Adobe Photoshop Tutorials - HDR effects

What is HDR? High Dynamic Range (HDR) is a set of techniques that allows a greater dynamic range of exposures (the range of values between light and dark areas) than normal digital imaging techniques. The intention of HDR is to accurately represent the wide range of intensity levels found in real scenes ranging from direct sunlight to shadows. This method was developed to produce a high dynamic range image from a set of photographs taken with a range of exposures.

Source : Wikipedia

By right, to create HDR, you need at least 3 different exposures of a same photo, but in this tutorial, I'll be showing you how to create HDR from a single image in just 5 easy steps!



Step 1

First of all, open any photo that you want to convert to HDR. I'll using one of my Butterfly Park Photoshoot photo.

Step 2

Now, go to Image> Adjustments> Shadow/Highlights. Set the "Shadow" and "Highlights" amount to "50%"

Step 3

Make another copy of the photo by dragging it to the "New Layer" icon.

Step 4

Then go to Image> Adjustments> Desaturate (for CS3 users, choose "Image> Adjustments>Black & White" and click "OK")

Step 5

After that, change the layer blending to "Hard Light".

Done! Can you see the difference now?

Here are some of the photos taken by me from different locations around Malaysia using the same technique.









Do leave comment or question if you have any.

Cheers!