The photabsorption spectrum of I IV-VI, Ba IV-VI and La V-VII have been recorded using the dual laser pro- duced plasma technique. At lower energies, the barium and lanthanum spectra are dominated by 4d → 5p transitions in the regions 76 - 79 eV and 84 - 94 eV respectively, whereas for iodine the 4d → nf transitions are dominant between 75 - 105 eV. For each spectrum, the transitions were identified with the aid of multiconfigu- ration Hartree-Fock