19 Shots from London. 56k Warning!

[Gamefreak501]

Hi everyone,

I had a day off on Friday, so I braved the light showers and went to a few places in London for about 7-8 hours.

Unfortunately, the grey sky meant a lot of washed out backgrounds! Also, a lot of the closeup shots of the various bands were shakey, so they are not here. Shame, one or two were so good! Still, a lesson learned!.

Anyway, I had with me my Minolta 5D, 75-300, 50, and 18-70.

1). This guy was collecting money for Cancer Research

2).Big Ben at Night

3). London Eye at Night

4). An Old Man

 

[Gamefreak501]

5) Man on his Phone

6) Trafalger Square Fountain at Night

7) A Woman

8). Classical Band Performing 1

 

[Gamefreak501]

9) Classical Band Performing 2

10) Man on his Accordian

11). Girl in the Crowd

12) Man in the Crowd

 

[Gamefreak501]

13) Selling the Evening Standard

14) Jazz Busker

15) Jazz Buskers Hands

16) Bridge at Royal Oak

 

[Gamefreak501]

and finally...

17) Big Ben in Daylight

18) Guitar Busker in Westminster

19) Classical Violinist

Cheers!

 

[Gamefreak501]

N4 - Good face and composition, shame about focus.
N11 - I like it.
N18 - Best shot imo.

Cheers

Focus did go a bit funny at times with my 75-300. I basically stood in a street corner where there was a huge and constant crowd and just had it on continuous focus and just clicked, sometimes it went right, other times it didn't!

They all seem a bit under-exposed. You're too close too. The title is telling the story rather than the picture. Also, er "Dark woman"? Thats a bit un PC isn't it?

Sorry, corrected,

Anyway, I'll just touch up some of those before putting a few on my DA. At times I intentionally underexposed shots so I could still hand hold them.

 

[Gamefreak501]

Agree with Cykey, first few are too dark. 19&8 look a bit soft, not sure I like 13 being cut in half. I like 10 the most, I also like the sculture in Traf-Square - good exposure there.

The musician shots remind me of when I was down at covent garden last. It's a difficult place to shoot because of the amount of people and the light isn't very good, so you can't get a lot of depth of field or a high shutter speed. This was the best I managed to get when I was there:

Think maybe this shot would have been a better entry in the music comp. mmeh anyway.

That is a good photo!

I have touched up the photos a little on my Deviant Art, by playing with the exposure using RSE, converting to TIFF and then JPEG.

 

[Gamefreak501]

Cheers for the comments everyone

A random name; I like what you have done with the shots there, they look more lively and colourful

As for the trip, I did really enjoy myself! I was so free because I was only on my own and got to go anywhere and everywhere I pleased.

Although I have learned a few things now:

1) To bring my f4 70-210mm lens instead of the heavier, slower, 75-300mm f4-5.6 lens (which was slightly overkill perhaps!).

2) To bring at least one flashgun (the onboard flash gun is quite pants, and I can't bounce or swivel it!).

3) To bring a tripod or use a higher ISO. (I was shooting at ISO 100, because I couldn't be bothered playing with the ISO settings for each shot. That made exposure kind of hard!)

4) To invest in a fast wide angle prime or faster wide angle zoom.

I have adjusted all the photos on my Deviant Art now, using RSE to play with Fill light, Saturation, Hue and finally Exposure Compensation to liven up the shots where required.

Then I used auto-level in Photoshop 7 on a few of the pics, before using IrfanView to add the border.

I am well pleased with the results though, best photos I have taken so far on my new Dynax 5D, even before manipulation.

Edit: Now I want to build my personal website, showcasing my work!

 

[Gamefreak501]

Would you belive it. In your shot 'classical band performing 2' I know the guy playing the violin with the red top on. Small world eh?

My goodness, what a small world!

Still - it was great music, I do like classical music amongst other things Just a shame I couldn't buy a CD!