Quincy Mine Boiler House

[ELAY]

Re the stopping down, I agree that diffraction may come into play at f/16 and beyond (at least that is what they say -- never shot there myself). But in this kind of shot, stopping down will give you a larger DOF -- so why not if the light supports it? No down side whatsoever, and the upside is improved sharpness throughout.

As for the smokestack and the fore/middle/back thing, I understood that this was what you are doing. The problem I think is that there aren't enough cues in the photo -- whether receding ground, size cues, leading lines, haze, or whatever, you need something that allows us to connect the fore/mid/back objects in a way that conveys the depth.

[ScooberJake]

This shoot looks great and has a lot of potential!

My thought is that you might be trying to do too much. I see a couple different shots here. One is the foreground building, with that great crumbling roof line and the beautiful rust color that contrasts with the sky and/or snow. A second would be the tall building and smokestack, with the cool silouhette of the building skeleton shot through the window and maybe the smokestack as another interest. A third shot, which I think is the one that you took, would be the overall shot, showing the depth of the buildings. I think maybe the proximity and/or tight crop may be working against you here.

Pretty cool that you will likely have a chance to go back there. Where is this mine?

[Tafnap]

I like the color, what I don't like is all the lines keeps taking me away from the smoke stack or the smoke stack almost dead center. What if you did it more like a panoramic picture to include more right and left or which ever way has more intersting things to see?

I see why you like it maybe be even better as two pictures one more left and one more right making the stack either in the left side of one of the pictures and in the right hand side in the other.

[dcclark]

ScooberJake,

Thanks for the comment. I would like to take a shot through the building skeleton, which is pretty amazing. Also, yes a vertical crop will probably remove some distractions and emphasize the height of the stack.

The mine is literally a stone's throw away, up here in upper Michigan. It's like Eddie Izzard said about castles in Europe: "Tourists think they're so romantic. But sometimes you just want to go to the store -- there's always a frickin' MINE in the way!"