New York City in HDR

Here is my small collection of Tone Mapped - High Dynamic Range Images of New York City. Most of these images were shot with three to six separate exposures to create each image. I always shoot my HDR photos with my camera on a tripod to help ensure that the images will align correctly during the creation of the high dynamic image. After the HDR image is converted to a tone mapped file, I will use Photoshop to make contrast and saturation adjustments to help give the photos the look I am going for. It is true that if you are looking at an image (such as a JPG or PNG file) on the web somewhere it is not actually an HDR image but most likely a tone mapped LDR (low dynamic range) image from an HDR source file. If you click on any of the images it will take you to my Flickr page for that specific photo. I hope you enjoy the photos and please do not use them without permission.

Scroll on down to view all the photos!
Cheers!
Jeffry Gugick

72nd and Amsterdam

This is a five exposure HDR image I took on the corner of 72nd and Amsterdam (facing south east, btw), in NYC. This was a tripod shot on my Olympus SP-350. I desaturated the image to give it a slightly more grungy feel of the city.

Looking up 8th Avenue

Three exposure HDRI looking up 8th. Ave. The building being constructed in the middle is the new New York Times building in Times Square. This photograph was taken on a window sill to stabilize the camera as there wasn't room for a tripod.

Manhattan Municipal Building

Three exposure HDRI looking east at the Manhattan Municipal Building, downtown, New York City. I wish I took one more exposure even darker as I'm still getting some blowout in the cloud highlights, but it was a really sunny day. I might try some neutral density filters next time to get an exposure that has detail in even the brightest areas of the clouds.

The Skyscraper Museum

This is a three exposure HDRI taken at the entry way to the Skyscraper Museum, located downtown New York City. It's a very small museum but the architecture is quite beautiful. When this image was taken there was an exhibit of the World Trade Center Twin Towers and their construction. You can visit the Museum's website here: www.skyscraper.org

Apartments

Three exposure HDRI of some apartments taken from a rooftop. This was taken with my Olympus SP-350 digital camera on a tripod.

WTC7

This is an HDRI of the newly opened 7 World Trade Center (WTC7). The new WTC7 building officially opened on May 23rd, 2006. The red sculpture seen further down in this collection is right outside of this building. WTC7 is (as of it's opening) considered the safest skyscraper in the USA and is NYC's first 'Green' building. To read more about World Trade Center 7 go HERE.

72nd Street Entrance

Three exposure HDRI of the southern subway building at 72nd St. on the 1, 2, 3 line. This is the older of the two buildings. The newer building can be seen in this collection as well.

Looking down 8th (tilt-shift)

Shot looking down (south) 8th Ave. in NYC. 8th Ave. is the long street to the right of the frame. Three exposure HDRI shot on my Olympus SP-350. This image has some post processing in Photoshop to simulate the effect you get when shooting with a tilt-shift lens. This type of effect when used this way gives the photograph the feeling that it is a picture of a small miniature model.

79th Street Uptown

This is a three exposure HDR image taken in the 79th St. subway station in Manhattan (NYC), looking uptown. I shot this on my tripod set really close to the ground to bring the eye much closer to the floor (as dirty as it is). You can see the downtown train leaving the station on the far left of the image.

1 2 3 at 72nd Street

This is a five exposure HDR image taken of the 72nd Street subway entrance on the 1, 2, 3 line in NYC. This was taken on a tripod on my Olympus SP-350 digital camera. I used a few more exposures to create this image to help blend the pedestrians as they walked by. The more exposures the, the more they would blend into the rest of the image.

The Skyscraper Museum (2)

This is a three exposure HDRI taken at the Skyscraper Museum, located downtown New York City. It's a very small museum but the architecture is quite beautiful. When this image was taken there was an exhibit of the World Trade Center Twin Towers and their construction. This room had tiled mirror walls and columns of milk plexi-glass that were backlit. I did not do any color adjustments to the image beyond some general saturation adjustment. The green/yellow color that comes from the left side is due to the different color temperature of the lights in the columns.

Water Tower

Three exposure HDRI of the water tower on the top of my apartment building. I saw that a storm was about an hour or so away, so I ran up onto the roof to take this picture. It started to rain about ten minutes after I took the photos. Turbulent clouds like these always make interesting subjects, especially with HDR/tone mapped images.

The Ansonia

Three exposure HDRI of The Ansonia an Upper West-Side Beaux-Arts style building built in 1899-1904. The building was named after Anson Green Phelps and at one point Babe Ruth and Arturo Toscanini lived there. To read more about the building and see some historic photographs of it you can head on over to www.nyc-architecture.com.

Penn to Empire

This is one of my favorite photos of the NYC skyline. One Penn Plaza is on the left and the Empire State Building is on the right side of the image. The large building in the front is the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT). This is looking north north-east. This is a three exposure HDR shot on my Olympus SP-350. The building being constructed on the far left is the new New York Times building. This photograph was taken on a fire escape and I didn't have my tripod so I had to steady the camera on the railing.

Boats in Lincoln Center

This is a shot of a boat sculpture that was in Lincoln Center in New York from July 5th through September 4th, 2006. Three exposure tripod shot. The sculptor is Nancy Rubins and the title of the sculpture is Big Pleasure Point. More info can be found at the publicartfund.org.

Support

This is a three exposure tripod HDR image of the support structure for the sculpture seen in the above image. Typically very reflective and glossy objects look very other worldly as the tone mapping process balances out all the bright and dark areas in the reflections.

Looking down 8th

Shot looking down (south) 8th Ave. in NYC. 8th Ave. is the long street to the right of the frame. Three exposure HDRI shot on my digital camera. This was another time that a storm was not too far away, and thus made it a great time to capture some stormy clouds. This is the full uncropped image that I used to create the tilt-shift version found above. It doesn't really matter what type of camera you use as long as you have some way to control the exposure settings.

City Hall Park

Five exposure HDRI of the fountain in City Hall Park in lower Manhattan. This is another image where I chose to use five exposures rather than the typical three exposures I use to get the moving people in the park to blend in more.

Graffiti

Three exposure HDRI with some post work done in Photoshop. The wall was on the side of a parking lot in SoHo. The HDR and tone-mapping process have a tendency to over saturate photos. I'm not really a huge fan of the images that are super saturated like that. In this image I left the graffiti fairly saturated but then I went in and desaturated the rest of the image to help separate it from the rest of the environment.

Old Police Building

Three exposure HDRI of the Old Police Building Condos. This is a Edwardian Baroque style building built in 1909. The NYC Police moved out in 1973 and it was converted to luxury apartments in 1987. That's New York City for you!

African Burial Ground

Three exposure HDRI. This is the medallion marking the African Burial Ground in lower Manhattan. The actual memorial was completed and can be found on the opposite corner less than a block away from the medallion. The text and the map on the medallion can be seen here: Text and Map. To read more about the African Burial Ground in New York City go to: www.africanburialground.gov.

Missing our towers

Looking downtown, through Chelsea. Three exposure HDRI. This was during a day of rain showers. Two towers are missing in the distance in the photo, but not from our hearts.

Downtown Sculpture

Four exposure HDRI of a sculpture by Jeff Koons that was downtown in the Financial District of lower Manhattan, New York City in front of the new WTC7. You can see me taking the picture in a few of the 'bubble' areas. I actually desaturated this photo as the original sculpture was so saturated - and the tone-mapping made it even more so. To read up on sculpture artists go to his Wiki page here.

That's it for now! I hope you enjoyed this photo series.