Tag Archive for: contrast

Stairway to... Bucharest, Romania, 2016.

Stairway to… Bucharest, Romania, 2016.

My regular readers have now understood that I’m a very big fan of lines and graphical elements in my photos. It’s even something I really try to include in my photography, as my eyes are so attracted by geometrical shapes. During a recent trip to Bucharest I’ve found one of my new heavens… in a shape of a stairway.

It’s funny how in urban and street photography some great things happen when you don’t expect it. I don’t refer to the others’ behaviour, which is unexpected anyhow. I’m thinking about this kind of 6th sense that photographers tend to develop, like sniffing in the air that something is happening, that some place may be an interesting spot. It’s what happened when I was looking to buy a bottle of water close to Piata Unirii (Union Square). From all the shops around me, I’ve instinctively chosen the only one which was underground, with the entrance on one side, and the exit on the other side. And when reaching the exit… voilà.

I’ve found this metal stairway with walls made of undulated metal, such a great amount of lines! The sun was shining just in front of the exit, making the old man just a silhouette and the undulated metal shine in such an incredible way. I’ve just waited for the woman to reach the top of the stairs, and the photo was done. I wished I’ve shot more at this very spot, but the security guard was not in a good mood and asked me to leave. No problem, I know the place now, I’ll be back!

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EXIFs:

  • Camera:Fujifilm X100T
  • Aperture: ƒ/5.6
  • Focale: 23mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/125s
  • ISO: 400
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved

 

Contrast: Bright present, dark future

This photo was taken in Cluj-Napoca, Romania. It’s a photo that I really like, full of contrast. I don’t speak about its processing, here 🙂  Bright/dark, young/old, dark hair/white hair, white clothes/dark clothes… This young, beautiful, dark haired girl stands in the light while this older lady with a white hair and dark clothes stay in the dark. Is it a vision of her future? That may be!

While technically not perfect, it’s a photo I really like as it displays the 2 sides of women in Romania. On one side today’s beautiful girls, on the other side the older woman who lived during the communist era, a totally different life. Did I say contrast already? 🙂 It was a reflex shot, as I was roaming in the streets, on the phone, the camera in the other hand. I passed by them, hardly had the time to rotate by 135 degrees, take the camera to my eyes and shoot them. I wish I framed a bit more on the right, but one second later they both moved and the scene was gone.

For this photo, nothing really fancy on the processing side, just a black and white conversion with Adobe Lightroom and a few dodge and burn to give it a more 3D look.

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About this photo:

  • Camera: Canon 6D
  • Lens: Canon EF24-70mm f/2.8L II USM
  • Aperture: ƒ/5.6
  • Focale: 35mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/640s
  • ISO: 100
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2015