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Amazing HDR Image of Bangkok Nightscape

flickr.com — Look at the highways of Bangkok lit up like the veins of an artery. Looks like a scene from one of the neo-futuristic animations like AKIRA only this is real!

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  • homestar2525, on 10/12/2007, -0/+14It looks like a pinball machine.
    • primehifi, on 10/12/2007, -13/+38A) 'HDR' is played out in some respects and people need to learn to take a decent photo without using HDR as a crutch
      B) THIS IS A GREAT PHOTO
      C) Would be great without the HDR/DRI

      I don't think this is HDR, I would suggest it be called DRI, but whatever. Such a great shot.

      /jealous
    • whymanwhy, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15I can't wait to see what fair city gets it's chance at the digg front page tomorrow. I have seen many HDR's lately
    • coldstatue, on 10/12/2007, -9/+4How long before someone makes a comment about prostitution or snakes?
    • masgrada, on 10/12/2007, -3/+17yea, this isn't HDR. This is 'saturation to the max!' With some curves/levels. So whoever is calling this HDR is wrong.
    • KiaserLies, on 10/12/2007, -20/+7my webcam takes larger pics
    • sishgupta, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7I have no idea why people are digging down primehifi. This shot wouldnt look much different if it were not HDR. At best, the green glow of the buildings would not be so saturated...

      HDR is just over used now.
    • drewish, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4@masgrada

      actually, an image like this can be accomplished using the HDR technique. you take multiple photos with different exposure settings. hence the over saturated look you are talking about, composite them together and voila! i would actaully go out on a limb and say this is DEF made using the HDR technique, because if you look @ the full size pic, you can see where the camera moved very slightly and caused the classic blocky look you get on night time HDR photography or HDR where the cam wasnt in the EXACT same position for each pic.
    • turquoisefish, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@Keiserlies - you know you can click on all sizes and see it bigger, up to 4288 x 2848
    • Quidam, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1yeah...sort of looks like a roller coaster too lol
    • xshaisu, on 10/12/2007, -2/+18Man who walk through door sideways Bangkok.
    • mtownand1, on 10/12/2007, -4/+3it isnt hdr, its a long exposure.
    • ninzoris, on 10/12/2007, -8/+2Great subject, amateur photographer. If you see a photo where the photographer can't even rotate the photo to keep the horizon level, than don't submit it to digg.
    • david76, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7"This is 'saturation to the max!' With some curves/levels."

      It's just a long exposure. I mean, you do know effects like this could be done before digital SLRs and PhotoShop, right?
    • rimco, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6This photo is NOT HDR... it's merely a photo taken with a very slow shutter speed... just because a photo has a somewhat different look to it doesn't mean it's automatically HDR... considering the work involved in any HDR shot, if the person taking the photo doesn't claim it as HDR, it likely isn't.
    • Mr.Scientist, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6@primehifi: Yes, this looks like a single exposure with a standard DSLR camera and kit lens. What people mean when they say HDR is a heavily tonemapped and saturated picture. Tonemapping is the process by which a high dynamic range is compressed so that it can be printed or viewed on a normal (LDR) monitor. It is necessary to show the detail in HDR pictures on LDR output devices, but of course one can tonemap the hell out of normal pictures as well.

      I can't blame the photographers for uploading these half-assed shots and calling them HDR when they're really just tonemapped/curved single-exposures. After all, they're making the front page quite regularly and apparently people like them and have accepted the HDR keyword for this kind of picture. But please, if you have any ambition left, correct the chromatic aberrations before you run the picture through Photomatix. The amateur quality of your lens really shows at full size if you don't.
    • sishgupta, on 10/12/2007, -5/+2I'd say that the shot is definitely HDR. A lot of people are saying its long exposure, yes that is so, but it is also HDR.
      The easy way to tell is that the tonal range is consistently wide despite the large depth of the photo.

      If this were merely a single long exposure the objects in the deepest portions of the photo would likely be much darker and have less colour. Since the photo is multiple long exposures of varying length (HDR) the photo appears consistent throughout.
    • JackHoffman, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@sishqupta: That's the effect of tonemapping. Most tonemapping algorithms reduce "low frequencies" because that's where the energy is that LDR displays can't reproduce. In a nutshell, tonemapping makes large dark areas brighter and large bright areas darker, so that the image doesn't span such a wide range of tonalities. Consequently you can then increase the contrast without blowing out highlights, which makes local features stand out better. This works just the same with normal photos, except that you can't rescue highlights that are already blown out in the original picture. The dynamic range in this picture is pretty ordinary: If it were a HDR picture, you could read the billboards that are just white now, and at the same time the rooftops would have detail, but they're just black now. But hey, people like it.
    • texpundit, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1"How long before someone makes a comment about prostitution or snakes?"

      HAHA! My first thought when I read the headline and saw the pic: "Wow! You can see the tranny hookers from here!"
    • DaffyDuck, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1This is not HDR. It is long exposure. There is nothing HDR about it. I wish people would stop using this term without understanding what it is.
    • akira117, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Dugg for the akira comment! Love the image too ;7)
      I'm not too sure this is HDR either....pretty sure it is though.
    • DaffyDuck, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1"I'm not too sure this is HDR either....pretty sure it is though."

      It isn't.
    • DaffyDuck, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1And by the way, if you look at the link in my profile you will see I do know a thing or two about photography. Here are some of my images.

      http://www.pbase.com/eclecticphoto/image/46666076
      http://www.pbase.com/eclecticphoto/image/42766743
      http://www.pbase.com/eclecticphoto/image/53758497
      http://www.pbase.com/eclecticphoto/image/34244176
      http://www.pbase.com/eclecticphoto/image/32364710
      http://www.pbase.com/eclecticphoto/image/32295095
    • aragon127, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1You can almost make out the prison where they torture all the Tibetans...
    • dpcamp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Am I the only one getting tired of seeing HDR images on digg? i mean they're cool i guess but if i really wanted to see HDR images i could just google it...
    • sinembarg0, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"Stuck in Customs Pro User says:

      Hey thanks y'all...

      The ISO was 100. It's true! :)

      But that's the beauty of HDR... sweet 100 ISO."

      That's from the comments. It seems at though it's just a slow shutter speed with some photoshop tweaks, not a composite of multiple images though.
  • ewcost, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Great photo. The light is amazing!
    • sorrow, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I agree, the light is really impressive; I wonder if the city is more spread out, because it doesn't look all that tall for the most part..

      I'm going in 2 months to do some travel studies, i'm super excited!
    • KiaserLies, on 10/12/2007, -16/+2my webcam takes larger pics
    • soopafly, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4@KiaserLies

      Not familiar with Flickr are we??? Click on the "All sizes" button on top of the image.
  • Plasmatica, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Cue the armchair photographers...
    • sunchild, on 10/12/2007, -4/+3Seen the linked photo? I'd say the armchair photographers are already in action. (Set up camera on high building. Frame shot. Put camera on bulb shutter mode. Hold down shutter for a minute or two. Upload to photoshop. Twiddle curves. Upload to flickr. Post to digg.com. Front page FTW!!!)

      BTW, Bangkok is a terrific city and very photogenic.
    • jesuschrysler, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2sunchild:
      you are incorrect
  • devindotcom, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6This picture is OK, but generally these so-called "HDR" pictures look like garbage to me. Soft from the layering, light flattened to the point where there's no real contrast in the picture, and usually way oversaturated. It's interesting sometimes (check out the artist's best-of portfolio: http://flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/sets/72057594049344877/detail/ , from which many of these HDR posts are taken) but mostly it looks like crap.
    • dreamlayers, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Thanks for the Flickr link. Yeah, you're right, many are overly processed to the point of being ridiculous and totally unrealistic. Some might make sense as art based on photos rather than photos though.
    • david76, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2If you knew anything about photography you would know this isn't an HDR photo.
    • bakagaigin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I really like some of these, the coloration kind of reminds me of a comic book or something, but I have to admit, some of them are just plain gaudy (like the ones of the motorcycles).
    • dkm201, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3It is HDR, the author has a ton of other HDR work, and submitted the photo into the HDR pool.
    • somerandomnerd, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1...and written tutorials on how he processes his HDR images.
    • devindotcom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1david76.... if you weren't RETARDED you would have noticed that I called them "so-called 'HDR'" because I don't think they ARE HDR.

      In my opinion none of these things are actually HDR since for real HDR you would need like independent-cell ISO settings going to a huge 16-bit RAW file, and a 16-bit monitor with like a million to one contrast ratio. These just have their shadows lifted, basically.
  • thefutureisours, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9What's with all these skyline images being dugg up. Enough already!
  • reevolutn, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2hardly amazing, when you enlarge it it gets quite blurry
  • LeetPCUser, on 10/12/2007, -6/+3Great shot. I really like it!
  • LeetPCUser, on 10/12/2007, -4/+3delete this laggy 2 messages
  • mymomsaysimcool, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1This is a crappy HDR image and so are the past 3 that have been dugg as "amazing."

    HDR can make some amazing pictures but it takes more than just a camera that does automatic exposure bracketing and 5 seconds in Photoshop.
  • a55h4t, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5These "HDR" images are getting old. Enough already...give it a rest. If you're seen one HDR nightscape, you've seen them all. I wanna see an HDR image of a freakin' titty or something...
  • djbeefcurtain, on 10/12/2007, -0/+17"lit up like the veins of an artery." Ingenious. I didn't know arteries had veins.
    • matrixbandit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yes I was very much confused on that point myself. Although it does make more sense if you remove the word 'the' and change 'of' to 'or'.
  • chrozz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1the veins of bangkok

    veins.. bangkok
  • unfinite, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2heh heh.. Bangkok
    • sooperdooper, on 10/12/2007, -0/+15I was going to make a joke about funny city names in Southeast Asia, but then I thought 'Ah well, Phuket.'
  • fino963, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2http://farm1.static.flickr.com/112/310074290_8c6e70b050_b.jpg
  • Rodalli, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2When I saw the preview on the front page of Digg, I thought to myself,

    "Secret Nazi Highway?"
  • GleepGlop2, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Yes! Keep front-paging amazing HDR images! I'll click on every single one!

    /not being sarcastic, HDR images are worth my 3 seconds
  • Amishplumber, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Its a cool pic, but not at all a good example of a good HDR pic, I don't know why people keep using HDR on night time landscapes, you could just up the saturation and get the same result, HDR is best for pictures with high contrast.
    • dreamlayers, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Cities at night have high contrast. There is a huge difference in brightness between lights and brightly lit areas and areas which aren't directly lit.
    • DaffyDuck, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1It's not HDR in the first place. The dynamic range in the photo is no greater than in a normal single frame captured by a normal camera of a nighttime skyline.
  • CrimsonBlur, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6How is this an HDR image? HDR means High Dynamic Range. This isn't an HDR image, it's just a photograph taken with a long exposure. It's a very cool image, but it's not HDR. Even if it was, so what? What's so special about HDR images? What most people are missing about the "HDR" images being posted here, and what is being used in video games, is just a technique to FAKE high dynamic range when in reality the monitors we are all using are not capable of displaying high dynamic range images to begin with. So can we all just have a rest from all of the "amazing HDR image of..." crap? Please, if you are going to post a link to a picture you like, don't mention anything about "HDR", especially if you have no idea what it actually means.
    • TonyBuzzan, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Yeah i agree before you post an image you claim to be HDR first go to the trouble of finding out what HDR actually means. Once you know the image is HDR the refrain from posting it! Cause digg really doesn't need anymore more of this crap.
  • Javlington, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Didn't know they drove on the left side of the road in Bangkok :)
    • bdbr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Last time I was there, they pretty much drove on whatever side they felt like at the time. They made Boston drivers seem like old ladies!
  • dtm1017, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Why has there been so many "amazing images" of cities on digg lately?
  • abaraki, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3WOW he's right, just like the veins of an artery!
  • tw0bit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"amazing" + "hdr" + foreign city = instant frontpage
  • rick2k, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Thats the poorest "HDR" shot ive ever seen :/

    Nice long exposure though!
    • steve693, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Too long if you ask me. The traffic looks less like a mass of frantic drivers and more like a blur of orange trash.
  • slicerace, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Get Thai'd! You're talking to a tourist whose every move is among the purest! I get my kicks above the waistline, sunshine...
    • MassaYoda, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I was getting worried going through the comments I wouldn't see a Chess reference. Then I'd have to come up with one and the pressure would be on me. Murry Head ftw!
  • ubica, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1wow i missed this one when i was at work after hours makeing 3x3 A3 size posters on the color lazer printer, http://posterazor.sourceforge.net/
  • skEwb35, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0the veins on my bangkok are like way better
  • Andross01, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I never liked HDR. Or rather, I don't like how people abuse it, as most don't do it right (including this guy). I prefer photography without exaggerated halos and absurd saturation, thanks. Check out the user valpopondo if you want some well done HDR/tone mapping - http://www.flickr.com/photos/valpopando/

    And why does this guy need to do HDR when he has a D2X? Digital may only have as much latitude as slide film, but you can still get a very workable range of light with pro level DSLRs. Shoot it right the first time or get some graduated ND filters. Or better yet, shoot black and white/color negative film!
  • bdbr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The dude's Thailand photo set were very nice, but I think they'd have been nicer without all the Photoshopping. The temples there are truely amazing, and don't need all the digital enhancement to be beautiful.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/sets/72157594384360311/show/
  • gateway, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1here are some more hdr photos and info, saw this on a blog.
    http://ibareitall.com/high-dyamic-range-photos-hdr/
  • Kinsbane, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I know Shanghai is not Bangkok, but that image reminds me of the cityscape seen in Splinter Cell: Double Agent where you gotta crawl along the outside of skycrapers.. so pretty...
  • Coy0te, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Hmm is it just me or do most of these HDR images look like saturated pieces of crap?
  • andrew12901, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0blah blah, might be a nice photo if it was bigger to see. Am I supposed to go to 640x480 to get a full screen shot? When will the web catch up with larger monitor sizes & larger resolutions? Bleh!
  • andrew12901, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0decent...
  • antdude, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=310074290&size=o is nice.
  • xVern, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2cool, but not hdr at all.
  • JPhilipson, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This is the second photo from the same flickr user i've seen on the front page of digg. I wish I could post my photos on digg from flickr too. bleh.
  • willynilly, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3JPEG != HDRI

    These idiotic terms and misrepresentations hit Digg in waves. Just when we start getting over "Web 2.0", here comes a bunch of people who don't have a clue what HDRI is.
  • bieber, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1A)This kind of thing is easy as hell to make. Finding something interesting, ideally something in motion, and doing a cool long exposure of it is difficult, but very rewarding. Setting up on the top of a building and doing a long exposure like that is interesting, but so are the eight million other similar shots people have done in the decades cameras have been around; there's nothing new about doing a long exposure of a city, except that now he's compositing multiple exposures to get an effect that can just as easily be done in Photoshop or GIMP with one.

    B)The guy apparently doesn't know how to do long exposures. Look at it full res, and there's very noticeable camera shake. Either because he's not using a remote shutter release or self-timer, he's using a _really_ ***** tripod, or he's not using mirror lockup. I'm betting it's the last. If you're doing long exposures, mirror lockup is a must, and far too few people know it exists.
  • drewish, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1omg, you guys suck... its an HDR composite... doing an hdr image encapsulates taking a few frames at long exposure times. go find an hdr image with water in it, thats why it looks all blurry and isnt all ripply and *****... gawd, go get something other than a freakin kodak funpix and learn something about digital slr photography.
  • MonkeyMoFo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1wow, i miss my home!
  • conto1987, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1looks like every city ive ever been to
  • RetardoCrisp, on 10/12/2007, -6/+1This is not HD!? How does it being large or several exposures make it HD? There are no HD certified still cameras out there only movie cameras. Talk about misleading people. This photo is also terribly blurry and blown out via over saturation. The colors are horrible and not correct nor crisp. I have some pics I took of Tokyo that came out very nice n crisp. Huge resolution but HD...no sir.
    • sohosid, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Moron...

      This article is NOT about HD...it's about HDR....
    • nolz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I believe the context is High-Dynamic Range, not high definition.
  • aardfox, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Just thought I'd post the picture that I created out of his. http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k199/aardfox/OnFirefox.jpg
    I think it's really appropriate for firefox :)
  • LoTekk, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1One day someone will submit an HDR shot WITHOUT the word "amazing" in the story title. Hopefully.
  • matthendrix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Am I the only one that thinks that most HDR images look awful?

    Yeah sure, some have been done skilfully with dramatic results, but most look as if they've been molested by some idiot and photoshop.

    I'm amazed that they receive such praise.
    • DaffyDuck, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3You aren't the only one that thinks real HDR images look awful.
  • SocketNine3Nine, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1What is HDR? Sorry im not into camera to much. The photo looks great if you look at the other ones by the same person, the photos look like renders from a high end graphics card.
    • DaffyDuck, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2HDR stands for High Dynamic Range. Basically, the process is taking several captures at different exposures and mixing them together to form one image with a higher than normal dynamic range. So, a normal photo of a barn with daylight sun on it will have very bright areas and very dark areas in shadows. You can take a short exposure to expose for the sun and a longer exposure to expose for the shadows. You mix them together to create an image where everything is exposed. Photoshop has a relatively new tool that makes this easy. The result is generally a washed out image missing the contrast that gives an image a sense of depth. If done well, the effect can look pretty cool though. A lot of photographers don't like it because it's mostly a gimmick.

      http://www.flickr.com/photos/kros/164073936/

      Example: people going ga-ga over a picture of a building. Yes, it's fun to look at but little artistry went into taking this picture of this building. The framing isn't even very special. The picture in this link is not much different. It's nice to be sure but there are much more powerful photos out there.

      Here's what photography is really about: http://photo.net/gallery/photocritique/filter

      You can find some truly awe inspiring photos at the above link.
  •  

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