Stock Photography Libraries

[delmo]

Apologies for the orginal thread name (First post...wrong forum group).


Anyway here is one of my shots to have a look at.

If it's in a lane way, especially if its hard to find, then in Melbourne, that makes it cool.

[mikem12188]

It's a good idea, but the sunlight is blowing out parts of the sidewalk. In other words, it's too bright and you lose some of the details in the bricks. See if you can try it again, maybe on a cloudy day.
With black and white you have to be careful not to blow out the details.

[praesentire]

Not sure if it's humidity or some kind of smoke, but I love the way you can 'see' the atmosphere. The small glint of the sun adds a nice touch. The array of balconies is also very cool.

Assuming that the buildings are not leaning one way or the other, I would tilt the frame clockwise a little to straighten the vertical line.

As for exposure, I would try to move back from where you were at the same time of the day so that the sun is behind the dark part of the overhead shade. It may reduce some of the complexity in metering.

However, I suspect that this alone will not be enough to bring back the details on the street surface. Another thing you can try is to bracket the exposure and tone down the street surface only.

I think this lane is a gold mine for opportunities. It's very nice that the people in the scene are going about their own business oblivious to the camera. I'm inspired to go take a similar shot at a local market.

Thanks for sharing!

[clockdoc]

As others have said, you have an extreme of contrasts to work with here. Perhaps that was you original goal. I am sure a glossy print will look better than an image on a monitor. This type of work may be a good candidate for the High Dynamic Range technique that has been discussed here and in some of the other forums.