My beef with HDR in smartphones

[Jason Voorhees]

I already made a thread explaining how computational photography works and singing praises about it

How to take better pictures on your budget phone

Have you ever wondered how tf phone cameras have gotten so good these days? Like How tf can a phone camera sensor so tiny take pictures on par with thousands of dollars DSLR/Mirror less camera, it's because of something called computational photography. The camera's sensor takes a raw image...

looksmax.org

But I have one small problem with this. It is HDR. HDR tries to merge multiple exposures so both the dark and bright areas look "perfect." In real life this is not possible because obviously you will have shadows and varying exposures because we only have one sun as a source of white light

And that's why it is a problem. nothing irl is supposed to be perfect. In real life, shadows give depth and atmosphere. When the phone lifts every dark corner and tones down every highlight, you lose the natural texture and contrast that gives a photo emotion. It's like turning every moody sunset or dramatic light into a wallpaper some painting or whatever

HDR processing also often boosts saturation, loses depth. I get that most people want punchy, social media feady photos but it should have some resemblence to real life. What do you think? Which picture is better? I took them


Picture 1

Picture 2

b

 

[Water Bomb]

First picture is better, I like the realistic image.

For social media you can just get a proper handheld camera.

The Canon Powershot is a popular option.

 

[FaceandBBC]

Picture 1 looks clearer and overall better. Picture 2 looks like the exposure was raised higher than it needed to be.

 

[Jason Voorhees]

Bumo

 

[Jason Voorhees]

More votes needed

 

[Jason Voorhees]

@childishkillah

 

[Sprinkles]

I already made a thread explaining how computational photography works and singing praises about it

How to take better pictures on your budget phone

Have you ever wondered how tf phone cameras have gotten so good these days? Like How tf can a phone camera sensor so tiny take pictures on par with thousands of dollars DSLR/Mirror less camera, it's because of something called computational photography. The camera's sensor takes a raw image...

looksmax.org

But I have one small problem with this. It is HDR. HDR tries to merge multiple exposures so both the dark and bright areas look "perfect." In real life this is not possible because obviously you will have shadows and varying exposures because we only have one sun as a source of white light

And that's why it is a problem. nothing irl is supposed to be perfect. In real life, shadows give depth and atmosphere. When the phone lifts every dark corner and tones down every highlight, you lose the natural texture and contrast that gives a photo emotion. It's like turning every moody sunset or dramatic light into a wallpaper some painting or whatever

HDR processing also often boosts saturation, loses depth. I get that most people want punchy, social media feady photos but it should have some resemblence to real life. What do you think? Which picture is better? I took them


Picture 1

View attachment 4266195

Picture 2

View attachment 4266198b

1