First night shot attempt

[Harry S.]

A friend of mine who runs a candy shop/patisserie asked me to shoot some pics of his shop for a gourmet guide.
For the outside view he wanted a night shot, so I tried my best.
This pic is a composite of two bracketed shots (with the AFS 28-70). I have no experience with this kind of shooting, so let me know what you think and what I might do different next time. The warm colors were intentional.

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[fks]

hi harry-

the bench, tree, garbage can, post and sign are all working against you. the sign can easily be moved out of the way (or rotated 90deg to be visible if the text is important). can you move the garbage can out of the way? if not, can you try a different angle to minimize their intrusion (maybe a little higher up, or from off to the side.

ricky

 

[Harry S.]

hi harry-

the bench, tree, garbage can, post and sign are all working against you. the sign can easily be moved out of the way (or rotated 90deg to be visible if the text is important). can you move the garbage can out of the way? if not, can you try a different angle to minimize their intrusion (maybe a little higher up, or from off to the side.

ricky

Thanks Ricky!

You know, I had to live with that situation. The only thing that could be removed is the sign right from the tree (I think this is most disturbing). The garbage bin (and of course the tree) are fixed. There was also the "No Parking" post on front of the garbage bin, so I had to choose an angle to get the narrow side of it.

I think I will send your reply to the town government :lol: :lol:

BTW - "Kodakan" sounds very Indonesian/Malaysian to me, at least they have a lot of similar conversions

 

[cwilt]

You could make the tree part of the image. Use an SB600/800 on remote and shoot it up into the tree....

Just a thought.

With a chainsaw, chain, and a big enough truck anything can be moved.

 

[fks]

hi harry-

sounds like you made the most of a tough situation. that's the tough thing about shooting architecture, the environment is usually fixed.

filipinos are part of the indo-malay group (despite what americans think, we are NOT pacific islanders), and i think some tagalog words are similar to indonesian words. it's possible that we share grammar too. i'm not a linguist though, so you'll have to take it all with a grain of salt.

ricky

Thanks Ricky!

You know, I had to live with that situation. The only thing that could be removed is the sign right from the tree (I think this is most disturbing). The garbage bin (and of course the tree) are fixed. There was also the "No Parking" post on front of the garbage bin, so I had to choose an angle to get the narrow side of it.

I think I will send your reply to the town government :lol: :lol:

BTW - "Kodakan" sounds very Indonesian/Malaysian to me, at least they have a lot of similar conversions

 

[JMartin]

a couple suggestions...

Harry

I would indeed move the sign from the right of the tree, it is very disturbing. The trash can and street sign don't bother me as much. One other thing to look at is the sign to the left of the door. Is there a way to tone down the amount of light inside it? That bright light tends to pull my eye there each time I look back at the image.

Beyond that, as fks stated, I would try a few different angles, from a ladder to get an elevated point of view. Try an angle from more to the right or left side, also try these elevated.

Take cwilts idea a little further, put a couple flashlights with colored gels in the tree well pointing up to light the under side of the tree and add some color outside.

Since all you see to the left inside the store is the brown display case, make the bench work for you. Add a couple sitting on the bench enjoying some of your friends candy... place the bag or opened package on the bench next to them. You don't need to emphasize it, but he bench has a wide enough opening that you should be able to give the viewer the idea of what it is based on the others inside the store.

Hope this helps,
Joe

 

[Kevin Scott]

Harry,
When I looked at the picture at first, I oooh-ed inside. I really like the color of the image. After I read some of the replies, I went back to look at these distractions. I did notice the bench and the tree and thought they added something to the image--darkness against the bright. As for the other elements, the sign can be moved (?), the sign post could easily be cloned out because of how you shot it, the garbage can would take a bit more work but could be cloned out.

Burn in some of the hot spots if they bother you--they don't bother me. The tree---hmmmm maybe the spot-lit idea would be good to try but it's really not that awful, IMHO.

It's a photo of a store that I would visit, but that could be because I'm a choco-holic!

 

[Harry S.]

Thanks all, your input was really helpful. However, to carry out all the suggestions I would need the management scale of the movie industry :lol:
The photos were a favour for a friend and not a large scale contract so the efforts had to stay within certain boundaries. Anyway, I will keep your suggestions in mind for follow-up projects.
But at least I will remove the post right of the tree (I already removed a big commercial plaque on the left wall).

For Kevin "choco-holic" Scott:
I will post a pic of their products later in this thread so get prepared for some heavy Pavlovian reaction :lol:
I guess you have seen the movie "Chocolate" with Juliet Binoche and Johnny Depp? It's one of my absolute favorites.

cheers