A couple of night shots of Beacon Hill

[DanK]

Spent an hour last night walking around in Beacon Hill, one of the very old neighborhoods in Boston. Not an easy spot for night photography. Most of the streets have lots of parked cars. People come wandering by in the middle of a long exposure, and cars also come by with their lights on. Here are two, for C&C. I had to clone light streaks out of the back of the second one from a passing car.

[Ziggy]

Very well taken Dan. Think I like the first one the best. Nice POV.

[rpcrowe]

Good job on both! I like #1 the best because of the cramped feeling it portrays... Did you just miss John Adams as he rounded the corner

[Shadowman]

Nice set.

[flashback]

Definitely #1 for me as well and Richard, I would be more expecting Samuel Adams. Great shot Dan.

[george013]

Wonderfull pictures. It looks like I can step in it.
I don't understand the doorpost on the left site of picture 2. It looks as if it is bending at the bottom.

George

[DanK]

Thanks, all. George, I don't know what those posts are. They are in both photos. I wonder if they were for tying up horses. At the very bottom on the left of the second one you will see a metal fixture with a horizontal edge. That's a boot scraper, to scrape off what littered the streets in those days.

[sleist]

Being from Boston myself, I can attest to the rare scenes without parked cars.
Well done.

I might play with the white balance a bit, but that's purely subjective.

[Manfred M]

Dan - while I like the compositions I was thinking exactly the same thing that Steve noted in #8.

The images have a very strange green / yellow colour cast that I find detracts from the overall look.

[DanK]

Steve and Manfred,

Very helpful comments about the color cast. This is difficult lighting--the bright lighting fixtures are actually old gas mantle lamps--and I had fussed for a while with it, but I think you are right that I hadn't done enough. I will post two revisions below. See what you think.

I also cropped off a bright light from the left hand side of the first one, as someone suggested that a bright light at the edge is distracting. In this case, however, I am not sure that the crop helps.

See what you think.

Thanks again.

Dan

[sleist]

I think the second post is an improvement.

White balance is tough sometimes - particularly with artificial (and sometimes mixed) lighting sources. It's a balance between what the software says it should be vs. what eyes say they saw vs. what the mind remembers seeing vs. what looks good.

Have fun sorting out that mess of logic.

[Manfred M]

+1 to Steve's comments. The colours do look better, and the one thing that we have to remember is that street lighting was never designed with photography in mind, so strange mixed lighting situations are going to be an issue.

I remember one picture I took in the winter where some brilliant person alternated two different colour temperature bulbs along the line of lights. Getting a decent colour balance - that was simply impossible.

[Mike Buckley]

The second version of the second image really pops. Great job!

Consider marking this one for a try with Photoshop's upcoming content-aware cropping. If it works (I doubt that it will on such a complex image), you could correct the slight perspective distortion and then use the content-aware crop to prevent losing anything at the top.

[sleist]

I'm not implying that this is the way it should look. I'm just showing this as an option for comparison.
Monitor calibration is always a source of perceptual variability, as is choice of web browser.

I apologize in advance if you have stated that images should not be edited. I looked and did not see that it was specified anywhere, but I tend to not see things - particularly when they are right in front of my face.

I think this edit came out a bit darker than I would have liked, but it was the color temperature I was trying to show.

[DanK]

Mike, Thanks l I applied perspective correction to the second (although of course without the new CC feature), and I think it is a bit better:



Steve, I don't mind editing. I lightened yours to get a better look at it. It's a colder white balance than I want. IMHO, the atmosphere depends in part on the warm lighting of the gas lamps.

thanks again.

Dan

[bnnrcn]

The edit looks better Dan. A very nice image

Mike, Thanks l I applied perspective correction to the second (although of course without the new CC feature), and I think it is a bit better:



Steve, I don't mind editing. I lightened yours to get a better look at it. It's a colder white balance than I want. IMHO, the atmosphere depends in part on the warm lighting of the gas lamps.

thanks again.

Dan

[IzzieK]

I agree with Binnur about the last edit...I quite like the warmth atmosphere of the shot itself like in #1...

[DanK]

Thanks all