Sydney Sunday Culture

[Deeno]

Ventured in to Sydney last weekend to catch a couple of Organ Recitals (yes, thats right) and feeling a little inspired from recent Omaroo and Octane outings, the D200 is set for black and whites and thrown over the shoulder.

Time restraints had me rushing about so, I never spent the time I had intended to playing with the camera.

Feel free to comment as I'm at a bit loss on processing these.

1. Fountain in Hyde Park

2. Church in Elizabeth St. Nine bracketed shots tone blended.

3.Pitt St United Church 1846. The first recital I went to featuring organist Robert Goode. Vocalist, Fiona Maconaghie and Verna Lee on the Harp.
Really entertaining with compositions from Rimsky-Korsakov, Henry Purcell, Brahms, Australian composer Graeme Rawson, a few traditional Scottish Songs and even Honeysuckle Rose by Fats Waller.

4. The 1910 Hill & Son pipe organ. Little sister to the Town Hall organ.
One of the best examples of this unmolested pneumatic action organ in Australia

5&6. A couple of old shots of St Mary's Cathedral I'd taken a couple of years ago. The venue for the second recital I attended. A more traditional recital featuring Robert Fox on the 1981 Canadian built Letourneau organ which is also connected to the 1942 Australian built
Whitehouse Bros. organ in the rear gallery.
The acoustics in this building are phenomenal. An indulgence of the sences.....

Thanx Deeno

[Omaroo]

Excellent Deeno :)

One of the great things that I find I love about black and white is that its often far more subtle on the eye than its equivalent colour version. Losing that extra dimension lets you see the whole picture, as it were, without the added distraction of colours fighting to be noticed. Tone is what matters, and with just light and dark areas to control you have so much more scope to be creative. With colour, you can end up simply being washed out on one end of the adjustment spectrum and over-saturated and plastic on the other.

I particularly like the shot in Hyde Park and also in the cathedral. The Hyde Park shot is a nice "street" photograph. It shows people in an uncontrived situation as a snapshot in time. This is what interests me more than anything these days, and I must admit that my interest in astrophotography has taken a big second place to this.

I hope you'll forgive me, I've taken the liberty to tweak a little and post back how I reckon these two could look given the high resolution originals. Ive simply brightened the Hyde Park image to show a fuller dynamic range and removed the quarter-segment of the street light from the top right of the image as it was distracting. The cathedral now has a little "film grain" associated with it, but it's difficult working with low resolution jpegs.

Nice effort - do more!!!

[Deeno]

Thanks Chris

Good advise and practise goes a long way so, I really appreciate
it!

I thought the black and whites you guys had posted were so cool, I love timeless quality they have.
Its funny, never thought to just sling the camera over the shoulder and leave the bag and tripod behind.....

Thanks Again
Deeno

P.S. Better?

[Omaroo]

Indeed better :) Both seem to have slight vignetting applied, and this works well in a scene with such a bright centre of interest. The tree's canopies make a great natural curtain. :thumbsup:

I'm even down to one camera on these trips now - either the digital or film version for the day, and just one lens. No swapping, just shooting. It's liberating not to have to drag a bag along with a plethora of choices stopping you from just stepping back or forward to fill the frame with an appropriate field of view given the lens you have on the day. With the rangefinders, I don't even have zoom capability or auto focus. Getting back to the basics - what fun. :)