I appreciate the exchange as I'm always interested in opinions on things that once fit nicely in the can (pack?) that somehow now doesn't close properly after some new item is added.

Too green/red ... I agree but the middle is even less satisfying.

I'm reading about what I expected with a lot of varied responses being what I consider to be dead nuts on. (Dead nuts on was once a very technical photographic term don't cha know. ;))

o_p_s - I agree that the HDR gimmick has a certain look. I don't mean to be harsh - gimmick just seems a good descriptive word to me at the moment. I can see a place for it just like the 4 stop range printers wanted and all but one art directors I knew poo-pooed those efforts. I don't know, we all have expectations on what's required and how things should be and people like to push the envelope when they can and that's a fine thing - to a point. Stopping there because all the numbers are within range w/o additional tweaking would be a mistake unless that's the look you want IMO.

Somehow I think that what a fire should look like has become part of our collective DNA by now and won't be changing anytime soon. Then again, anyone seen a friend's TV where the color isn't way over saturated?

Kodachrome went away recently. It was a nasty process chemical wise from what I understood and I always got E-6 processing for free yet I'd shoot Kodachrome on trips until Velvia came along. "... Give us the dre-eeams of Summer ... make all the World a Sunny Day oh ya" BTW - I have a 4x5 Polaroid back in really good condition. Anyone interested?