on March 20, 2009, 19:14
I belive you get the same effect by adding some Highlight/shadows adjustment in Ps.


Yes, same as most here: pseudo HDR

(http://cjoint.com/data/dxbTaDryJs_choch.jpg)

Another one by changing colors thru soft light layers:

(http://cjoint.com/data/dxbZFdlE2n_cami.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: MatHayward on March 20, 2009, 23:28
I hardly ever do these but I do think they look pretty cool.  My gut tells me that in 5 years or so they are going to be very cliche' type photo's like spot colored images that were so popular in the 80s, overloaded Gaussian Blurred images and such.  For now though, I like the ones I see that are done well.  I've never intentionally sought to do an HDR image but this photo I shot in the Serengeti caught my eye while I was processing thousands of images in Lightroom so I stopped and did a full edit on it.  Little did I know it would end up being one of my most talked about images ever.  Take a good look and see if you can guess why. (http://www.mathaywardphoto.com/serengetirock.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: null on March 20, 2009, 23:38
Quote from: MatHayward on March 20, 2009, 23:28
Little did I know it would end up being one of my most talked about images ever.

Great shot Matt. Deviantart would love it. Let me guess... the right rock looks like an eagle head with a smaller human face inside?
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: MatHayward on March 21, 2009, 01:11
Thanks Flemish.  I haven't heard the eagle head, but a lot of people have seen a lot of different things for sure.  The face on the rock is what had caused the most common stir though for sure.  You were right about that.  I didn't see it when I shot the pic or when I edited it for that matter.  I posted the pic on my blog and got an immediate response.  I looked again and my jaw hit the floor.

Mat

Quote from: FlemishDreams on March 20, 2009, 23:38
Quote from: MatHayward on March 20, 2009, 23:28
Little did I know it would end up being one of my most talked about images ever.

Great shot Matt. Deviantart would love it. Let me guess... the right rock looks like an eagle head with a smaller human face inside?
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: null on March 21, 2009, 07:07
Quote from: MatHayward on March 21, 2009, 01:11
I haven't heard the eagle head


More like an owl... Ah, the goold old Rorschach test (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projective_tests). What you see is what you are.

(http://cjoint.com/data/dxnpTW0VbD_owl.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: ljooc on March 21, 2009, 08:41

Good tip, thanks, that explains why my resulting HDR images have so much noise, because I increase saturation as opposed to intensifying the orange and black locally.

jc
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: null on March 21, 2009, 09:09
Quote from: ljooc on March 21, 2009, 08:41
Good tip, thanks, that explains why my resulting HDR images have so much noise, because I increase saturation as opposed to intensifying the orange and black locally.

Yap. If you want to add pop-up, you can better use Image > Adjustements > Match color. It adds less (color) noise too than just increasing saturation.
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: ichiro17 on March 21, 2009, 13:07
Dave Hill is not HDR.  He's said it himself.  For him, its all about the lighting. 

However, his work is phenomenal.

So is Joey Lawrence.

www.joeyl.com

His personal subject matter is a bit 1980s, but the photographs themselves are great.
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: borg on March 22, 2009, 17:30
Some of my new one:
(http://www.slichke.com/images/cqs1237762709g.jpg)

(http://www.slichke.com/images/opt1237762745z.jpg)

(http://www.slichke.com/images/cqs1237762797k.jpg)
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: RacePhoto on March 22, 2009, 17:58
Quote from: MatHayward on March 20, 2009, 23:28
I hardly ever do these but I do think they look pretty cool.  My gut tells me that in 5 years or so they are going to be very cliche' type photo's...

I think they already are.  ;D

I think the effect is striking and very attractive, but already becoming cliche'. I'm trying to make HDRs that don't look like some artificial lighting, just having a dynamic range that's more like film. I'm sure there will always be photos that lend themselves to HDR, which improves the shot, it just seems that far too many people are doing them just because it looks cool. Not sure if the same interest wins over to buyers?
Title: Re: Do you do HDR? and what has been your experience selling them as stock
Post by: garycookson on March 22, 2009, 19:00
This guy does some interesting ones and has tutorials plus lots of nice stuff anyway

www.chromasia.com