On July 5th, I visited the Pennsylvania State Capitol in Harrisburg. To my disappointment, the doors to the House of Representatives chamber were locked. So, I joined the tour as my only way to gain access to the room.

When I first entered the chamber, I was overwhelmed! I quickly moved to the center of the balcony, set up my tripod and began shooting. I can set up my tripod in less the 15 seconds now!

Since the room was dark, this photograph required very long exposures (up to 30 seconds). I wanted to bracket my exposures using five separate images so that I could later blend them during post processing to retain more detail in the highlight and shadow areas of the frame. The tour guide had just enough patience to allow me to get through the five exposures.

Here was my initial capture (with the upper chandeliers outlined in purple):

House of Representatives chamber Note how with this single exposure, the highlights surrounding the lower lights are completely blown out (void of any detail). Also note how the upper chandeliers (outlined in purple) are not lit.

My first goal was to bring back more detail in the lower chandeliers. I accomplished that by utilizing additional frames with less exposure than this one. By blending those other exposures into this one (using HDR Efex Pro software), far more information becomes visible near those lower lamps. In the image below, you can now see the individual globes that make up each lamp.

Dealing with the unlit upper chandeliers is another challenge. I asked the tour guide if the chandeliers could temporarily be lit. I had success at other venues with such requests, so I thought I would give it a try! She explained that the upper chandeliers require very specialized and expensive bulbs, so those lights are always turned off unless the House is in session. She went on to explain that photography is prohibited when the House is in session, so basically the photograph that I was seeking is impossible!

So, I brought the blended image into Photoshop, selected a white brush, zoomed in on the chandeliers, and began painting each bulb with that white brush. Eventually, I turned all the lights on!

House of Representatives chamber