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!!Con 2017: HDR Photography in Microsoft Excel?! by Kevin Chen

Confreaks · talk · Watch on YouTube

Software (other)Visual arts, photography & architectureComputer vision, speech & NLP

What it is

A short conference talk from !!Con 2017 in which Kevin Chen explains the HDR imaging algorithm from a foundational paper, framing it as a system of linear equations, and implements it in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. No prior image processing knowledge is needed.

Why Hacker News recommends it

HN commenters recommend it as a fun, short talk that shows how HDR photography actually works through an absurdly playful implementation.

  • 4 people recommended it
  • 4 different months
  • 2 strong recommendations
  • first 2017, last 2025

What HN commenters said

  1. “My favorite talk from this year was about implementing an algorithm for HDR photography purely in Microsoft Excel”

    Talk implementing HDR photography algorithm purely in Excel

    levthedev, 2017-08 · Strong recommendation · in “Employer gave me a conference budget for next year. Can I get suggestions?”

  2. “It's short and fun, I recommend it to all HN readers.”

    Short, fun explanation of HDR photography.

    asafira, 2025-05 · Strong recommendation · in “What is HDR, anyway?”

  3. “Included in a list of favorite 2017 talks”

    floatboth, 2018-01 · Recommendation · in “Ask HN: What’s your favorite talk from 2017?”

  4. “things like this are a really interesting way to show how things like HDR photography actually work”

    Shows how HDR photography works by implementing it in Excel.

    Mister_Snuggles, 2019-06 · Recommendation · in “3D engine on MS Excel without VBA (2018) [video]”

Excerpts from Hacker News comments, linked to the originals. Summaries and labels were written by a language model from those comments.

Topics: hdr, excel, image processing, linear equations, !!con

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