affinity photo 2 for iPad not great quality

[Beardeddabber]

I am getting into real estate photography. I am trying to merge bracketed images to get a HDR image where i can see outside the windows as well as inside using several different exposures. It is technically working, but the image quality drops in the merged image (photos get noticeably blurrier than source images). Also i am getting a source image where outside the windows are clearly exposed well and also a source image where the inside of the house is exposed correctly, but the merged image i feel is still choosing to overexpose outside the window. I’ve uploaded the source images and the final merged photo for an example but I’ve done this multiple times with different angles of the house and i get a similar result on every one.  As you can see on the source images I have an image where the outside the window is totally visible and at the very least “decently” exposed, so why is the final merged SNY08282.ARWimage always giving me an overexposed outdoors? Am i just expecting too much from this app or am i doing something wrong??

SNY08284.ARW SNY08285.ARW SNY08283.ARW SNY08281.ARW

[NathanC]

Welcome to the forums @Beardeddabber,

I don't have an iPad to hand currently to check for comparison, but after merging all 5 of your RAW images using the default settings and without tone mapping I'm left with a generally well exposed outside and no blurriness when compared to a single RAW at the same zoom value (200%), this was with the HDR/32bit preview enabled which is available on my monitor, with the HDR preview turned off the outside highlights would be immediately clipped similar to what's shown on your final result, however.

If I instead opt to tone map following the HDR merge, clamp to SDR and then set the tonal compression to 100% I'm left with the below result.

In your previous merges, have you been tone mapping the image, or is tone mapping something you want to intentionally avoid on your workflow?

https://affinity.help/photo2ipad/English.lproj/pages/HDR/hdr_tonemapping.html

[Paul Mudditt]

On 7/12/2023 at 7:23 PM, Beardeddabber said:

I am getting into real estate photography. I am trying to merge bracketed images to get a HDR image where i can see outside the windows as well as inside using several different exposures. It is technically working, but the image quality drops in the merged image (photos get noticeably blurrier than source images). Also i am getting a source image where outside the windows are clearly exposed well and also a source image where the inside of the house is exposed correctly, but the merged image i feel is still choosing to overexpose outside the window. I’ve uploaded the source images and the final merged photo for an example but I’ve done this multiple times with different angles of the house and i get a similar result on every one.  As you can see on the source images I have an image where the outside the window is totally visible and at the very least “decently” exposed, so why is the final merged SNY08282.ARWimage always giving me an overexposed outdoors? Am i just expecting too much from this app or am i doing something wrong??

SNY08284.ARW 81.69 MB · 6 downloads SNY08285.ARW 81.47 MB · 5 downloads SNY08283.ARW 81.78 MB · 5 downloads SNY08281.ARW 81.5 MB · 4 downloads

I often recommend that you should develop each image, sharpen where necessary before you do the HDR merge, quick example on my iPad Pro. Similar results to Nathan workflow but because raw images are notoriously soft maybe slight improvement on detail as you can see best in the writing.