B&W nighttime cityscapes

[dmr]

DMR, is one of those the Merchandise Mart from Wacker Drive? Yep, I miss Chicago, it's official 🙂

Uh-huh, sure is, taken from the Clark St. bridge, looking northwest. Yes, I love Chicago too! 🙂 That was a really nice trip back in October even though the weather was yucky. 🙁 It was actually snowing when I landed at Midway, but all gone by the time I got to the hotel. Windy! Definite Bad Hair Day! 🙁

DMR This is Da Figuera square, a very central one with an outstanding view on the upper S. george Castle.

Although I've never been to Lisboa (yet!) I recognized the scene from the castle in David's photo on the other site. Maybe some day. 🙂

This thread is driving me crazy, I love night shots ... a lot of good stuff here!

Yes, I'm a sucker for urban night scenes and there are some great ones in this thread, which is one of the best threads here of all times, IMAO. 🙂

 

[cosmonaut]

MikeL, Strong composition and great exposure, I just wonder what the scene would look like with the sun was cresting between the or just at buildings edge. But a great picture as is.
Peter, Very strong composition, but I would like to see more detail in the foreground and less in the ceiling.
Nico, Strong composition but you might be a little over exposed on them, the building on the top of #1 makes the shot, great work.
XP2, Wow, Did I say wow, nice work, How did you expose #2 fast enough not to blur the two people walking, What was your settings?
Roland, Blow #1 up and hang this one in my house, beautiful tones, tell me how you post process to get such rich tones? #2 reminds me of Archie Bunkers house LOL, I love it, great tones on this one too.
Micheal. #1 is dead on with strong composition, I would like to see more reflection in #2 and #3 might be slightly over exposed and cropped a little tight.
You guys are good I would love to pick your heads on some camera settings. It would help me a lot if you could post them along with the picture. Just an idea. I am glad to meet all of you and can see I am going to learn much from you all.
Cosmo

 

[40oz]

ferider, amazing shot of the bridge. The houses against the highrises is very nice, as well. Really gives an impression of the city.

BTW, my shots were taken with a Canonet G3 QL17, so it was a 40/f1.7.

MichaelB, those are great, they have some sort of ethereal air to them.

Michaal I, somehow it looks like the road itself is speeding by, kinda cool. The poles marching off into the distance, but not a car in sight.

wes, that's an awesome shot 🙂 The colors, the clearly identifyable surrounding city, but absolute darkness except for the lone smoker. A man and his habit, alone in the big city until that match lights lol.

 

[demian]

Venice

Venice

Views from venice the other day.....

 

[nico]

...
Nico, Strong composition but you might be a little over exposed on them, the building on the top of #1 makes the shot, great work.
...
You guys are good I would love to pick your heads on some camera settings. It would help me a lot if you could post them along with the picture. Just an idea. I am glad to meet all of you and can see I am going to learn much from you all.
Cosmo

Hi Cosmo,
thanks for looking and commenting, I agree with you about the overexposure of my photos, usually I take these kind of shots at f/1,5@1/30 (can't exactly remeber for the first one but I'm pretty sure of it for the second).
Hope this may help in some way 🙂
ciao
Nico

 

[cosmonaut]

Demian, I really like the both of these. The horizon is unlevel in the first, fix that in PS and then hang it on the wall. How do you guys figure exposure for your night shots. I have to use my Rebel 2000 for the night pictures because the meter will calculate long exposures, but would love to use my QL-17?
Cosmo

 

[MichaelB]

40oz you started a wondeful thread.
MikeL your second shot is wonderfull. I just want to walk over there and have a look.
Petrc I wonder what caused the curved haze at the top of the street light.
XP2 your first picture makes me feel at home. I don't know why because my hometown doesn't look like that but it realy makes me hear the firplace burning...
Ferider your color version of the bay bridge is even better. I like the uncommon perspective of the city. It is not the usual postcard look you see all the time.
Thank you all, you have been an inspiration

 

[Wayne R. Scott]

Some times I think that I am in the top ten thread killers here on RFF. So with this in mind here is my night cityscape and probably the end of the thread:

Wayne

 

[peterc]

That shot still rocks, Wayne. Great detail and light.

Peter

 

[MichaelB]

Wayne, great detail. Somehow it reminds me of Half Life 2. 🙄

 

[ray_g]

I prefer shot #1, too. The composition of shot #2 is good, but it is a bit overexposed, and the blown-out highlights are very distracting. If you notice, you hardly have any true blacks in shot #2, even though it is a night shot. Great effort, though. Keep it up!

I found the info on this page helpful.

And since this is a 'critique' thread, I need to post my own, so here is an old one of mine.

 

[nico]

Wayne, i's impossible to kill threads with good stuff like yours, lot of details here and good compisition too.
Ray, everything works perfectly here - imho - composition and framing, light, it has a timeless mood . Very good.
Ciao
Nico

 

[40oz]

demian, I like the vertical better, the light reflecting off the water balances the tower, to a certain extent. My only compaint is they are too small to see much detail across the water.

Wayne, tht's a fantastic shot! The light, the structure, it all works for me.

Ray, that's a cool shot, too. The haze and the light give it an exotic flavor, added to the rickety looking poles in the foreground and the elaborate structure in the background.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

Here's another 40oz, just downstream, daylight. I liked Minneapolis and St. Paul.

omg. I recognized this place instantly. Are you in the Twin Cities?

 

[40oz]

Ahh...Chi-Town.... Tri-X@1600.

Sorry I missed commenting on this the last post. great shot, I really like it.

 

[40oz]

omg. I recognized this place instantly. Are you in the Twin Cities?

I live just south of downtown Mpls. Where are you?

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

I live close to Uptown. Huh.

 

[MikeL]

omg. I recognized this place instantly. Are you in the Twin Cities?

Hi Gabriel,
I was doing research there for a month in October. St. Anthony Falls Laboratory is just upstream from the bridge there and the other night shot is taken from the lab. I really enjoyed the area and look forward to visiting in March. It would be great to meet other Minn. RFFers if anyone's interested.
Here's another shot from the lab using a 'that which shall not be named' (no post processing (other than by camera), just resize):

 

[LazyHammock]

You worked at SAFL Mike? With the sedimentation tanks? i was a grad student in the Geology Dept at the UofMN. Never worked at SAFL but had a number of friends down there.
Cheers,
Nick

 

[MikeL]

Hi Nick,
I worked in both the large and small flumes down in what we called 'Moria' (3rd floor down). Most of my stuff is funded off National Center for Earth Surface Dynamics (NCED). Lotsa neat toys at SAFL......