Night / city / long exposure; please critique

[Dave Humphries]

Another thing that makes this image that bit more interesting than the norm is the alignment (or otherwise) between headlamps and tyre (tire) tracks in the snow.

[Donald]

Dan

I hope you realise that, in accordance with the rules of CiC, you have to send a bottle of fine wine to the person who, in your opinion, has done the best edit!

The alternative is that you say you don't like any of them and you drink the wine yourself!!

But at least you can see what happens when the creative juices get flowing in post-processing. All of them are perfectly legitimate artistic interpretations of an original photograph. None of them is falsifying the original scene. It's all about the vision you had in your mind when you pressed the shutter.

[DanTheManWithTheSuntan]

A quick summary of some of the suggestions:
- retouch flat or boring areas of the photo to make it look more interesting
- or use -1 exposure to make the lights the subject instead of diverting attention to other areas of the picture
- or use a reversed ND graduated filter to even out the imbalance in lighting between the top and bottom of the frame
- or enhance contrast for a more "nighty" look with less shadow detail

And some suggestions that seem to be unanimous:
- shoot in RAW
- learn to post-process for better results
- send everyone fine Romanian wine

It's unlikely I'll be able to redo the shot soon. The picture was taken in Timisoara; I might not go there again for at least 2-3 months or so, and it was a serendipidous event that I got a room with the window on the right side of the hotel, perfectly aligned for this shot and on the last floor of the building (this must be the most comfortable winter photo ever taken). But I loved this exercise so I think I'll throw some more stuff for you guys to chew on as soon as I get another decent photo!

See you next year!