Assignment 8 - Buildings/Urban

[Applespider]

Augusts's assignment is Buldings/Urban. The idea is that members will go out and try to find their own way of interpreting the monthly theme thus improving their photographic eye. Posting is open to all MR members, and encouraged.

You must have taken the picture yourself between 7 and 31 August 2006. If you took a picture that fits the assignment but was taken earlier, then post it in the Gallery: Buildings/Urban thread instead.

Anyone can enter from those with (D)SLRs from P&S to cameraphones although they should be pictures that you think are good rather than just snapshots. The goal is not to 'win' but to share the enjoyment of taking pictures and learn from others.

Some basic rules on commenting (basically be nice!) are listed. Changes to the rules should be discussed there just as remarks about the topic(s) chosen should be kept in the poll thread. Let's keep this thread just pictures and comments on them if possible

Post your pictures in this thread by the end of August with a title and we'll start commenting (make sure you title your comments referencing the pic you are commenting on)

 

[simie]

EXIF

Camera Sony DSLR-A100
Aperture f20
Shutter Speed1/25
Focal Length 42mm
ISO 100
Metering Mode 2
Lens 35 -70 mm

Altered the Image size and the quality when saving the image.

 

[Chip NoVaMac]

EXIF

Camera Sony DSLR-A100
Aperture f20
Shutter Speed1/25
Focal Length 42mm
ISO 100
Metering Mode 2
Lens 35 -70 mm

Altered the Image size and the quality when saving the image.

Great shot, though it seems to have some post processing qualities to it. Surprised if this is the way it came out of camera. It has a certain HDR quality to it.

 

[simie]

Great shot, though it seems to have some post processing qualities to it. Surprised if this is the way it came out of camera. It has a certain HDR quality to it.

Thanks for the comments - This is the original image - I have altered the image size and then altered the quality of the jpeg when exporting it in Photoshop CS2.

 

[millar876]

Urban decay

Panasonic DMC-FZ7
60second exposure
f3.2
focal length 12.6mm
iso 80

[img=http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/1820/p1000017kt8.th.jpg]

Elgin Cathedral, Elgin Scotland, 0230, brickwork lit py low level phosphor lights (giving it the orange look) contrasting against the blue of the sky

 

[gekko513]

While there's still few posts in here, I'm taking the opportunity to encourage everyone who posts a picture here to also take the time to comment on several others'.

Well, I suppose anyone could comment, but those who participate should feel particularly obliged to help others learn and improve, and if everyone takes care to give nice and constructive feedback to others, we should all get more feedback to help us.

Now... to come up with something interesting and urban...... and some good comments for others...

 

[simie]

Panasonic DMC-FZ7
60second exposure
f3.2
focal length 12.6mm
iso 80

[img=http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/1820/p1000017kt8.th.jpg]

Elgin Cathedral, Elgin Scotland, 0230, brickwork lit py low level phosphor lights (giving it the orange look) contrasting against the blue of the sky

Very nice photo, did you crop the image at the bottom or did you deliberately photograph it at that height?

 

[millar876]

it was taken at that hight. i couldnt get closer because its grounds are shut at that time of night, and i couldnt go further back or id be standing in the middle of a road, and it was too dark for the zoom & af to work properly together

 

[simie]

Here is another photo taken with the same camera and lens. The photo was lightened to show up the buildings in the background and make the brighter, I did this in Aperture, then open up the image in Photoshop CS 2 and use the Lens correction tool to eliminate some folk on the edge of the picture and lastly I cropped the image.

 

[gekko513]

Urban Photographer

I was going for a walk with my camera when I suddenly spotted a fellow photographer taking an urban photo.

Canon PowerShot S3 IS
1/1600 @ f5.0
30mm
The ISO was set to 400 because once again I had forgotten to turn this down from some previous shots. The graininess is quite apparent on the full size image. Cropped in iPhoto, increased contrast and saturation slightly in Photoshop.

 

[MatthiasC]

I was going for a walk with my camera when I suddenly spotted a fellow photographer taking an urban photo.

Canon PowerShot S3 IS
1/1600 @ f5.0
30mm
The ISO was set to 400 because once again I had forgotten to turn this down from some previous shots. The graininess is quite apparent on the full size image. Cropped in iPhoto, increased contrast and saturation slightly in Photoshop.

I love this photo! I think the saturation is spot on! The colours are bright enough so the graffiti stands out, but they still retain a sort of gritty, earthy feel to them, or at least that's what I reckon anyway!

What were you standing on to get the shot from that perspective?

 

[MatthiasC]

Chipped Bricks

Well here's mine, it's my first time doing one of these assignment things so apologies if I've got anything wrong. I'll almost put money on the image not displaying properly in the post, but anyway here goes!

Fujifilm S5600
1/400
f5.0
ISO 800

Fiddled with the contrast and made the corners and edges a touch darker. I also added a sepia filter and sharpened the whole thing up a bit in Photoshop.

 

[gekko513]

Thanks for the nice comments MatthiasC. I was standing on a small grass hill that separated the road he's standing on from the road I was walking on.

I think yours is a great picture. You've done something that I'm rarely able to do myself, and that's taking something very normal and everyday and capture it in an interesting perspective. The details in the textures are very sharp and I think the colour job you've done with the sepia and the darkened corners and edges together with the chipped brick sets a kind of dark, run down and depressed mood. I could easily see this as part of a greater work on the hardship of urban living or something like that.

I think you've done the posting right, except that you haven't given a title that we can refer to when commenting, and neither has simie, so I just have to say that I'm now commenting on simie's second picture.

I really like the reflection in the building and the blue, distorted effect it gives on what it reflects. It's very cool that it reflects a, hm, what's the English word for that, it's called a Parisian wheel in Norwegian. Anyway it's even more cool that it reflects the wheel from two different perspectives along the wall. Apart from the cool blue reflection, what almost immediately catched my eye because they were in such contrast to the blue was the red and yellow of the flower bed and sign in the bottom right corner. I'm not sure if that's a good thing, because they're located so far out in the picture. While pondering this I found that in the bottom right the protruding roof and the mirroring wall sort of frames a picture in the picture. The inner picture is busy with everyday life, while the big picture is more abstract. It's interesting, but I think it jars a little because the inner picture attracts a bit too much attention while being too small, out of focus and located too far out in the frame.

I'm just a beginner, so take my comments for what they're worth.

 

[annk]

Gekko, I really like that shot. Where was it taken? It looks so un-Oslo...

And I love the picture reflecting the Ferris wheel, simie. What exactly does the lens correction tool do?

 

[gekko513]

Thanks, annk. I don't know how well you know the area, but it was taken at the dam right above Bekkedalen in Bjerke. The funny thing is that everything surrounding the frame of the picture looked far from urban: trees, water and grass. The building in the picture is just a tiny concrete cube that I guess has something to do with the maintenance of the electricity and mechanics of the dam.

 

[simie]

I was going for a walk with my camera when I suddenly spotted a fellow photographer taking an urban photo.

Canon PowerShot S3 IS
1/1600 @ f5.0
30mm
The ISO was set to 400 because once again I had forgotten to turn this down from some previous shots. The graininess is quite apparent on the full size image. Cropped in iPhoto, increased contrast and saturation slightly in Photoshop.

Thats a great picture. I like the way you have to look close to spot the door middle of the picture underneath all the urban art.

 

[MatthiasC]

I think yours is a great picture. You've done something that I'm rarely able to do myself, and that's taking something very normal and everyday and capture it in an interesting perspective. The details in the textures are very sharp and I think the colour job you've done with the sepia and the darkened corners and edges together with the chipped brick sets a kind of dark, run down and depressed mood. I could easily see this as part of a greater work on the hardship of urban living or something like that.

I think you've done the posting right, except that you haven't given a title that we can refer to when commenting

Thank you, that was exactly the mood I was trying to get across so it's great you got that from it! Cheers.

Oh and I've added a little name for my picture now, I knew I'd do something wrong! he he.

I like the way you have to look close to spot the door middle of the picture underneath all the urban art.

I second that. I hadn't noticed that until just then.

 

[theenigmat]

Frank Lloyd Wright

Hi! I have posted on here once before. I go to Florida Southern College which happens to have the single largest collection of Frank Lloyd Wright structures in the world. This was a shot I just got tonight of the Annie Pfieffer Chapel.

EXIF:

Camera: Canon PowerShot A620
Aperture: f3.5
Shutter: 1/60
Focal Length: 12.6mm??? (Seems WAY too short)
ISO 100

 

[cookie1105]

There are some really nice entries in this assignment. Gekko, yours is my favourite so far. I really like the contrast in colours between the Graffiti and everything else.

Nice capture theenigmat, it looks like the rocket-shaped building is about to take off into the hole in the clouds.

 

[cookie1105]

Copenhagen Opera House

Copenhagen Opera House; 16/08/06; CPH, DK

 

[gekko513]

Wow, cookie, that's a beautiful shot (Copenhagen Opera House). How much colour editing have you done on it? The colours are amazing.

Also, thanks for your comments on the "Urban Photographer" shot.

 

[cookie1105]

Thanks, it's always nice to get some encouragement. It's been something that I have wanted to shoot for months now. I have just never gotten round to it.

Not a lot of post-processing. A slight white balance correction, Levels + curves, Unsharp Mask, Resize for web

 

[gekko513]

Yes it definitely feels good to get encouragement. Did you edit the levels+curves for the different colour bands separately to make the blue "pop" or wasn't that necessary. I'm eager to learn.

 

[cookie1105]

I only edited levels + curves for rgb, not for the seperate bands. The shot is actually pretty close to how it came off of the camera so it wasn't really necessary.

 

[cookie1105]

Grundtvigs Kirke

I know it is not really the done thing, to post more than one entry in a day. But.... I had another keeper out of tonight's shoot. So, I'll post it anyway.

Grundtvigs Kirke; 16/08/06; CPH, DK