Make Rocket Go Now!

This was my first attempt shooting RAW for one, which is totally rad, and it's also HDR, which is also rad. For more on HDR go here > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_dynamic_range_imaging

This is 5 different shots taken at different exposures at one F-stop each (+2, +1, 0, -1, -2) and then merged using photoshop CS5. Unfortunately, when I converted the NEF to JPEG, I deleted the NEF files so I don't have the individual images to show precisely what it looked like before merging them. Again, I'll post a little more about that later. Though these are RAW, I didn't do any tone mapping on this image so the image is almost precisely what the eye would see. I did increase the vibrancy a little, but the only place that it shows is in the color of the sunlight.

There's a couple of ways that you can do this depending on your camera. My camera has auto-bracketing which makes things relatively easy. You simply select the number of exposures you want to take (2-9), and then snap away. For this I used 'continuous high', which means that as long as you hold the button, it will take pictures. I did that for 5 exposures but that can cause camera shake (you can resolve that by using a time lapse or bracketing burst).

If you don't have auto-bracketing, this can be done manually, and easily with the same results. Mount the camera on a tripod, and frame the shot, then take a series of shots at multiple exposures varying by whatever degree you choose. I think, personally, the best results come from 3 shots at 2 f-stops (+2, 0, -2).