Turning Day into Night- abandoned hotel in scary part of town

[sk66]

So there's this abandoned hotel I drive by occasionally and I've had this idea to do a picture that would convey is state of decay, but also give a feeling that the building hasn't quite "given up"... I envisioned a night shot with it's broken neon light shining what it could....

Now this building is in a scary section of town...The idea of walking down there to take a picture at night isn't very appealing... So I just took this image during the day... I went for mid morning because I wanted the strong lighting/contrast.



For the final result I wanted something with some color to the entire image, like strong moonlight or the end of evening just before black. The idea there was to prevent a complete "horror flick, bates hotel" feel....

To achieve this was fairly simple....
First I adjusted the originals perspective and cropped the image. Duplicate the layer and turn off the visibility of the original.

Duplicate visible layer and invert it's color ("invert" or "negative") change overlay mode to hue and reduce opacity to about 50%...This creates a basically b/w image, but it "feels" more like night than a simple B/W conversion)

Merge the layers and make some basic shadow/highlight and brightness/contrast adjustments to suit for the "time of night" desired.

Next was to create the glowing neon.

Create new empty layer. Select suitable brush tip with hard edge and color (I used orange).
Trace over the existing tubes (shft-click "connects the dots" as you go)
Once done duplicate that layer 2 times.
Blur each copy with gausian blur (second copy more than the first) and adjust their opacity levels...I also adjusted their hue to more of a yellowish orange. You could also take the original tubes layer and apply a neon glow filter to it...I tried it but didn't like it for this image...

Next "merge visible" This will leave you with an image something like this


A little too cold IMO...So I duplicated the original background layer adjusted it for a dramatic look (topaz type of effect) using highlight/shadows.
Changed the "b/W" layer more to hard light.

Copy to new layer and change mode to "screen" to lighten it up a little and add some contrast.
This is what I ended up with...



I realize the images look very dark at this size (at least on my computer). It really needs to be viewed at a larger size to discern the differences. http://www.flickr.com/photos/skersti...69514/sizes/l/
So, did I accomplish my goal? I think I came pretty darn close....what do you think?

[Steve@C4]

If you don't mind me asking... What street is this hotel on? I see the Harris St sign but cant place the Hotel. I'm thinking like 6th and Harris? I work in Strawberry Square. Anyway... 'Nuff bout me. This is a great conversion. Nice comp. Nice execution.

Steve

[sk66]

Originally Posted by Steve@C4

If you don't mind me asking... What street is this hotel on? I see the Harris St sign but cant place the Hotel. I'm thinking like 6th and Harris? I work in Strawberry Square. Anyway... 'Nuff bout me. This is a great conversion. Nice comp. Nice execution.

Steve

7th and Harris. Not a very good place to be after dark....