Best hdr photo software free plus#
Best hdr photo software free series#
Best hdr photo software free mac#

HDR Express uses a series of presets for tone map and style settings, giving it an iOS feel in certain areas. Take your time with the controls and you’ll get nice results. So take your time, move those sliders carefully, and you’ll be pleased with the outcome.īottom Line: The nicest user interface of the bunch with a very familiar feel. When I was editing, minor adjustments resulted in bigger visual changes than other apps. Higher quality previews take longer to render. Hydra allows you to set the preview quality in the app’s preferences. The completed image will be rendered and saved. When you’re happy with the result, click the Render button and choose your preferred file output type. Each method offers a different slider for adjustments, and the changes can be seen in real time in the large preview window. The Tone Mapped editing pane has three tone-mapping methods: Compression, Local Adaption, and Perceptive (which seemed to yield the best results, to my eye).

Once you have selected the Merge pane on the Inspector window, a histogram appears with an exposure slider below it to set the overall exposure for the HDR image. The editing controls are simple and straightforward. These images then get displayed in a large preview window, where you can see your adjustments made.

When the app is launched, a window opens and prompts you to drag and drop the images you would like to use to create the HDR photo. Creaceed only produces products for OS X and iOS, and it show in the little details.

Best hdr photo software free mac#

From the app’s icon to the user interface, Hydra feels very much like a native Mac app. If you’re comfortable with iPhoto, you will feel at home in Creaceed’s Hydra. Overall, HDR Darkroom’s user interface is relatively intuitive but could use a little more polish around the edges to make the workflow more clear. Each of the engines also allows for custom settings to be saved for quick future access. In some case this may be all that’s needed, but there is more fine turning available with the other two engines. The final engine is the Fast Tone Compressor, which apples a uniform adjustment to all areas of the photo and allows for the quickest adjustments of all the tone mapping engines. This engine seemed to quickly wash out the overall image. The Fill Light slider is the key to this engine and will reduce the overall contrast of the image, and lighten some darker areas of the photo. The Local Tone Enhancer engine is for targeting the shadow details specifically. Local Tone Balancer can be used to balance highlights and shadow detail in small areas of the photo via the Strength and Local Lighting sliders. After the selection is made, the slider controls in the Tone Mapping Parameters panel adjusts automatically. The app’s strength lies in the three tone mapping engines to adjust your image after the files are loaded-Local Tone Balancer, Local Tone Enhancer, and Fast Tone Compressor. It could end up being all you need.Įverimaging’s HDR Darkroom easily combines multiple image files to create an HDR photo. The settings are not refreshed when you load a new set of images, so adjust accordingly.īottom Line: A good starting point for HDR on the Mac. Light Compressor’s default tone mapping settings seems overly strong, but yields pleasing results when lowered slightly.

Best hdr photo software free plus#

Below this, there is a familiar Photoshop-style curves adjustment tool, which allows for multiple adjustment points by clicking the plus sign at the top. There are three sliders under the tone mapping controls that allow you to adjust strength, radius, and saturation. The dynamic range of a photograph is much wider than what can be accurately displayed on a computer screen, and tone mapping-a core concept in HDR photography-reduces the overall range while maintaining as much of the contrast as possible. With very simple controls, this app allows you to quickly drag three image files to the main window, and make tone mapping and curves adjustments to the combined image. Available in the Mac App Store for $1, Light Compressor is a basic HDR app that yields solid results. Don’t be fooled by the price tag on Tai Shimzu’s Light Compressor.