Photographer’s Notes Yep, it’s Seattle again, my hometown. Maybe I’m in a rut. But Seattle’s a great city and I never realized how clean the train station is! I’m happy to show her off.
Last Monday, I had a few hours between two downtown appointments. So I made sure to bring my kit with me and used the time to wander around to see if I bumped into anything I might want to photograph.
The take was pretty good for a change. I got maybe half a dozen that I could have “developed” into Free Study Entry entries. But of these, this one seems to have played to the best reviews. I showed it to my wife and friends and this is the one they mostly seemed to “like” best.
Nobody’s quite sure why they like it, but I hope you do.
Post Processing • Create HDRI from 7 photos (Photomatix)
• Tone Map (Photomatix)
• Boost Contrast (PSCS4 Curves Layer)
• Darken & Mask (PSCS4 Curves Layer)
• Darken Sky (Dodge & Burn Overlay Layer)
• Darken Further (PSCS4 Curves Layer)
• Dodge & Burn (PSCS4 Overlay Layer)
• Boost Building Contrast (PSCS4 Masked Curves Layer)
• Brighten (PSCS4 Curves Layer)
• Boost Contrast (PSCS4 Curves Layer)
• Remove Litter (PSCS4 Clone Layer)
• Desaturate (PSCS4 masked Channel Mixer Layer @ 25%)
• Crop
• Resize
• Sharpen (PSCS4 USM Layer)
• Border (Stroke layer)
• Save for Web (PSCS4 @ 200MB)
Generally Curves Layers were blended in Luminosity mode. The lower left is the brightest part of the image so you eye tends to start there. The channel mixer layer has a gradient mask going from white in the lower left corner to black in the upper right corner. It has the effect of drawing you into the photo by drawing your eye to the color. The leading lines reinforce the lower-left-to-upper-right movement. The strong horizontal line stops your eye and now you can concentrate on the picture-in-the-picture which is the cityscape skyline. This is the most purposefully built image I've entered in some time. Wonder how it will do in the voting?
Camera Data • Date: 9/14/2009
• Camera: Nikon D3
• Lens: Nikon AF Zoom-Nikkor 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G VR @ 32mm
• ISO: 1250
• Aperture: f/10
• Shutter: Various – 7 photos bracketed EV 2/3 f/stops apart
Statistics
Place: 47 out of 400 Avg (all users): 6.3691 Avg (commenters): 7.7143 Avg (participants): 6.3604 Avg (non-participants): 6.3947 Views since voting: 1268 Views during voting: 260 Votes: 149 Comments: 11 Favorites: 4 (view)
Excellent!! My only nit, if you will, is the lack of people on the train platform. I suspect they don't come out this far, though. Excellent comp, clarity, color, etc. Just an all around pleasing shot in my book.
What strikes me the most about this is the cleanliness of the train station. I'm not a real fan of city scapes but this is really neat as it almost looks like an architect's rendering how a newly built train station will enhance the view of the city. Great shot!
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