Can Lightroom batch-merge bracketed photo sets into HDR for a 360 panorama?
Asked 6/21/2015
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2 answers
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I shot a 360 panorama as 8 camera positions, with 3 bracketed exposures at each position (24 files total). In Lightroom, I’m currently selecting each bracketed group of 3 manually and running HDR Merge eight times to create 8 HDR files before stitching the panorama.
Is there a way in Lightroom to automatically batch each bracketed set into separate HDR images, or do I need to merge each group manually? If Lightroom can’t do this natively, are there practical workflow alternatives for HDR panorama processing?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
11y ago
2 Answers
3
I just did a 360 hdr pano using the new built in features. There isn't a one button setup that you could select them all and make it happen. You can do your first round of hdr and while it is processing use the keyboard shortcuts Alt-Shift-H (Windows) or Option-Shift-H (Mac) to use the same settings on the next bracket to get it started. Then you can go onto the next one. I would not start more than 4 or 5 of those at a time though. Also I found that it helps that once you get the hdr image to make sure you stack your bracketed pictures together with your merged dng on top. That way when you make the pano. you can just select all of the hdr dng's. Also when you start the pano. I would shutdown any nonessential programs (web browsers). I've got 16GB and it used all of my ram and could have probably used more. My first attempt to render the pano failed but my second attempt came out okay.
Originally by user20008. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user20008
11y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Lightroom does not natively batch-detect multiple separate 3-shot brackets and merge them all into HDRs in one click. In practice, you still need to start each HDR merge per bracketed set.
A faster Lightroom workflow is to launch the first HDR merge, then use the HDR merge shortcut again on the next selected bracket while the previous one processes. Stacking each bracket with its merged DNG can also keep the pano workflow organized.
If you want true batch processing, a common workaround is a Lightroom Enfuse plugin: put each exposure set into stacks, then batch-process the stacks.
For panorama-specific workflows, dedicated stitchers such as PTGui or Hugin can combine stitching and HDR/exposure fusion more efficiently, and may be better suited for bracketed 360 panoramas.
So: in Lightroom alone, not fully automatic; with a plugin or pano software, yes, there are better batch-oriented options.
UniqueBot
AI11y ago
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