Some Fun Plugins
If you are using Photoshop you most likely understand how to layer mask and know why you want to bring in your original
brackets and your tonemapped image to fine – tune your shot. This tutorial is not about Photoshop layer masking so we've
omitted this.
Other fun plugins and tools come from a variety of software companies.
OnOne Software is outstanding. Phototools 2.6 has over 300 professional effects
to make your tonemapped image pop. They also have Focal Point 2 which enables you to select multiple focus points – great
for blowing out backgrounds or creating tilt effects. OnOne's Perfect Layers also promises to bring simplicity to layer
masking within Lightroom 3 and Aperture 3 without needing Photoshop – a very exciting prospect!
Nik software also has a variety of great
plugins with highlights including Viveza 2 to add extra control over light and color and Silver Efex Pro to get
professional looking B&W images. Perhaps the most crucial plugin software for HDR post processing is noise reduction.
Nik's Dfine 2.0 is the tops for noise reduction. One of the highlights (in all Nik Software but especially for noise
reduction) is selective noise reduction – you are able to select different points in your image and remove noise,
leaving you the opportunity to take grain out of your sky but keep detail everywhere else. Another great noise reduction
software is
Imagenomic's Noiseware Pro.
Finishing Note
Finished Image
So we've gone over the many steps in the HDR process-the rest is up to you. Find your style and go with it. To borrow a
quote from Ansel Adams, "There are no rules for good photographs, there are only good photographs."