"Sunrise and sunset are the two most favorable themes for photographers because of its rapidly changing hues and great color saturation. But they are also one of the difficult themes to master in photography.

The difficulty lies on how to get a balanced exposure in a great dynamic range of luminance between the lightest (the sun) and darkest (the foreground) areas of the image. Often times you either get a silhouette against the golden hue horizon or a clear shot of the foreground but an overexposed background.

Thanks to modern technologies, there are many ways to overcome the exposure dilemma in a high contrast environment such as the High Dynamic Range Imaging (HDRI), active D-lighting built in cameras, multiple exposure on the same image, Graduated Neutral Density (GND) filters application and black card photography, etc. Each technique has its pros and cons but that's not the focus of this entry."


"Compared to gradient ND filters [application} and HDRI, black card photography can handle a greater dynamic range of luminance and it can be done without computer software post-editing which usually disqualifies a great photo from a photo contest."


Article in it's entirety ... found here at hanjies.blogspot.com.

Thank you, that is very interesting. I have sent the link to my sister. Part of me wonders if there is genuinely any physical difference between such techniques and post-processing? Though I can imagine it feels good to get something that comes straight out of the camera looking so good.