Retouch, take two.

Since this photog kind of gave me a bit of constructive criticism, and I haven't in awhile, I felt the need for a new post. She's right though, Halos in HDR reek of bad HDR. In my defense on the final image, (its #3 at that link) it was cropped so that the trees were out, and the skyline, though minimal was cropped out of the final image as well. I really just put those up to show the difference in an image out-of-camera and one that had been really retouched. The fact is on large automotive photography shoots, there is almost always a professional retoucher there as soon as the image is taken on a tether from camera to computer. We are still in the minor leagues, however I feel like we're getting there. I actually enjoy massaging and kneading the image until the final result. I feel like it is as much of the final look of the image as the photography is. Here's another from yesterday to illustrate my point, it took most of the day to do and I'm really pleased with the results.

Before

After