Apologies for the delay. Tuesday was my birthday and last night I was watching my team thrashing AC Milan 0-0. Plus I wasn’t expecting such a response, so thanks to all who entered. There are some excellent efforts there and I have learnt a lot through this process. I hope everyone has enjoyed it and will continue to support the challenge. The photo supports any number of different looks and it is very difficult indeed to pick one. I stressed before that appreciation of the range of entries is more important then the competion element and it has opened my eyes to lots of possibilities.

I have the advantage of knowing the scene so I have certain preferences which include retaining the overhead wires (which are for the tram which once ran) and also I am drawn to those entries which have the greatest sense of melancholy. This being a mood photo I think some of the simple processing can easily sit side by side with the more technical efforts. Both approaches are appreciated.

I won‘t comment in detail on the entries, but these are my thoughts on seeing them.

Bforbes

I like this look which reminds me somewhat of the World at War tv series which did a feature on this place.

Mike P

Stark realism done well with a light touch

Mannesty

Appropriate gloom

DigitalCG

A closer view, the details on the car stand out well.

Galoot

Good sepia, verticals corrected well. The subtle border is a nice touch.

Snappychappy

Strange looking but effective.

Marklj

Has something of an after the storm light about it.

Gareth

This seems to make the scene expanive and draws my eye in. Not sure about the tone though.

Andrewk

Good job in being faithful to the visuals.

Johnriley

Very surreal, nice to see an entirely different take. I have a wide angle lens now and it will be used on the next visit.

Geordie 01

Strangely compelling,
Sandinista

Good mood piece. Melancholy.

Don.

Wow and double wow. Fascinating to see what it once would have looked like.

Thoughton

I like the tones.. I prefer to see more background.

IBerg

Great mood. A bit flat which works very well.

Pnjmcc

Very skilled, I really like this interpretation. I’d love to learn to do this.

Judith Ann

I like the use of tones to separate the car. The white vignette is an interesting alternative. I’m not sure about the background colour.

Darlene

A different, soft very colourful look. The edges of the buildings look a tad harsh against the sky.

Beginner

Highly sepia’d. It works.

Pentaxophile.

A somewhat washed out feel is very appropriate.

Stopher

This really brings out the rust and brings the car out from the background.

Tyr

The heavy grain works well.

Henri Teine

I immediately thought old newspaper before seeing the narrative.

Elscotto

Very left field. Nice to see an entirely unique interpretation.

Grahamwalton

Looks like the end of the world.

Stefan

Very interesting, it really works.


From a fascinating range of looks my preferred three are:

3 Stefan
2 Pnjmcc
1 MikeP - for me something about this processing really brings out the desolation.

Thanks again to all for a very interesting exercise. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I.

PM on its way shortly to continue the challenge.

Bête noire




7th March
K5, K series 35mm f3.5

I'm not supposing anything, just noting behaviour that I wouldn't expect. The battery had just gone down to two bars but I took anothert forty shots after that one and I suspect I'll get another 100 or so. But it's possible. I'll just document any further cases should they arise.

Thanks for the help. I will email the images. Plus I had a different example this morning (with a different lens) with one exposure of 1/200th followed by one of 1/2000th under identical conditions with no obvious (to me) cause - I'll send those too.

Thanks for the contributions so far. I haven't yet updated the firmware, but will do so. The white balance was almost certainly user error - thanks for that, its back to auto now. I'll clean the contacts although it is strange that just turning off and on again cured it.

I had another example today. Another brightly lit scene - setting sun behind the shoulder. First shot:




I always check my shots on screen, so I noticed the overexposure. I checked all the settings including the possibility of any dials or levers stuck between settings. Couldn't find anything wrong so I took a second shot - it was exactly the same. So I dialled in an EV adjustment of -4 and that came out underexposed, but not -4 worth (-2 I'd say). I returned Ev to 0 and turned off the camera, turned on again and reshot three times without adjusting anything. This yielded close results of which this is one:




The photos with EXIF are on my flickr stream first one here and second here. I can't work out what I might have done wrong. If someone could cast there expert eye (Matt?) over this I would be interested in the verdict.

I'll post some K5 star trail and night sky images if you wish. I'm far from getting anything good yet as I'm still experimenting, but I think it would be capable of decent results in the right hands.

I forgot about the dark frame thingy. Amazing effort. Come to think of it I did try once with the K20 and it came out as you said. The K5 seems quite succesful, but it's still difficult (well. for me). I once did it with a little compact film camera and the results were excellent.

A black camera looks like another black camera. The little changes in number after the K don't seem to get noticed. Thankfully.

Thanks. I have never noticed any problem with flare.

Thanks, I shoot RAW so just add the sharpness I want, but I'm usually fairly conservative on sharpening. I tried to get the best out of the lens by not cropping much (I sit in a tent to get close to shoot the birds); using a tripod and waiting for the best conditions so I can stop down - these are f8. Having said that I'm satisfied with my results at f5.8 as well.