Notre Dame La Grande, Poitiers (Vienne)

Interested in critiques, thank you for your time and interest.

You've done a great job using HDR here. The only nits I have are some blown specular highlights from the the indoor lighting and at the bottom from the doorway. I think the composition is great. Overall a winner. Nice work.

... didn't plan for this to be HDR, shot brackets to be safe, but after learning about HDR, tried it on this and several other shots. Next time I shoot there (September next year) I'll shoot for the windows. Question for you HDR buffs ... do you get a lot of camera noise in the (nearly) black areas when you expose for something like a window? I've solved that by blacking everything out except the windows, but was wondering if I'm missing something.

Dennis,

To answer your noise question: Yes! I use Photomatix (www.hdrsoft.com) and their answer to this is to make sure you capture the full tonal range of the scene across the number of images you take. Check out their FAQ's for more info. I still fight with noise on all my images and wind up using noise removal and masking. The problem is definitely worse if you have dark areas in the scene. HDR sure is fun though.

Best of luck,

Paul