Color...

bdcolen

...if at all.:rofl

Wil Davis

Well, it's nice…

…but I think I'd have wanted to fill the frame

(well, all that massive space in the foreground; all from the manhole down is wasted, IMNSHO!)

The texture on the wall is nice, but the green in the traffic light is somehow wrong... (not enough saturation, esp with the new LEDs…)

…love the "Banksy" shadow creeping in from the right!



- Wil

TonyCooper

The first thing I see about this photograph is the stoplight, and a color that I have never
seen on a stoplight. I also see what I consider as too much foreground, but this is a matter
of personal taste by the photographer. I don't expect all photographers to like the same
look I like in a composition.

That aqua lens, though, makes me wonder what the other colors should be.

bdcolen

TonyCooper wrote:

The first thing I see about this photograph is the stoplight, and a color that I have never
seen on a stoplight. I also see what I consider as too much foreground, but this is a matter
of personal taste by the photographer. I don't expect all photographers to like the same
look I like in a composition.

That aqua lens, though, makes me wonder what the other colors should be.

Well, one, the lens is overexposed, which throws the color off, and two, it's pretty close to what it looked like. But the point about the foreground is well taken. Note that I said...if at all. I'm not sure about this one.

Richard

TonyCooper wrote:

That aqua lens, though, makes me wonder what the other colors should be.

The green light is a bit blown--which makes the color shift--but it doesn't matter to me in the least. Nothing important going on there, just a green light. I love the shadows on the building, but am less sure I like the featureless bottom half. It seems to de-emphasize the nice, low angle light, which makes the upper half so appealing. Maybe try a different crop?

bfjr

Color or B&W not much past that shadow to keep me

vintagemxr

The verticals are a bit skewed, also. Was that intentional, B.D.?

Doug

bdcolen

vintagemxr wrote:

The verticals are a bit skewed, also. Was that intentional, B.D.?

Doug

Nope. Getting much of anything is a bit tough when you're on a Vespa.
And, of course, maybe I didn't get much of anything. As I said - not sure.

Patti

I'm leaning to the left for some reason. It's not doing it for me I'm afraid.

Flyinggina

This one doesn't do it for me either, BD

That said, it has been very interesting to look at it and think through why I might have taken the picture and how I would have presented it.

Because of your title, I will address the color question first.

For me, this is a excellent example of when black and white should be the choice. In this one he color adds nothing to the story I would be trying to tell, nor is it enough to carry the picture without more. The gorgeous clear, blue sky is lovely and makes me think of the beautiful days we have enjoyed this week, but the people aren't dressed in a way to tell us that spring has sprung (at least temporarily).

The green stoplight is a distraction mostly because the color is off (as the comments above have suggested). This could be fixed but, even if it were, what would it add to the story? The bicyclist could be getting read to cross or not. Do we care?

The long shadows (which seem to be the story) would look just as good in black and white as the color.

And, on my screen at least, the color is off - too cool. Warm it up and the picture looks a lot more inviting.

I see that you cropped to a square. I can understand that you wanted to include the buildings as much as possible. However, given the huge dark area at the bottom of the picture (which would be even more of a problem in black and white), the picture needs a tighter crop.

It also needs straightening. If you did that on the original you might be able to retain the tree and its shadow on the right and keep all three figures in the frame in an appealing way while cropping out much of the pavement.

I straightened posted version then cropped it tighter to see if it would work, but the result cut off a sliver on the lower right.

Which brings me to perhaps the basic issue - what is the story here? What interests me are the shadows of the person on the right and of a passing car (I think it is). Bottom line, though, is that I find this is not enough to draw me into the photograph.

Thank you for posting this picture, BD. It has helped me think about what works and what doesn't work for me and - at some level - why. Though I have much more work to do in developing my critical viewing skills (I don't mean just negative reactions, but the positive too), I'm sure that going through this exercise will help me understand better why some pictures (my own and those of others) work for me and some don't.

Virginia

rutt

Since it was titled "color", maybe the color matters? It had a blue cast in the shadows (which I know because I measured the pavement and it really was blue. Can that be right?) And everyone noticed the color of the light (which I improved but maybe didn't nail.)

So with those things adjusted, what do we think now? I think it's an interesting shot, but the composition doesn't work as well as B.D.'s better work. By accident I looked with some of the bottom cropped off (maybe just below the manhole) and it looked a lot less static.

With the crop, I like the juxtaposition of the shadow, two men, and the door. It seems almost as if they are connected somehow, other than just by being at the same time and place. Might be the second after something happened between the two men?

Richard

I prefer the original color. Yes, the shadow is bluish, but the solution to that is cropping most of it off. On the other hand, in this version the light has shifted somewhat towards green on the walls and the shadows on the walls, and that doesn't compute at all. So this only improves the part that doesn't matter at the expense of the part that does. And yes, I measured it as well. If the blue shadows at the bottom are really problematic, you could mask the image or use Blend If sliders to constrain the adjustment.

I say, crop the bottom and call it a day.

W.W. Webster

They say rules are made to be broken ....

vintagemxr

bdcolen wrote:

Nope. Getting much of anything is a bit tough when you're on a Vespa.
And, of course, maybe I didn't get much of anything. As I said - not sure.

Well, if the Vespa was moving you did great.

I've been looking at the image for a few minutes now and I find that I like various elements of the photo like the shadow of the door, the shadow of the tree, the light and textures on the front of the building, and the repeated rectangles on the front of the building, but the sum of the good parts doesn't quite add up for me.

Doug