HDR Flower Photography

HDR is great for photographing flowers, especially doing macro photography. The HDR effect on flowers in the details can be exquisite. And it gives great latitude for your creative expression.

This image was made from three exposures, two stops apart. I tone mapped them in Photomatix Pro 4. Here are the three images I started with:

I tone mapped the merged file with these settings (very subjective) after much experimentation:

Here is what the initial version looked like:

I tweaked the image some more in Photoshop to increase the contrast. I also decreased the color saturation in the white petals (there was too much of a blue cast) and increased the saturation in the center of the flower. And finally, I adjusted the hue to give some warmth to the image.

The image came a long way from the initial three exposures.