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Ghosting? Artifacts? HDR Merge...


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I would like some help... there are unsightly smudges and what looks like ghosting along the sides of the trees probably due to motion after HDR merging... but I don't know how to get rid of them. Auto deghost check box did nothing and I already looked up the tutorial on Youtube but cloning from one of the bracketed exposure images changed the sky exposure as I brushed on the hdr merged image...

problem.jpg

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  • Staff

Thanks for sending the images.

I've spent a bit more time than I'd like to admit doing some tests and comparing it to some other apps and I'm getting a very similar result on the merged image. I think the issue is the fringing where the trees meet the skyline.

Neither of the apps remove the ghosting perfectly so I tried to add a Defringe filter and applied Chromatic Aberration. This fixed the purple fringing but I was still seeing the weird outline at the edge of the trees.

Here's a comparison between Affinity and Photoshop which were the two giving me the best results.

Affinity

825885775_Affinityfull.thumb.jpg.ff3216292e72e37c90f899e8c159b53f.jpg

 

 

Photoshop

1104749506_PSfull.thumb.jpg.cc375b98d1ae6096d78243fa9dfc5d7a.jpg

 

Affinity 200% zoom

1993676106_Affinity200.thumb.jpg.34f2f7b0a70110630ce57b6616e146fe.jpg

 

Photoshop 200% zoom

864790555_ps200.thumb.jpg.c162c373753117d6585b592e024d7e1f.jpg

 

I think there is only so much the apps can do when the fringing is so severe. You'd have to manually go in and clean it up using other tools if you wanted it perfect. These screenshots were taken with the default settings apart from enabling 'remove ghosting'. Photoshop seemed to have a few more options but the more I fiddled, the more the image began to look very unnatural. Same goes for Affinity with the Tone Mapping.

One thing to note is that Affinity seemed to make my PC perform extremely slow at times during the tests so that's one thing we need to look at. 

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Thanks a lot for taking the time to do those tests, Chris. I wonder if I could be using a better technique to capture scenes like this in camera to help make this issue more manageable in post... I'll keep practicing! :) Who knew taking pictures of landscapes would be so complicated!

Any updates to improve the response time/speed of the program would always be welcomed as I use an old computer that needs to be upgraded real soon! Haha.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I can highly recommend trying Aurora HDR 2019. In all my tests, Affinity Photo looked poorest (to say it polite) while Aurora didn't need any manual work at all in most cases and I was able to directly tune the image to my liking instead of fixing errors. On One is much faster but just as crappy as Affinity.

I never once got a usable (in my book) HDR merge out of Affinity Photo so far.
You probably don't need to change your technique, but rather use software that actually knows what it's doing.

As for speed: Aurora takes a bit less time here, but isn't superfast either. But in it's case, I'm actually okay with waiting, since the results are actually working.

Sorry if the above sounds harsh, but this is NOT a problem of camera technique.
With Aurora, you can usually take 3 images separated by 2 stops for normal situations and get a great result. For more extreme situations, you may want to take 5. Otherwise there isn't a lot of magic to be done, as long as you don't wobble like crazy and your objects are halfways static too.

I'd actually love to see this part of Affinity Photo brought up to snuff!

Cheers,

Tom

ScreenDream   |   Windows 8.1 x64 - 64 GB Ram - i7 6 core @ 4.1 GHz - GeForce GTX 1080 TI & GTX 980 Ti

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