From Scratch

I went down to CORA today and decided not to buy a regular tripod. They cost more than I expected and I don't know if I want to drag one around everywhere. I bought a cute little table tripod instead that fits nicely in a pocket and does a moderate job of imitating a full-sized one. If I get a lot of low-angle shots in the coming months, you know why. I ripped off the packaging almost as soon as I stepped out of CORA and took a bunch of HDR photos. I have put one together with so-so results. It's going to take some time to get this down. It's fun to play with, though.

I took five pictures of the same tree, each one with a different shutter speed. Here is one of the five photos that I assembled together for my final image:

Here is what they look like, put together with levels and sharpness adjusted:
Here is where I play around to make it what I want:

There are a lot of things that don't look quite right, mainly the purple lining and the blur. The blur can't be helped because it was windy so I was taking a picture of a moving tree. The rest is the result of either not enough experience or not enough perfectionism. You will notice that after the first image we moved out of the realm of photography. I believe this technically falls into the realm of digital art. There is a ton to know, and at this point I'm just starting.