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Auto-HDR: Do you shoot with it?

BeeGood

BeeGood

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Sep 15, 2013
1,859
6,120
Lot 23E. Somewhere in Georgia.
Since Auto-HDR was on by default with my 8+, I left it on. But after a month or so, I didn’t feel like it was quite aggressive enough. It seemed like there were obvious times where the camera should have taken an HDR shot but chose not to.

So I turned it off, but I’m getting tired of manually toggling HDR on when I need it (it won’t stay on by default).

I wish I could just leave it on always, but I’m not opposed to the idea of the iPhone making that choice for me. One of the great things about iPhone cameras has always been that you don’t have to tinker too much to get great shots. It’s just that Auto-HDR doesn’t do what I would expect it to.

What says the board? Do you use it? If you do, does it work well for you?
 
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I never use it. It's not a useful feature. Like Live, it's something that just gets in the way.
 
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Hi mate
I have been saying this since i first bought my iphone 3-4 months ago.

On my iPhone 4s it would always stay OFF unless i turned it on
On my SE it would always stay " Auto " even if i turned it on.

The only way around this is buying an app called "VividHDR" which always shoots in HDR, however the pictures are no way near as sharp as the iPhones original camera
[doublepost=1517520687][/doublepost]If you have an old version of iOS you can jailbreak and set it to always be on
 
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BeeGood said:
Since Auto-HDR was on by default with my 8+, I left it on. But after a month or so, I didn’t feel like it was quite aggressive enough. It seemed like there were obvious times where the camera should have taken an HDR shot but chose not to.

So I turned it off, but I’m getting tired of manually toggling HDR on when I need it (it won’t stay on by default).

I wish I could just leave it on always, but I’m not opposed to the idea of the iPhone making that choice for me. One of the great things about iPhone cameras has always been that you don’t have to tinker too much to get great shots. It’s just that Auto-HDR doesn’t do what I would expect it to.

What says the board? Do you use it? If you do, does it work well for you?
Click to expand...

My iPad Pro 9.7 on 11.2.5 allows me to leave HDR on all the time. I’ll try my 6s later and see if that does the same.
 
venomx999 said:
Hi mate
I have been saying this since i first bought my iphone 3-4 months ago.

On my iPhone 4s it would always stay OFF unless i turned it on
On my SE it would always stay " Auto " even if i turned it on.

The only way around this is buying an app called "VividHDR" which always shoots in HDR, however the pictures are no way near as sharp as the iPhones original camera
[doublepost=1517520687][/doublepost]If you have an old version of iOS you can jailbreak and set it to always be on
Click to expand...

You can turn off auto hdr in settings. Doing so will return the toggle in the camera app.
 
BeeGood said:
HDR will stay on all the time on your iPhone 8+?

What I’ve noticed on mine is that HDR will stay on after I close the camera app, but after I’ve opened a few apps other it reverts right back to auto.
Click to expand...

Yes. I'll turn HDR ON, kill the camera app and it will still be on when I open it. Have you checked camera settings in the settings app?
 
ZEEN0j said:
Yes. I'll turn HDR ON, kill the camera app and it will still be on when I open it. Have you checked camera settings in the settings app?
Click to expand...

Yup, and I’ve tried a couple of different combos of “Preserve Settings”. This is what I have currently:

BFD71A0F-1A3F-465E-B722-2852C3507753.png
FCA6EE6B-35D3-4D42-9C05-F83CF2435CC5.png


Now, HDR will stay on if I close the camera app and go right back in. But if I close the camera app, open a few other apps, then re-open the camera app, HDR goes back to auto
 
It’s maybe not about the thread but. Have anyone ever been taking HDR and picture come out blurry ?
 
PeLaNo said:
It’s maybe not about the thread but. Have anyone ever been taking HDR and picture come out blurry ?
Click to expand...

Yes that’s happened to me before. I believe it’s a consequence of the way HDR works.

Since an HDR picture is actually multiple pictures of different exposures made into one by using software, any movement could be exaggerated in the HDR shot and come out a blurrier than normal.

I’ve read that you shouldn’t use HDR if there’s movement in your shot, but I’d still rather just leave it on and choose which one to keep later.
 
Just tested again with opening multiple apps after killing camera. It went back to auto after being set to on. I actually have all those settings disabled.

Could be a bug or Apples way of assisting so you don’t ruin a shot with hdr. But then again if you have keep the normal one then that shouldn’t be an issue.
 
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HDR should be used sparingly. Apple knows this and defaults the HDR setting to auto, they also default to save the original photo.

While it has its uses its generally more detrimental to photography than beneficial.

I think Apple has a good approach. If you are going to shoot a photo that can benefit from HDR than you'll generally have enough time to turn it on.
[doublepost=1517705229][/doublepost]
PeLaNo said:
It’s maybe not about the thread but. Have anyone ever been taking HDR and picture come out blurry ?
Click to expand...

Normal. HDR shouldn't be used in shots that contain fast paced motion (less motion the better actually).
 
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BeeGood said:
Yes that’s happened to me before. I believe it’s a consequence of the way HDR works.

Since an HDR picture is actually multiple pictures of different exposures made into one by using software, any movement could be exaggerated in the HDR shot and come out a blurrier than normal.

I’ve read that you shouldn’t use HDR if there’s movement in your shot, but I’d still rather just leave it on and choose which one to keep later.
Click to expand...
But isn’t Google always use HDR+ in every photo taken by stock cera on Pixel and it’s still come out very sharp ?
 
PeLaNo said:
But isn’t Google always use HDR+ in every photo taken by stock cera on Pixel and it’s still come out very sharp ?
Click to expand...

Androids HDR+ is a suite of techniques they use for image processing and isn’t just “HDR” in its raw form.

It can typically be left on however in shots with a lot of fast pace motion you can still see improvements by turning it off.
 
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PeLaNo said:
But isn’t Google always use HDR+ in every photo taken by stock cera on Pixel and it’s still come out very sharp ?
Click to expand...

I don’t own a Pixel/Pixel XL so I don’t know. I do know that google does a lot of image processing, so I would imagine that it can “fix” some of the motion-induced blur in HDR photos. But I don’t think you can eliminate it completely. There’s really no way (that I’m aware of) to take multiple images with motion in them and put them together in a way that makes everything look like it’s not moving.
 
I use Auto HDR and for me it's the best thing since slice bread (well, at least in photography) on my iPhone X.

I feel the algorithm they use to decide whether to take an HDR picture or not is extremely clever. Mainly it gets used in backlight situation where you would usually get a completely unusable picture.

I know, Auto HDR is not for professional photography, but for my social media purposes, the share of usable pics I get since having that feature has dramatically increased, as has the "wow effect" the photos get.

Oh, and I disabled the "keep normal photo" as it's usually unusable anyway.
 
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