There will be times when you want or need to use environmental lighting (rather than Blender light source), and therefore will need an HDR image. Many scene type HDR images can be found online, but there may be times when you want an image of a specific scene.
Typically this would be achieved by taking a series of photos where the camera is rotated (ideally) around the the central node of the lens. These images would be stitched together to create a 360 panorama. This option isn't always available.
Another simple approach that would give you a 180 degree solution is to use a mirror ball (or christmas ornament), and do some manipulation. This entry will show how to convert a mirror ball image into a rectangular background which could be used in blender for lighting, such as Cylinder Lighting, or HDRI Lighting.
So first we start out with a mirror ball-like image.
The program of choice is to use HDR Shop, which can be found here: http://www.hdrshop.com/
Load the image in this program, and it should look something like below.
Next, open the Panoramic Transformations dialog.
Apply these changes and hit OK.
Next, open the same dialog, and now apply the following changes, and hit OK.
Now the image should be nicely unwrapped to a 180 degree pano of the scene.
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