Dynamic range gets tossed around every time a new camera launches, usually framed as a make-or-break spec. You’re told more stops equal better images, but that claim deserves a harder look.
Coming to you from Adorama, this straightforward video with David Bergman tackles the idea head-on. He explains dynamic range in plain terms: it’s the span between the brightest highlight and the darkest shadow a camera can capture in a single frame while still holding detail. When highlights clip, they turn pure white. When shadows collapse, they go black. You’re working within that space every time you set shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. In high-contrast scenes like a bright sky over dark buildings, you can’t always keep both ends intact, so you choose which one matters more.
Bergman pushes you to think about that choice instead of chasing specs. If the subject is on the ground, expose for it and let the sky go. If the sky is the story, protect it and allow the foreground to fall dark. That decision shapes the mood of the image. More dynamic range promises fewer compromises, but it can also tempt you to avoid making a call. You start trying to save everything. Images with every shadow lifted and every highlight tamed can look flat. Depth often comes from contrast, not from squeezing detail out of every corner.
He also digs into file formats, which changes the equation fast. If you’re shooting JPEG, you’re locking in an 8-bit processed file with limited room to recover blown highlights or crushed shadows. Once detail is gone, it’s gone. With raw files, more tonal information is stored, even if the preview and histogram suggest otherwise. That extra data gives you latitude in post, often enough that bracketing isn’t needed. Bracketing and HDR can extend dynamic range further, but they add time, alignment issues, and problems with moving subjects.
There’s another layer here that doesn’t show up on spec sheets. Dynamic range shifts with ISO. Most cameras perform best at base ISO, and the range narrows as you crank it up. Sensor design and processing play roles, and measurements vary depending on the testing method. You can get lost in charts and comparisons. Bergman’s point is simpler. Most weak images don’t fail because the camera couldn’t recover enough shadow detail. They fail because the light was dull, flat, or coming from the wrong direction. Or the subject blended into the background with no separation.
He brings up examples where extra range helps, like a white wedding dress next to dark suits or an interior with bright windows. In those cases, more flexibility makes life easier. Still, he reminds you that iconic images were made on films like Kodachrome 64, which offered less dynamic range than modern digital sensors. Those images worked because the light was strong and the composition was intentional. Constraints forced better decisions.
You’ll get more from this video than a definition. Bergman challenges how you think about exposure, recovery, and the habit of “fixing it later.” That mindset shapes how you shoot in the field, not just how you edit at home. Check out the video above for the full rundown.
9 Comments
“When photographers say they want more dynamic range it’s because they want the camera to capture both ideas at once so they don’t have to make that decision” - This is absurd of a comment. In fact that’s the way the average person did it using negative film and that included many pros who never touched positive film.
The real point is: how does more dynamic range hurt? Because it doesn’t and never has, never will. In fact no one purely buys a camera based on dynamic range alone. This guy knows that but nitpick on something that is not a problem.
Now with positive film, you had much less dynamic range. That’s why most people stayed away from it. You used it with a specific purpose, never to limit the dynamic range. So yes you did not have the flexibility you wanted and they were keepers and trash, unusable, but never by choice ever with the proper exposure. If this guy ever printer or drum scanned for clients (for self is different, the liability is not the same) he would know that.
More dynamic range isn’t about fixing in post, it’s about more range available. With film, negative or positive, there was always someone fine tuning a print or scan for the best outcome possible, it’s jus that most people never realized it. That video tip on dynamic range is terribly awful and misses on separating need from availability. And that’s what’s weird, because it wants to in part of the video, yet the title “Is Dynamic Range Overrated?” conflicts with it. Click bait in my books.
I don't think the point of the video is whether additional dynamic range hurts. Of course it doesn't hurt. The point is that it most likely doesn't help much, if at all. Of course that too is a relative comparison. I valued the increase in dynamic range from my first Olympus digital camera in 2003 to my Nikon D800E. But my D800E with reportedly about 14.4 dynamic range is virtually the same as newer mirrorless models, Z8 and Z9. The highest dynamic range on the market appears to be the Fujifilm GFX 100 II at about 15. The question is whether that additional amount of dynamic range is worth having. Naturally it can't hurt. But I'm skeptical that it would have practical advantages.
The point Mr. Bergman makes is that dynamic range doesn't turn a bad image into a good one. A super high contrast landscape image most likely is still a bad image. I agree. That may not be true for everyone, but I simply don't take the camera out of the bag on those occasions. I prefer subtle transitions of tone... images that fit well within the histogram. If it doesn't fit, I might wait until the light is more diffused. Or go read a book. And for those images where small areas of bushes or trees go black, I'm perfectly fine with that. In black and white photography, total black is not necessarily bad. Capturing both ends of more shadow and highlight detail would not change anything for me. So I can appreciate that in many situations, dynamic range can be considered over rated. But, as in many cases, it also depends on the needs of the photographer.
Yes, that's my point, the argument does not have enough weight to make an article about it. People buy cameras with specifics in mind like dpi, frame rate, cost, just name it. DI is not something you can pick or alter. It's baked in. There is no debating in the first place.
I mean, David Bergman is one of the most accomplished photographers I personally know. He most certainly has scanned film with a drum scanner. He has taken one of the most viewed photos of Obama, has at least one Sport Illustrated Super Bowl covers, and has been Bon Jovi and Luke Combs personal photographer for a decade each. He's the real deal.
The question I wonder is who really needs more than 14 stops of dynamic range? I've yet to meet a full time, professional photographer whose work actually requires this on a regular basis. As David says at 7:45 in the video, displaying too much dynamic range is almost always a bad thing and the photos look awful.
I am not judging his notoriety, this has simply no relevance to me. Content is where I value an article. And I am not saying that we need 25stops of dynamic range. Instead, I am saying pick a camera for your style because you don’t have DI option anyway. That could have been the entire article because it does not discriminate or influence the personal intention, yet explains the entire irrelevance of the debate.
Now, you are suggesting that I accept the article based on his novelty. No I haven’t shot a Sport Illustrated Super Bowl cover, but for someone who doesn’t care for football, I can’t say that I been exposed to one either. I probably saw one of his Obama photos, but his name didn’t click with me. At the same time, I’ve had food photography reproduced in millions of copies on cans, boxes and what I shoot now is sold on many extremely popular retailer sites. Does that make my opinion not valid simply because I have no interest in notoriety? Am I less knowledgeable?
So, Is Dynamic Range Overrated? No, it’s not, but the options are strictly defined by the camera model. That’s not negotiable. Now sports photography are situation dependent, not controlled environment. So, no, in concert and games you have to go for the shot not the dynamic range. In fact sports events are where you will find the most practical use of jpg capture vs RAW because of time constraints. So clearly DI is extremely accessory in that type of situation where capturing the action is the main goal. In film days, studio photographers who really knew their stuff and understood printing press process would often under expose their sheets of 4x5 or 8x10, shoot 3-5 copies with the same exact exposure and have them pushed (E6) one at a time with different timing. If they reach their goal early, the rest was not processed. This was extremely intentional with the intent of keeping the values they choose would hold on a drum scanner by operators they trusted. And that’s where the issue is. Who is to tell someone that something is overrated, because then it becomes quickly social acceptation, not personal decision. And that’s why I really appreciate young people being intrigued by film photography, because they see value in the process, not the this guy has notoriety, he must be right. I mean I see this frequently, an article says 5 things you shouldn’t do, and then two days later another article by someone else says 5 things you should do. They are a necessarily presented the same way, but really they describe the exact opposite perspective on one specific topic.
Notoriety is not authority and saying that photographers “want DI to capture both ends at once” is an extremely exaggerated opinion. The reality is that people are looking for more edge within their exposure decision. But if you agree with him, that’s fine, I just don’t. Words do count and matter, that’s my view on it.
Overall, I think your site is still the best when it comes to creativity and expression, but at time some articles are way too commercial I feel. This one to me screams - look at this problem you actually don’t have and check the ad in the middle of it too.
Spoken by a representative of a retail photography sales company trying to sell more cameras, including lower cost products, in a shrinking market. Dynamic range is a good benchmark in comparing overall performance of specific camera models if one is looking for overall capability and versatility, particulalry if shooting raw files. If you only shoot jpegs, dyanmic range is not as important. But then you're probably only using a mid-lower range camera or a mobile phone.
To this day I still can't completely wrap my head around the idea that Jpeg can't display enough dynamic range. I understand if you SHOOT/Capture in jpeg, then yes you are limited by the detail baked into the file, but if you shoot in Raw and your output is THEN jpeg like almost every file these days, can't the jpeg still hold all the dynamic range in the processed image?
For example, if you shoot a super high dynamic range image, like David's photo of the buildings in Central Park from the video, and then pull the highlight slider all the way down, and the shadow slider all the way up so the most amount of detail is shown on your screen, and then save that image as a jpeg, won't that jpeg still be able to reproduce the majority of the detail in the scene? Let's go even further, what if you raw processor could pull those sliders to even more extremes (or you bracket stacked the exact same file processed twice), you would wind up with SO much detail.
Will it look god awful? Yes! And that's the issue I have with needing more DR as David says at 7:45. Once too much dynamic range is displaying in a final image (raw, jpeg, tiff, rgb screen, whatever), the human brain stops viewing it as normal and even acceptable. It's why all those tvs at Costco look so insane.
Can someone explain this to me in a way I can understand it?
Yes, the final JPEG that end users see can hold the full SDR range, but only at 8-bit resolution, meaning 256 steps per RGB channel. That's perfectly fine for the final rendering of most photos for most use cases. If you want to tweak the image further, it may not be enough.
If you know audio, think of JPEG as a CD compressed to MP3. To most people for most purposes, a high quality 44.1KHz 16-bit MP3 is indistinguishable from a much higher original, but if you'd put that as input to an effect processing chain simulating tube amps, reverbs and analog compressors, the output will most likely sound awful. Which is why audio is often recorded at 96KHz with 24 or 32 bits and the FX chain is working internally at 64 bits, but rendering the output at 44.1KHz 16-bit is dynamic enough range and resolution for what ears can hear and compressing that with MP3 will not make it sound any different to most people's ears and brains.
I fully agree that too much squishing of dynamic range into SDR makes photos look unnatural and awful. It's good to be able to save some under- or overexposed shots by digitally raising the whole exposure, though. A large dynamic range also brings more data to things like denoising algorithms, enabling them to be more effective.
So, dynamic range is good to have during postprocessing when you tweak curves and add effects, but JPEG is (usually) fine for the final photo that other people will see.
Absolutely, 100% DR is over-rated. The dynamic range of any modern digital camera is beyond slide film, negative film and even N-2 developed B&W. It’s the kind of thing pedantic pixel-peepers go on about. I shoot backlit on bright sunny days with blankets of snow, so I am well aware of the limits of DR — it has NEVER blind-sided me and I’m shooting with an Olympus / OM System OM-1. Worst case scenario, I use +/- 2 or /- 3 HDR blending of raw files. It’s a no-brainer!