Whoa

A lensbaby goes to Birmingham (and sees the Selfridges building)




The main problem I have with the lensbaby is its focal length of 50mm. It's too long.

Mike

Mike,

What a great picture. It has a really strange effect when you scroll down. Its almost as if the blurred part just keeps going with you and then when you scroll up again it is like it grows. Weird but clever.

I like it!

Mike, scroll the page over the photo!

Brilliant.

It makes me feel a bit queasy looking at it.
But a good composition, and nice strange effect.

Well it seems the lensbaby might have scored something of a hit but it's an odd beast to use.

Mike

Apart from being a cracking subject, it has hit the mark with the eliptical highlights for me.
It's just gotta have highlights to give the full LB effect.
Is this building floodlit at night I wonder

That's a good question about the floodlights - Kenty what's the answer!

It is a cracking subject - I wonder what it's like inside?

Mike

Oh dear Mike....I'm not too sure. I've googled Selfridges Birmingham and there are a few night shots and I think there must be some form of lighting on the building at night - sorry to be a bit vague.

Here's a photo I took very early on Saturday - Selfridges catching the rising sun - I used Raw (PEF) and used the auto setting - otherwise no adjustments. Looks totally different to your shot with the lensbaby!! I used the long end of my 18-250 lens and used -2 EV. Can't make up my mind about it!!

Mike, I was there earlier this year and inside its just another department store, no big surprises or delights in there.
david

Mike, I love that shot. It's futuristic, it's abstract, it's many things. Well done!

Kenty - my own feeling is that the longer focal length has robbed the discs of their magnificent sweep and accentuated the irregularities(which might be no bad thing). The Sigma 10-20 magnified any curves there and seems to have minimised irregularities making it look better than it is! But then I'm a wide angle man. I can't have used my 50-200 more than three times in 6 months. The lensbaby is of course a special case but at 50mm is a bit long for my taste.

Colours are quite different at that time of day.

I expect I can locate someone who works downtown in Birmingham who can tell us if it is lit at night and how well. I can't see it being as good as daylight though.

Mike

Mike I love it, keep coming back for another look and my monitor will not take it all in one view. Resisted the urge to print it out as I think it would loose a lot not just the back light but the quality. First class for me and I would be pleased to have it on my wall.

Kenty's shot does not please me so much, it does not have the dynamic effect and although I enjoy the repeated pattern there is nothing to draw the eye into the shot and retain the interest, somehow no where on the shot seems crisp something which I feel these sort of shots require or they have no punch.

It would seem this building would be perfect for a set of shots as it seems to offer many views and angles to the viewer and I would think it could be revisited on many occasions and never reproduce the same results.

Thordell... take a look at mikews flickr (linked in his sig) where the small size version should fit on your monitor.

Searching "selfridges night" on flickr results in a load of blue floodlit images. A trip there when it's dark seems in order !

Thank you Bob, I used to have a square monitor that I liked and was great for viewing images, could only replace it with a wide one and I am not impressed. Think next time I will try for something better and deeper if that is possible as I feel I am not always getting the best of my image viewing.