Palace and Cathedral in Madrid

[Tony M]

Hi all,

I managed to get out and take some photos yesterday, and this is one of them. I cropped it to a panoramic view because there were many uninteresting buildings below. This was taken shortly before sunset, and I hope to return another time to photograph it just after sunset. (I was photographing another monument instead.)

I did minor post-processing; warming it a little, and tonal adjustment. Any comments on composition, additional PP, etc. would be welcome.



Exposure details: 1/25s at f/11, ISO 100, focal length 64mm.

[dje]

Hi Tony

Could I suggest a crop something like this below. I've also straightened it up and adjusted the Levels a bit. I like the muted colours in this image but it would be better viewing if it were a larger file (say 1500 pixels wide and less jpeg compression).

Cheers Dave

[Reynold Mainse]

Great image... I like how Dave tweaked the image. Tony that is nice perspective you captured.
I might have cropped the image so that the main part of the building was on the left third of the image in stead of somewhat central

[Tony M]

Thanks for your comments. I'm using Lightroom and while it doesn't have levels, it has other ways to tweak the colours and exposure. That said, I had some difficulty reproducing the tones that Dave produced. I tried straightening it; I only rotated it by +0.6 (not sure of the units - degrees?) I did this by aligning the left-most tower to a vertical line. What did you do, Dave?

I also tried a different crop; removing most of the tree to the left, and I put the cathedral to the right. (Reynold, I'm not sure what you meant by putting the main part of the building in the left third.) I think it's a better composition, but I've lost a lot of pixels; next time I'll shoot the photo with a bigger zoom and get it right in the camera. This image is larger than the previous one.

[dje]

Tony

The treatment you've given your new image, including straightening, looks pretty good to me. The larger image size makes for better viewing too.

The new crop changes the nature of the shot somewhat - from a panoramic view to a more detailed view of the main subject. It just depends what you are looking for.

I dont exactly remember what I did with the straightening but I probably just lined up the towers with the vertical grid lines. It didn't need much rotation.

Cheers Dave

[Reynold Mainse]

Nice job Tony on the cropping. I think your choice to put the main high structure on the right third was the best choice.
I noticed you use Lightroom. it is a great tool.
Might I suggest bringing a little drama out in the clouds by going to the HSL tab in the develop module and pushing up the blue slider in the Saturation panel and then in the Luminance panel bring down the blue slider ( there might be some Aqua in there as well). This will deepen and darken the blue in the sky and not effect the white/yellow clouds. instead of moving the sliders with your mouse you can also target that area of the sky by activating the mouse to click and slide up or down on the image. To activate the mouse just click on the little circle beside the saturation title and luminance title. If you find your blue in the sky starts to break up...it is usually a colour noise issue. try going to the Detail tab and push the Color slider to the right. You can also experiment with using the Clarity adjustment brush to brush over the sky and see if that also helps the drama and contrast in the sky.
Great image... it's worth the effort you have put into it.
reynold

[Donald]

Tony

In compositional terms, I think your original (on Post#1), is a much better image. There's a nice balance and harmony to it and the wider vista gives us a much better feeling of an open city space.

The one naughty error is your forgetting to check around the edges after you're rotation (top edge at the right and left edge at the top).

The one thing I'd do is take out the flag and the flagpole it is on.

I note Reynold's comment about doing some more on the sky. I think that might destroy the subtlety and sense of calm and quietness that's in the image.