of the incidental statuary in the City of London, this is one of the best executed faces. I feel that he's looking at me, that he's saying: 'this is my burden, so what is so tough about yours?'.
The City of London - that's the 'square mile', rather than the entire urban agglomeration, is a wonderful place on a Saturday afternoon: quiet, near-deserted, as all the banks, financial institutions and ancilliary businesses are closed. But the city is full of extraordinary details - and here's one for you, I believe over a doorway on an old branch of Lloyd's Bank. I can recommend this trip to anyone visiting London - so much more interesting that some of the tourist traps: just wander, let your eyes guide you, and remember to look up; it's such a compact area that even if you do get lost, it'll be no time before you find a tube station or something.
Compositional note: the primary strength of this image comes from the use of repeating elements. The two sets of scroll work, the growing lines of the pedastal on which Atlas sits, the repeating and growing curves of the arch and the shadow. Of course, light is important, despite the vast quantitly of dodging and burning that's one on here: perhaps should be mentioned that this is not by use of the brushes, but by selecting areas of the image with a feathering of anything from 8 to 200 pixels. Using the brightness/contrast controls on those areas allow one to brighten without disturbing the sense of continuity through the image - basically, the more one brightens the more one has to increase contrast. And then there's those areas outside the grainy stone-work, where things are I think darkened too far: but I'm kind of working on the basis that as I don't like the extreme dodging and burning of some shots, maybe others will like what I don't here.
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Excellent shot! I love the feel of the stone in the image. The thing that makes this one so nice is the point of view. How often do any of us look up? Well cropped and though out! 10
A very nice photo but I would like to give more points if this had specific meaning to this building. In other words, is this figure symbolic of something? If there are any impotant details I would have liked to see them in the title somehow. Otherwise, I see this simply as a male figure with a globe(?) on his back. Might be Atlas but I cannot tell.
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