Capturing Unique Shots in Drayton Cellar

Historic Drayton Hall in Charleston, South Carolina has some dramatic rooms designed for photography. In this video, professional shooter Tony Sweet photographs the building’s shadowy cellar stairs in HDR. He shoots three static exposures in available light to capture the complete dynamic range for merging into a single file in editing.

With a 14mm lens, Tony also photographs the basement door, using five different full-stop exposures to adjust for exterior sunlight and interior shadows. The sky is gray, the door white, and the ceiling pitch black. The HDR technique solves the lighting contrast problem, and the finished image captures the full tonal range.

See all of the videos in our Visual Artistry Course:

• Visual Artistry—Course Preview
• Using Long Exposure to Photograph Water
• HDR Photography: Capturing a Water Scene
• Close-Up Photography: Capturing the Details of Shells
• Photographing Scenery with Multiple Exposures
• Black and White Conversion
• Capturing the Beauty of Downtown Charleston
• Infrared Photography: Tips on Shooting and Editing
• How to Mirror an Image Using Photoshop
• How to Photomerge to Create a Panoramic Image
• Creating a Digital Sandwich
• Capturing Unique Shots in Drayton Cellar
• Capturing HDR Images at Drayton
• Capturing and Editing Infrared Images
• Mirroring Images at Magnolia Gardens
• Photographing Charleston Gallery
• Drayton Hall: Stitching and Merging Photos
• Assembling a Digital Sandwich at Magnolia Gardens
• Photographing Trees with Multiple Exposures