Since many devices in everyday use – smartphones, tablets, TVs and laptops with OLED displays – can display high dynamic range (HDR) content, it’s worth updating your editing practices so your images look as good as possible when they’re shared. [Article courtesy of Zoner.]
Zoner Photo Studio X makes HDR editing straightforward, revealing the tonal range your display supports and showing how images edited in HDR will look on standard dynamic range (SDR) screens.
Although the latest HDR screens are much brighter and can display a much wider dynamic range than an SDR screen, it’s becoming important to know how to get the best out of your images, regardless of what kind of screen they’re viewed on.
Zoner Photo Studio X is one of the few dedicated image editors that can show you the real dynamic ranges in your images whether they’re edited for viewing on an HDR or SDR display.
Zoner Photo Studio X can be used on both SDR screens (top) and HDR screens (below), where it allows users to see the full editing potential in images.
To see how much dynamic range your screen can display, start by selecting HDR mode and looking at the red section of the line below the histogram, as shown in the screen grab below. This changes the histogram to cover HDR values, adjusting the section of the graph above the red area to show how much of the dynamic range in the image can’t be displayed on the SDR screen.
When you select the HDR display modes (indicated by green arrows) on an SDR screen the histogram (outlined in green) will show you how much of the image’s dynamic range extends into the HDR band (shown by the red line below the graph).
A bright white background will help you to make the most of the full dynamic range when editing images in Zoner Photo Studio X. Set the workspace background to white by selecting the View > Preferences buttons to bring up the adjustment panel, as shown in the screen grab below.
Before making any further adjustments, switch the workspace to HDR mode by clicking on the HDR tab in the Color Style section of the side panel, as shown below. Just below it you’ll find a drop-down menu for matching the rendition of your image to different scenarios.
We’ve selected Landscape for the colour style in the image here.
The White Balance and Exposure panels below the Color Style area provide all the normal exposure adjustments, which can be applied to images, regardless of which type of monitor you’re using. You can make additional adjustments to the dynamic range of HDR images with the HDR whites slider at the bottom of the Dynamic range list, which will also shift the HDR section on the Histogram.
If you’d prefer working with Curves adjustments you’ll find a separate Tone Curve section in the editing panel, as shown in the screen grab above. Note that, although it is divided in two with the SDR section of the left and the HDR section on the right, the adjustments work in the same way as they do in a regular editor.
To see how your edited image will appear on an SDR screen, simply click on the HDR icon in the top toolbar to open the dropdown menu shown in the screen grab above, which provides a list of simulations to choose from. Selecting Display Mode – Forced SDR will set the image to display in HDR mode on compatible devices or in SDR mode if the device doesn’t support HDR.
Clicking on the Show preview tab at the top of the SDR Adjustments section at the base of the Exposure panel switches off the HDR display and makes a separate set of exposure sliders for SDR available, as shown outlined in red in the screen grab below.
Separate adjustments for SDR tonal values allow you to fine-tune images edited in HDR mode for viewing on SDR screens.
The two additional sliders: Lights – clarity and Lights – saturation can help you to bring out details and improve the tonal rendition of highlights in the image so they display better on SDR screens.
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