"Robert McGregor" <rob### [at] mcgregorfineartcom> wrote:

>
> I have a 5 inch chrome sphere that I use for that very purpose (plus it looks
> cool on my desk when not in use). Mount your camera on a tripod and take a set
> of bracketed shots, then rotate the tripod ~90 degrees around the sphere and
> take another set of bracketed shots. After you've combined the two bracketed
> imagesets into 2 HDRs you can merge these offset images to eliminate the
> camera/tripod completely from the final shot. Of course, Ive's IC is very useful
> here:
>
> http://www.lilysoft.org/IC/ic_index.htm
>

So the 90-degree image is simply to get a clean area to 'replace' the
camera-plus-photographer in the original straight-on image? That makes perfect
sense. Here's a question, though: Is the *final* light probe ultimately made
from BOTH of those images? (Meaning: Is the 'corrected' straight-on image
somehow combined WITH the (similarly-corrected) 90-degree image to get a light
probe that has MORE environment imagery in it? Or is only the straight-on image
used?)

There's also something *mysterious* about light probes that I still have trouble
grasping: In my research into the subject, several sources stated that the
mirrored ball actually gathers environment imagery from BEHIND itself-- in the
spatial hemisphere out of view of the camera(!)-- implying that the very edges
of the ball pick up the 'hidden' back-side environment. Is that true (or even
possible?)

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