Wow Tony, that really worked. Now where's my old negatives, must give this a try. I wonder if it would work with colour slides.
david

Gareth,
More than 3,500 visits to this thread since you launched it just a week ago. This must be one of the biggest responses to a Your Photos entry.
david

The first of your revised versions is excellent. The crop creates a much more satisfying picture.
david

Gwyn, when you say they speed past at 44kph (27mph) that will be the average speed for the whole stage. At times they will be going a lot faster than that, at others, like when going uphill or at feeding stations, they go a lot more slowly. In my cycle racing days (I was an amateur not a Tour de France rider) I was in a group clocked at 65mph coming down a steep hill in the English Pennines.
If you are going to be at a fixed point, as you say behind a barrier, I think you need to consider panning your shots. The riders will be quite close and it may be difficult to catch them head on with a long lens. Practise panning before you go because you need to be 'match fit' to be successful at this type of picture. You can practise in advance simply by panning cars whizzing past on the road near where you live and decide before the shoot which lens will be best for the distance away they'll be. I think I would chose the 17-70 or the similar length Sigma from your armoury.
Best of luck with the project and I hope we see some of your shots here.
david
PS Whats's the Giro doing in The Netherlands. I know the Tour de France goes abroad quite often but Holland is a long way from italy.

Thank you Stefan, it was your first judging and you did a good job.
I agree with your choice of winner, Elscotto's picture would also have been my choice. I also liked i-Berg's cooling tower shot.
I was delighted to get highly commended as I thought the lack of landscape in my industrial scene would let me down, but the picture I had in mind to enter didn't work out because of poor light and me running out of time. At your suggestion I may try it in black and white.
I don't understand how the EXIF works in The Forum. In The Gallery it's easy, you just click on 'details' but here I wouldn't know where to find it so I always write in the details when I enter the Fortnightly competition.
david

Lovely set of images Gary. The cathedral shots are superb and I just love the pictures of the children.
It was good to chat to you at Whitby on Saturday.
davidi

From where did you take the picture of the Eiffel Tower and La Defense - if it was the Montparnasse Tower that's quite a long way off and you must have been using a helluva lens. Or where you up in an aircraft?
david

Stairway to Heaven
[IMG]http://i799.photobucket.com/albums/yy273/Davidtrout2/2174StairwaytoHeaven.jpg[/IMG]
Like Mike I'm not sure about the landscape element in this, except to say that if you climbed that ladder that goes nowhere you would get a good view of the landscape.
Date taken: April 17 2010
Gear: Pentax K10+DA* 50-135mm lens
Location: West Auckland, Co. Durham, England.

Make sure you are there for the autumn event in October Lilly.
david

I'm more fond of La Defense than I am of the Eye Full Tower, its much more to my photographic taste. Nice set of pics, makes me wish I was back in Paris.
david.