Why HDR (sometimes) sucks

I cannot believe this my first post about a technical fotography aspect in 3 years.
For some time now, I see there a lot of these HDR pictures on the web like on flickr for instance.
I am sure most of you know how these High Dynamic Range images are made and how they look. In case you don’t, here’s a short introduction:
At first you take several pictures of the same motive but with different “exposure” settings.

Then you transfer your pictures to your computer. The rendering software then produces a high dynamic range image.

As you can see, in this example (taken from the English Wikipedia) the results can be stunning. Especially when the lighting makes good results almost impossible.

OK, but there are MAAAANY “bad” examples…

or
Don’t get me wrong. There are some really nice and impressive HDR images out there but lately I’ve mostly seen pictures like the two examples above. Let’s hope some people stop exaggerating 😉

size doesn’t matter? – think again

I was really suprised when I saw these two videos earlier today. There are people out there who aren’t just building RC planes. Nope, they create BIG RC planes.

First of all comes a F-14A Tomcat

Here’s a little background information:

Built out of kevlar and carbon fiber, this miniature figher jet can reach speeds upwards of 280 M.P.H. The models use small jet turbines, functionally identical to those used in actual full-sized jets to achieve remarkable speeds and flying precision.

and a WWII plane.

new cellphone on the screen :D

Because my old Nokia 9500 communicator had reached a critical level of “hull breaches” it was time to change my old busted cellphone with a shiny new one.
My weapon of choice was the S730 by Taiwanese manufacturer HTC. Germany is right now no big fan of cellphones produced by Nokia because they are planing to close a site in Bochum/Germany, firing their 2300 employees (more infos here) and I also didn’t choose the successor of the 9500 the E90 because for 2 reasons: a way to big formfactor and the price of 800Eur…
So I am now proud owner of a Windows Mobile 6 cellphone but one thing still bugs me: Seems like there is no support for east asian fonts so far. Aaaaaaaaahhhhhh…. 😥

New country, new cellphone

Because sending SMS home is very expensive, I bought a new (second) cellphone in China.
‘My weapon of choice’ was a Nokia 2630 with China Unicom SIM-card. 150Yuan (15Eur) were included and the total price was ca. 80Eur.
Nice side effect: SMS to Germany only cost 1Yuan (10 Cent) BUT it only works in Beijing… 😦
So I need a new SIM when I’m heading for Shanghai tomorrow… Tamade (Shit)

PS: Of course you can switch between Chinese and English language on your cellphone 😉