The Trajan Fountain

[FrankMi]

In the second largest city of ancient Rome, Ephesus, the Fountain of Trajan was built to the north side of Curetes Street. In the 2nd century AD and it was dedicated to the emperor Trajan. The pool of the fountain had been adorned with statues of Aphrodite, Dionysus, Satyr and the family of the Emperor. There were also columns surrounding it.

A colossal statue of Trajan had been placed over the pool. The water was flowing from the pedestal of Trajan’s statue to the fountain. Nowadays, only the feet of that statue have survived as well as a part of its facade which had been adorned with Corinthian order columns.

[Donald]

Again, am mightily impressed how you have handled the contrast in brightness and shadow and got the exposure across the whole image just so spot-on. High quality work.

[FrankMi]

Thanks again, Donald. You always find the nicest constructive things to say about the images posted at CiC and that is appreciated.

Although I shot many of these vacation images as Bracketed Exposure of -2EV, 0EV and +2EV (and this was one of those images), the post processing was a bit surprising.

I wasn't fond of even the best tonemapped version I produced, perhaps because all of these images were hand-held and not very sharp after combining in HDR. In the end, didn't use it or the +2EV. In fact, almost none of the -2EV was blended in either.

To keep it sharp, most of this ended up being done with the single normal exposure image using a lightened duplicate to softly blend the just the shadows back into the normal image.

[Donald]

To keep it sharp, most of this ended up being done with the single normal exposure image using a lightened duplicate to softly blend the just the shadows back into the normal image.

That's the creative photographer speaking now. So may people wouldn't know how or what to do. I understand what you are saying, but I doubt if it would have entered my head to think of that as the solution to the problem. But, like other things you have done and shown us, it's so simple that it's brilliant.

[Steve S]

Enjoying this series very much, frank. Very well done.

[FrankMi]

Enjoying this series very much, frank. Very well done.

Thank you, Steve. I need to cut back on these for a while but I think I've published some of the better ones from the set.