Tuesday
Sep062011
The Same But Different
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 6:00AM The time I spent not shooting recently gave me time to reflect. I thought about how post-processing, especially when tonemapping an HDR image, can have as much (possibly more) to do with the final image than the actual image captured in camera. The photographer and the post-processor are usually one and the same. But I thought I'd try to separate the two. I took an image of mine as reference point so we could celebrate the differences that post-processing can make to the exact same set of pixels.
I proposed that a fun little experiment to some friends. I offered up an eight-image bracket set of one of my photographs for them do their magic--whatever that may be. They processed the images according to their sense of aesthetics. This is not about who's processing is "better," but rather about seeing how each of us interpret the exact same image. Keep in mind that some of the players in this little game of ours might never shoot an image like the one handed to them, so they might be out of their element with what they were handed. Regardless they all did an impressive job. I'm glad we did this exercise. It gave me a different perspective on my own work. I hope you enjoy this little experiment. Here's what we came up with. Click on each image for a larger version.
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Post-processing by Tod Grubbs http://BeeCreekPhotography.comPost-processing by Tod Grubbs http://BeeCreekPhotography.com;)
Post-processing by Van Sutherland http:\\exileimaging.wordpress.comPost-processing by Van Sutherland http:\\exileimaging.wordpress.com;)
Post-processing by Jim Nix http://www.nomadicpursuits.comPost-processing by Jim Nix http://www.nomadicpursuits.com
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Post-processing by Michael Connell http://www.txshooter.comPost-processing by Michael Connell http://www.txshooter.com
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Post-processing by Rusty Jackson http://www.terra360.comPost-processing by Rusty Jackson http://www.terra360.com
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Post-processing by Andy (ATMTX) http://www.atmtxphoto.comPost-processing by Andy (ATMTX) http://www.atmtxphoto.com
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Post-processing by Peter Talke http://places2explore.wordpress.comPost-processing by Peter Talke http://places2explore.wordpress.com;)
Post-processing by Yves Vandervennet http://www.flickr.com/photos/yvdv/Post-processing by Yves Vandervennet http://www.flickr.com/photos/yvdv/;)
Post-processing by Dave Wilson http://davewilsonphotography.comPost-processing by Dave Wilson http://davewilsonphotography.com
And my own version of this image is
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Photograph ©2011 Alex Suárez. All rights reserved.
Reader Comments (8)
Alex, super cool! Love the diff styles and looks! Thats what makes HDR'ing great...so many ways to process one pic!!
nice work everyone! Alex, thanks for sharing the brackets and hosting this, it was fun!
Very cool to see everyone else's interpretation. It was a fun exercise!
Thanks Mike, Jim and Pete! I'm really impressed with how different everyone was able to interpret the same batch of pixels. I was afraid I was going to end up posting a half dozen iterations of the same thing. Glad everyone put their own spin on the image. Thanks for playing, y'all!
What a fun comparison. Love how we all different interpretations of the same scene.
Nice work, gents. I enjoy checking out these collaborations and it's cool to see a few more people getting in the mix.
Alex, thanks for hosting this. Lots of great interpretations here. So who's going to offer up the next set of brackets?
Alex, thanks for the exercise, it was fun and the results are very interesting. Maybe should we all do it from time to time.