I've been meaning to try HDR photography out for ages so while there was some sun I went out into the garden. If you don't know what HDR is then look here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_dynamic_range_imaging Basically it's taking several shots of the same thing at various exposures and combining them to for one image. Here is what the photo would have looked like as one shot taken on auto
4 more shots were taken, at +1 +2 -1 -2 stops
the images were then fed into Photomatix Pro 3.1 (free demo version available here
http://www.hdrsoft.com/ )
this is the resulting image
you can see the increase in detail in the highlights and shadows where the software has taken the detail from each exposure and and combined them
now to find a better subject I think