topic Re: Methods of exposure bracketing in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

Methods of exposure bracketing

stevet1 — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 20:24:44 GMT

There has been some discussion of Auto Exposure Bracketing recently,and it got my curiosity aroused.

There are a couple of ways of doing exposure bracketing; two of them are in-camera, and one involves HDR post processing

I have a T8i and one of the Special Scene Basic Modes in my camera is called HDR Backlight Control. The camera takes three quick shots in succession, and brackets them as a jpg.

One of my Creative Filters Modes is called HDR and you have several options: Standard, Vivid, Bold, and Embossed. In these scenarios, the camera again takes three quick shots in succession and brackets them as a jpg.

The third option is to take three shots in a Creative Mode like Manual, or Av, or Tv, etc. in three exposures: one standard, one under exposed, and one over exposed and do an HDR Compisite in post processing.

Just out of cutiosity, I decided to compare these three methods.

The first picture is an in-camera Special Scene HDR Backlight Control jpg

The second picture is an in-camera Creative Filter HDR Standard jpg.

The third picture is a post-processed HDR Composite RAW, composited in DPP4 and converted to jpg.

I tried to include some elements that were bright and some elements that were dark to give some veracity to the bracketing process. In the third picture, (the three RAW shots) the exposures were one stop apart.

What do you think?

(I personally think pictures 1 and 3 are more true to life and the HDR Backlight Control (#1) is a little darker than the post-processed HDR (#3).

Steve Thomas

Re: Methods of exposure bracketing

Waddizzle — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 21:31:02 GMT

Hard to critically analyze the images, which appear to be a screenshot. I prefer #3.

Re: Methods of exposure bracketing

johnrmoyer — Sat, 20 Jun 2026 01:44:31 GMT

I also prefer number 3

Re: Methods of exposure bracketing

stevet1 — Sat, 20 Jun 2026 03:22:32 GMT

On a side note, I discovered something when taking the post processing approach.

If you leave your camera in single shot mode, you have to press your shutter three times; once for each exposure, but if you set a 2 second time delay, the camera will take those shots for you in less than a second. It's like Bam, Bam, Bam almost instantaneously. I think it's faster than a slow burst mode of 3 shots per second. (At least that was my impression.)

Handheld, there is less of a possibility of camera shake between shots with this approach.

At least that's the way it is working on my camera.

Steve Thomas

Re: Methods of exposure bracketing

stevet1 — Sat, 20 Jun 2026 03:33:05 GMT

Waddizzle,

It's not a screenshot, it's a saved file. Like you and John, i prefer the three exposures merged in DPP4 (#3).

I didn't want to say anything, so as not to prejudice anyone's thinking.

Steve Thomas