Monochrome Skyscape

Any thoughts on this? Old picture I've recently modified in CS2

Thanks very much for your input

Great shot,

 

really like the composition and the lighting is great!

 

Very strong use of silouhette, and a great sky behind it

 

Jon

grate silouette! 5/6

i like it!! very dramtic feeling! like a storm is coming...

I like the shapes in this photo. You might crop the right side a little. Where is this?

The photo was taken in Cambridge, UK. I believe it's the gatehouse into Kings College (allthough I'm not 100% sure).

 

I'm inclined to agree with your idea about cropping the far right, maybe I should bring the right hand edge over such that it aligns with the rightmost of the small turrets. Thanks for your interest and advice.

excellent photo.great tones and nicely composed.great perspective and angle.

skyscape of doom

great mood

Excelent shot, ambient, light and composition are great. Congratulations

Regard from Uruguay

It makes a very striking shot. It would be interesting to see the original and compare what you have done.

 

Was the original a silhouette? Did you add the sky?

Thank you for your interest in this and several of my other photographs. I'll try my best to answer your questions. The original JPEG featured the spectacular cloud formation; it was a bit of grab shot (full automatic etc) taken early in the evening while there was a storm brewing. My camera struggled to cope with the dynamic range within the scene and produced a pretty unimpressive exposure where the buildings were hopelessly underexposed. I originally abandoned the photo but discovered with a bit of post processing (mostly contrast curves) I could reduce the details in the gatehouse and make the entire image into a silhouette.

 

I've attached the original JPEG from my S3000 to show you what I had to work with. Thanks again for your interest, Robert.

It was a very good idea to eliminate detail in the buildings--we gain so much from the rhythm of the towers, which I think are flamboyant Gothic, and their juxtaposition with the cloudscape. It keeps our attention where it belongs.

Here the juxtaposition is the critical thing. The climactic element in the towers, the tallest one, is losing its contour in the dark clouds above it, and the climactic element in the clouds, the highlight, drifts off to the side of your picture. This didn't bother you enough to stumble around out there getting more grab shots, and it may not bother you enough to spend some more time massaging your tonal values in Photoshop; but whatever you do decide to get hypercritical about and fuss with, that's really the whole enjoyment, isn't it?

I keep puzzling over the layout of the buildings, and that jog in the roofline at left that gives this shot so much depth. Thank you for depriving us and leaving us in mystery.