Building with strange lighting

[Davey]

2008_11170040small.jpg

I always meant to get a pic of this before and now i have my tripod I had no excuse, it's the building that houses maintainance stuff for the road tunnel that runs under the river. There are 2 tunnels going under the river mersey so 4 buildings like this (1 close to the end of each tunnel) but only this one is lit up like this, I think they house the air filter systems etc. They only leave the lights on for a limited time of a night, usually off by 12am approx.

Unfortunately sRGB 8bit doesn't do it justice to how it appears (pretty much how the cam picked up too but long exp a bit more vibrant than looks with eyes). Long exposure in particular means the foreground stuff is vivid sodium orange from surrounding streetlights, and the blue and magenta on the building is deeper. I compressed a little and scaled down an saved as JPEG to fit on site. I ramped up the vibrance in the sRGB to look more like the basic processed raw version (basic I mean standard WB, demosaic, etc etc). The colours are pretty much left alone other than that, the main process was just slight curves adjust to pick out shadow, denoise, and very light sharp filter.

Couldn't get a better angle, the one I wanted wasn't possible as to each side the road curves so it's obscured by buildings or there are streetlights in shot in the centre of the frame. Further back isn't possible as it's a coastal path, I was about 1 metre in from the railings separating me from the river hence the angle I wanted would involve climbing high rigging on a boat. Until I aquire a boat it's limited angles I'm afraid. Any suggestions on possible better angles, getting closer or composing different are welcome. As are all other suggestions.

[dendrophile]

Beautiful colours... The building looks amazing against that deep black sky. Very well done.

The one thing that I'd try to improve, either by choosing a different view point, possibly getting as low as possible and shooting upwards, or by some post-processing, is to remove the writing on the wall at the bottom of your shot. My eyes and brain always go directly to words and letters in photos. Perhaps others do also.

This is fun... must upload some of my photos.

Dendrophile

[Davey]

Ah thanks I didn't think of that. I might have to crop it or blur the writing out because that wall is quite high. Will try getting a few angles with that in mind. The scale of the thing is actally lost in the image without reference so I did take a pic on 10sec timer standing against the wall (see below) to show exactly how big that building is. I'm the little man stood in the bottom right corner of the shot against the wall, I'm 6'4" by the way so you can see it's a big building.

2008_11170030.jpg

[taken]

i love the way you describe the whole story behind the building and your effort in taking this pic its undoubtedly very colorful too colorful as a matter of fact very rarely seen colors on a building its these shocking pinks, blues, voilets, that would keep ur pic flying high in a gallery but i do have a grouse with ur composition the lower part,the overexposed part,the writing on the wall part is actually gabbing my eye away from the delicious upper part of the frame if this part had been cropped to keep the whole frame in the low light category.......keep the eye inside,would have been more soothing to a viewer minds

[crisscross]

Hi Nocturne

nice to see a ghost from Merseyside days of long ago...photographically it strikes me that it is essentialy a composition of coloured light and shape and therefore better freed from distractions...have had a quick go to get this:

Chris

[Davey]

Thanks again for the feedback

I see what you mean about the letters pulling your eyes away. I also notice since you mentioned the sodium orange foreground does still pull the eyes. I think cropping will do trick, or I could vandalise and knockout the lamposts in that area (just kidding).

[crisscross]

Thanks again for the feedback

I see what you mean about the letters pulling your eyes away. I also notice since you mentioned the sodium orange foreground does still pull the eyes. I think cropping will do trick, or I could vandalise and knockout the lamposts in that area (just kidding).

I think the sodium orange is a nice complementary colour to the dominant blue-purple higher up, so is it necessary to remove it altogether?