HDR with the Fujifilm X-Pro 2

I visit the Santa Monica Pier a few times a year to test cameras and lenses or update my portfolio. Even though I only live a few miles away, it’s a huge pain in dealing with the crowds and parking. At least this time, it ended up being a rewarding experience.

I was using the Fujifilm X-Pro 2 and the Fujinon 16mm lens this time

My original Santa Monica Pier is one of the most popular shots on Google. I’ve licensed it several times and have sold several copies. It’s also number three when you search Santa Monica Pier. It was number one a few weeks ago.

Back then, I shot the pier with the Canon 5Dmkii, and it took so much work to clean up all the noise and flaws to get it presentable—hours and hours of work. You can see that shot here: Santa Monica Pier at Night. There is still something magical about that shot that I’ve never been able to reproduce. 

Now, with the Fujifilm X-Pro 2, the image comes out so sharp and so clean with such little noise that it only takes a few minutes to process to get it looking pretty. The only drawback of shooting APS-C is that to match the same resolution as the full frame, I can’t shoot at an aperture that is as high because of diffraction. I don’t usually like going over f8 with APS-C. You can read a little more about that in my Fujifilm X-Pro2 Review.

These lower apertures mean I won’t be able to get those little stars on the lights as I did with the Canon 5Dmkii shot unless I shoot a separate shot with a higher aperture and mask those over the image. I do that sometimes, but with the setup in this scene, I had to chase the waves and only had a few seconds between each shot.

Getting The Shot

I would have liked to shoot this a little earlier in the day so the sky would have had more color than just dark blue/purple, but it’s Summer in Santa Monica and on a Friday night. There were people everywhere.

For these kinds of shots, the only way to get the reflection on the ground is when the water is still fresh from the waves. So you have a few seconds after a wave comes up to get the shot before the sand absorbs it. This means getting in the water and getting wet.

I set the camera to drive mode with three shots + +-2 EV and a two-second countdown timer. My tripod was adjusted to the lowest setting to get as close to the ground as possible. After the wave rolled in, I would chase the water back out to my spot, set up my tripod quickly, level it, and shoot my three exposures until the reflection disappeared.

I also had the camera’s white balance set to daylight. I’ve gotten into the habit of using daylight white balance for sunset and night photography because I’ve been shooting Sony for many years now. Their AWB balance always turns my images into catastrophes. So, at least when the camera is set to daylight, you’d have a stable color balance from which to adjust.

Fujifilm X-Pro 2 – 16mm f1.4 R WR – ISO 200, F8, (7.5s, 1.9s, 0.5s)

HDR With The X-Pro 2

I know many guys these days don’t like to shoot traditional HDR anymore, and exposure blending manually has come back in style with some great new advancements. But you know what? Photomatix is awesome and quick, and I don’t have time to spend three hours in Photoshop per photo unless it’s a shot I am passionate about.

One of my biggest disappointments with Fujifilm over the last few years was they sucked for HDR photography. They would only allow you to bracket your shots +-1 EV. So you always had to bracket manually if you were in a high-contrast situation like with this shot.

The X-Pro 2 solved this problem, allowing us to now bracket +-2 EV, which is perfect for HDR. I know Sony lets you do more than that, and I modified my old Canon to give me even more, but the +-2 EV is perfect, and I rarely shoot anything other than this.

What is more great about the X-Pro 2 is the OVF. Many turbo nerd camera reviewers like to trash-talk this feature, saying it’s completely unnecessary. But you know what, they just don’t get it, and I like it. It’s so much fun to use and makes shooting in dark situations much easier. I 100% would not have bought the X-Pro 2 if it did not have an OVF.

Why I Used Photomatix

Photography is just like anything else in that it goes through trends. Five years ago, everyone got into HDR and used Photomatix to remap everything. Today, more and more photographers are blending in with Photoshop and using the Orton effect on everything.

But I still like and use Photomatix. When tone mapping is in moderation, it still gives the image a punchy and unique look that is impossible to emulate in Photoshop. Plus, it’s about 100x faster than noodling the shoot to-death in Photoshop.

I give away my Photomatix Presets for free if you’re a user. I typically use one of the presets that comes close to what I’m looking for, then make a few adjustments from there. I then export it back to Lightroom, tweak it, and call it a day. It’s quick and easy, and you don’t need your PHD in Photoshop to pull it off.