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100 in 100: Tripods are the HDRI Photographer's Friend

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100 photography tips in 100 days: Day 91

By Jack Howard

January 5, 2009

For more tips, go to the 100 in 100 homepage!

HDRI (High Dynamic Range Imaging) has become a much-discussed way to get the produce images with a range of tones and colors similar to what the human eye sees. This week, Jack Howard, author of the just published the book Practical HDRI: High Dynamic Range Imaging for Photographers shares some basic HDRI techniques and advice.

In the field, High Dynamic Range Photography begins with a series of images of the same scene captured at different exposures. A tripod helps to ensure that the multiple source images are aligned properly.

Know your tripod, and trust your tripod. The single most important thing to know about your tripod is its safe load weight. The second most important thing is to know its balancing points. If you overload or overtax even a ridiculously expensive, amazingly rugged tripod, you run the very real risk of watching your camera and lens topple over. And that is not fun.

Invest in the best tripod you can afford, and make sure you are comfortable with its operations. A tripod that is clunky and cumbersome will likely be left home. Your tripod's job is to be a stable, easy to use shooting platform. There's no reason not to love your tripod as a photographer—especially as an HDRI photographer!

The carbon fiber Gitzo Traveler tripod (shown) with the magnesium Gitzo G1177M ballhead travels with me almost everywhere, because it is so easy to manage. Folded up, it's shorter than the distance between my elbow and fingertips—that's small enough for a carry-on bag. Oftentimes, it rides inside the camera bag, instead of on external tripod hooks because it is just that compact.

In a pinch, a monopod, Gorillapod, Manfrotto Superclamp, or other stabilizing solution can also help keep your camera stationary for an HDR capture sequence, but a rock-solid tripod is still your best bet for ensuring total alignment.

Jack Howard is a freelance writer/photographer and the former web editor for Popular Photography magazine. He recently published the book Practical HDRI: High Dynamic Range Imaging for Photographers, available at many bookstores including Amazon.

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About The Author

Jack Howard first picked up an SLR camera as a teenager over twenty years ago and has been exploring the photographic process ever since. Starting in the wet darkroom and now exploring cutting-edge digital imaging techniques, he's thoroughly embraced the evolution of the photographic process.

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