Monuments in rainy evening

[Marwus]

I went out during rainy day on end of January. I found that day how hard is to raise tripod by one hand when you must hold umbrella by other one :-D
I went out because i wanted to get these two pictures. Especially the statue i like to photograph(all statues actually) because of expression of mother. Rain always add special mood to it. Both monuments are to victims of nacism.


[IMG]Památnik obětem nacismu během Květnového povstání v Čachovicích by David Mareček, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]Pamatnik obetem nacismu_Čachovice_2 by David Mareček, on Flickr[/IMG]

Any comments or suggestions for improvement are more than welcome.

[Geoff F]

For me, you were on an impossible quest with the first image. You have managed a rather spooky scene; but have you included too much distracting background?

The second one works better but do you need all of that bottom area? It probably depends on your intention but could you lose some of the plinth, while retaining all of the names? I think that might make a stronger overall scene?

[Marwus]

Thank you for comment, i will try remove bit on bottom on second photo and maybe clone out the lamp so it will not end cut in half. I like that that support of statue rise from the platform and i would like to keep this.

The case of first photo is different story, location which was chosen for monument in past for it is logical from reason of reverence because people mentioned on desk were killed there when protecting access to near sugar factory and railroad which Nazi army intent to destroy but now it is hard to avoid distracting elements. Right from it is train crossing with lights and barriers and left from it is trash can and bus stop, not to mention old house for barrier operator from time when it was operated manually which you can see on background. I could use wider aperture, picture is made at f/8 because i wanted to put whole tree in focus, which i gloriously failed because it is not sharp at all :-), and avoid glares which i manage. Above it is rather strong lamp. But i will be trying to fine tune the position, it was not raining on evening for last time and practice make perfection.

[ThomasHaynes]

Your rainy evening adventure sounds like quite the challenge with the tripod and umbrella juggling! But the results are beautiful. The photos capture a unique atmosphere, and I totally get why you enjoy photographing statues, especially the one with the expressive mother.