The Shambles York

[GVincent]

I thought i’d post my first HDR shot on here... Any feed back welcome.



History:

The Shambles was a street of butchers’ shops and houses, many complete with a slaughterhouse at the back of the premises, ensuring a ready supply of fresh meat. The meat was hung up outside the shops and laid out for sale on what are now the shop window-bottoms. It is still possible to see some of the original butcher’s meat-hooks attached to the shop fronts.
Lacking modern-day sanitation facilities, there was a constant problem of how to dispose of the waste produced by the slaughter of animals in the city. The pavements are raised either side of the cobbled street to form a channel where the butchers would wash away their offal and blood twice a week.
In some sections of the Shambles it is possible to touch both sides of the street with your arms outstretched. The architecture which now appears so quaint had a very practical purpose. The overhanging timber-framed fronts of the buildings are deliberately close-set so as to give shelter to the ‘wattle and daub’ walls below. This would also have protected the meat from any direct sunshine

[stuck]

Hi,

I'm not a fan of HDR but I do like York, which is just as well as I live in the area.

Ken

[KCBrecks]

How lucky your are to live so close to such a photogenic location. IMHO this is a good composition however I think the HDR processing is a little overdone for my tastes.

[Wavelength]

Liked it; but i wanted the couple to step up few more so that the viewer is led to them.....

[kdoc856]

Looks like a fantastically photogenic area, Gary. I appreciated the background info as well. If you evolve anything like I did, I was a huge fan of HDR with fairly heavy tone-mapping, but now like a bit less of the "artistic" look, while still appreciating what a huge tool HDR is for expanding our visualization of broad dynamic range.

Hope to see a lot more from York. I'd love to get up there. (I still reread James Herriot's books from time to time)

[rawill]

We were in York in 2007, only for two nights, loved it.
Loved the Shambles, brings back memories.

Do you know why the streets are curved?

I would like to know,
a guy told me it was so people could get away from those chasing them with bows ans arrows, I think he was kidding me.

Anyway, I wished I had taken more photos back then.

[GVincent]

Thank’s peeps, it was really hard to get a shot of the shambles with no people in the frame that’s what i was originally after. Looking back i do wish i’d of waited for them two people to step up and make them a focal point. I’m not really into HDR this was my first ever effort, i do appreciate it for what it is but i do like natural shots better. Thanks for all your feed back

I’m not sure Robin why the streets are curved i’ll try and find out for you though.