La Tour Eiffel (The Eiffel Tower) From One Window (View Six)

This is the sixth in an occasional series of how the Eiffel Tower

looks in its many aspects (views) as seen from one particular window

(see the rest of the folder for great variety from the same

window). Your ratings and critiques are invited and most welcome.

If you rate harshly or very critically, please submit a helpful and

constructive comment; Please share your superior photographic

knowledge to help improve my photography. Thanks! Enjoy! John

 

(It helps to view this photo in maximum enlargement)

This photo was 'underexposed by two stops',and it showed perfectly (as above) in the camera's digital monitor, but nearly black on the thumbnail.

 

Shadow/highlight filter in Photoshop, judiciously applied to the photo affected the shadow/dark areas and restored it to the same as it appeared on the camera back.

 

This is NOT how it appeared to the bystander -- the scene was MUCH brighter.

 

Therein lies the lesson -- underexposure tends to bring out the clouds, make them brooding and if the foreground will withstand the underexposure (and it makes sense photographically) it can make for an interesting exposure (no split frame Neutral Density filters required, or their equivalent in the digital darkroom).

 

Shadow/highlight filter in Photoshop, combined with deliberate underexposure seems to have added a new 'trick' to the photographer's grab bag, I think; and since it is only a 'brightness' adjustment, it does not count as a 'manipulation.'

 

John (Crosley)

...but for A0 and bigger size. Underexposure did a great job along with the wide angle here...The larger view the better :-) Small view really doesnt do it justice :-) Great feelings it gets, and nice atmosphere...almost weird! (btw IMO by far the most moody shot) Great work!

Yes, I hadn't thought of it, but this really ought to be presented on a transparency and backlit there (not paper).

 

It ought to be shown on a bus stop or something or on an overhead with tubes of light behind it.

 

Yes, it's extremely moody.

 

I found out about underexposing two years ago when I was shooting the Oregon Coast in broad sunlight -- way too sunny for my taste, full of blues. I was pointing south, in summer, toward the sun, along the sea and rocks, and just started to bracket downward with a 80~200 and soon as I got to the edge of visibility, the traces of sea air and moisture began to appear in the frame, blowing over the rocks and the color began to desaturate (it's still in my 'Black and White From Then to Now' Folder, and you might want to have a look. It was a perfectly ordinary, even 'blown' scene, until I went 'manual' and started to 'stop down'. It's a good trick from a photographer's grab bag.

 

It helped that the piping in the foreground tends to accent (surround) the subject and bring it out) and the gravel rooftop tends to disappear just as the brackets that hold the piping (duct work I presume) tends to disappear.

 

I was at Paris Photo (Exposition) and this is the sort of work that would have been exhibited there, I think, and very large.

 

I try to think I'm versatile -- just look at my next post (actually taken just previously).

 

Thanks for a valuable hint and observation (about back lighting) and for the compliment.

 

John (Crosley)

Great perspective. I like the stormy look of the sky.

One would hardly know the subject is the Eiffel Tower, if I didn't say so, but it is; there's a whole folder (small) devoted to different views from the same window.

 

Why not look at all of them for a look on how you can create variety from one fixed viewpoint -- all with a choice of lenses and/or zooms.

 

Thanks for the comment.

 

John

This is, I think, the most effective of your Eiffel Tower views with the tower seen in distant silhouette, the amorphous shapes of the pipes in the foreground and the buildings and the brooding sky almost like a stage set, Very nice shot.

I happen to agree, although others, with searchlights, may be more dramatic and easier to view in thumbnail.

 

I also note that the few who've commented have been PN members, a sign that the photo is highly original and/or has some other merit.

 

After the other photos, it was hard to think of some other way to depict this landmark well FROM THE SAME WINDOW, SAME BUILDING, but I think you will agree that I have succeeded (and in aces).

 

Frankly when I started stopping down (and also changing the color temperature from Auto to tungsten to fluorescent, as well), I was greatly surprised, but it was only the stopping down that succeeded.

 

My advice to anyone who wants to make a sky dramatic which is merely overcast is greatly to stop it down. By the way, this is a midday shot, and the skies were foreboding but not nearly so thundershowerish as it appears here, though it was raining on and off. (In other photos, the coloration was obtained by 'setting' the color temperature from one to the other, but I'd have -- at this time -- to go and point my camera at the Tower to remember which it was -- or perhaps any night sky.

 

Photographers forget that they can achieve the effect of color filtration by simply changing color temperatures, and the D200 has presets as well as fixed temperatures Kelvin, so the possibility is quite impressive.

 

I am not sure, but this may be the last of the series. (and it does not show well on thumbnail, since expansive views seldom show well on thumbnail -- it's a hazard of showing things in the thumbnail medium which lends itself to more simple subjects.

 

Thanks for a thoughtful comment and for taking the time to view my whole folder on Eiffel Tower shots.

 

John (Crosley)

In response to a comment: This is a no-post-processing shot. There are no 'filters, masks, levels (as such), or other 'techniques' -- not even 'selecting' any area for special treatment, which may not even qualify as post-processing at all, just as dodging and burning probably wouldn't qualify as post-processing in my book, since they just selectively allow one to lessen or enhance the contrast/and/or/brightness.

 

The only technique here was to frame the photo and then underexpose it about 2 stops using Easy Exposure with Nikon's D2Xs, and then, with the thumbnail to use shadow/highlight filter to raise the levels just a little bit (not very much, even), to match what the screen showed on the back of the camera (not what the thumbnail showed on my computer screen, as it showed almost black on my computer screen, using the 'Windows XP' basic browser program, not an Adobe program or anything more complex -- a good argument for using an Adobe or other browser rather than anything Microsoft puts out.

 

I do know it looks post-processed, but those who know my work, know I seldom indulge in that sort of thing; there are just too many photos to take to spend hours trying to make something nice when maybe around the next street corner is a masterpiece waiting to be taken that will go wanting because I was too busy with Adobe Photoshop trying to play with a photo that was good and was trying to 'make it better'.

 

If a photo's 'got it', whether or not it's got 'post processing' or not, that 'something' will shine through, and the post-processors, can have their day. If I ever publish, then the publishers can hire a post-processor to 'clean up' my images and make them 'perfect' -- e.g., iron out any little imperfections that might detract, but otherwise keep them as they are.

 

John (Crosley)

I like this photo John, has an ominous feel to it. Foreground is a nice mix with the clouds. Eiffel Tower tops off the detail.

 

cg

I stopped down several stops to get this ominous feel -- I exposed for the clouds and the highlights on this HVAC (heating, ventilation, air condition) ductwork atop a section of a hotel in which I was staying (photo taken from window near elevators of a second section, higher by one and two stories.)

 

In reality it was quite bright daylight outdoors, but still quite overcast (see above), and this photo is the triumph of skill and technique over the 'reality' of depicting the scene as a point-and-shoot would have depicted it (you wouldn't look twice at such a P&S capture).

 

There' a reason for (1) reading the camera manual and (2) learning how (and when) to make those darn camera/lens adjustments.

 

John (Crosley)

 

;~)

 

 

I really like your picture. I would avoid all the comments about yourself though... it makes it a little boring. Good job!

Thanks for the kind comment about the photo.

When I joined Photo.net just over six years ago, almost no one would explain how they got a good to great photo; they would show the photo, but explanations were entirely opaque.

So what you seem to say is 'personal' really here seems to be relating to the 'how' ' of taking such a photo, and I have a wheelbarrow full of comments by e-mail and posted comments thanking me for such sharing.

I vowed to make the opaque transparent and have been well rewarded for that, so I hope you'll excuse what you regard as 'personal' in favor of those who need and wish help in achieving such results.

Also, far too many photos on this site are heavily photoshopped to get such effects -- this one decidedly is not, and for that alone it's a triumph -- and worth sharing with members how to achieve such an effect withou spending lots of time in the 'digital darkroom'.

Thanks again.

John (Crosley)