New Raw HDR Capture Mode

We’re excited to announce that Lightroom Mobile now has a new raw HDR capture mode that lets you achieve a dynamic range on your mobile device that was previously only possible shooting with an DSLR or mirrorless camera.

This new HDR mode harnesses the power available in the latest mobile hardware on both Android and iOS. These updates, version 2.7 for iOS and version 2.3 for Android, were released today and make the HDR mode available for free. The updates for both Android and iOS can be downloaded by tapping here.

The new HDR mode works by automatically scanning the scene to determine the correct exposure range and then capturing three DNG files which are then automatically aligned, merged, deghosted, and tonemapped in the app. You get a 16-bit floating point DNG, with all of the benefits of both an HDR and a raw photo, which is processed by the same algorithms with the same quality as the HDR technology built into Adobe Camera Raw and Lightroom.

Previously, capturing an image in HDR either meant using a DSLR or mirrorless camera, capturing multiple exposures, copying to your computer, and then merging in an application like Photoshop, Adobe Camera Raw, or Lightroom. Alternatively, you could capture an HDR JPEG on your phone, though those images normally used only two shots and often failed to capture the full range of tonality in difficult lighting scenarios. By capturing three raw shots and merging on the phone, you get a greatly increased dynamic range with the ability to edit and share right away. Creative Cloud members get the additional benefit of automatically syncing with their desktop, ensuring that the photo, plus all of the edits that were made to the photo, are backed up and available in the desktop version of Lightroom.

Our very own Russell Preston Brown has created a great tutorial for using this new HDR capture mode within Lightroom Mobile, check it out!

HDR Processing & Supported Devices

When we started working on HDR for Lightroom Mobile, we realized that adding desktop-caliber, pro-quality processing algorithms to mobile devices is no easy task. Our team was able to make some pretty amazing breakthroughs that eventually made it possible.

For iOS users, the HDR mode requires a device that can capture in DNG, such as an iPhone 6s, 6s Plus, 7, 7 Plus, iPhone SE, or iPad Pro 9.7″.

For Android users, at this point only the Samsung S7, S7 Edge, Google Pixel, and Pixel XL are supported. So that we’d adhere to our stringent quality and reliability requirements, our primary goal was to ensure the stability of the app while enabling the algorithms to provide the highest possible quality. Thanks to the processing and memory available on the Samsung S7 and Google Pixel devices, we were able to achieve the quality and capabilities required by these incredibly powerful algorithms. The team is working hard to support additional devices as quickly as possible.

Other features in these releases

In addition to the new raw HDR capture mode, iOS and Android users get the following new features:

iOS

Export Original, enabling you to export the original files, including DNGs captured in the camera as well as raw files imported through Lightroom Mobile and Lightroom web (Lightroom Desktop does not upload originals to the server):

Gestures to rate and review in the Rate & Review mode, greatly speeding up your review process:

New Force Touch and Notification Center widget, making it even easier and faster to launch Lightroom’s camera:

As well as a new option available in settings, Prevent From Sleep, which will keep the screen from locking as long as the phone is plugged into power, improved synchronization stability and speed, and general bug fixes, performance enhancements, and UI tweaks.

Android

For Android Creative Cloud members, the Radial and Linear Selection tools are now available:

As well as general bug fixes and speed improvements.