In this post, I take a look at the results of two HDR images created using two different software: Raya Pro by Jimmy McIntyre and Adobe Lightroom HDR.
The image I used is from my recent trip to Auckland where I visited the North Head location and captured these images using DJI Phantom 3. The images were 5 Bracketed exposures, 1-stop apart so that was -2, -1, 0, +1, +2.
Of the 5 images, I used -1, +1, +2 exposures as my Dark, Normal and Bright respectively to create the blended final image.
With Raya Pro, I loaded the images in Photoshop CC as layers and did the very simple blending using the Darks and Brights button on the plugin. Then finally finished the image in Camera Raw adjusting various sliders.
With Lightroom, I selected the same 3 images and selected Photo Merge > HDR. Then adjusted the final result in Lightroom Develop module to apply similar settings as the first image edited in Camera Raw.
I think both the results are nice in the end however my preference is the image created with Raya Pro as the distant landscape still remains a bit blurry and low in contrast. This gives a more natural looking result.
While the image created with Lightroom, makes the distant landscape more contrasty and tries to sharpen it up. Which is nice and normal trait of an HDR image.
Which image do you like the best?
Ultimate HDR Preset Pack for Lightroom
