Yesterday morning I rose very early and went to work through first drizzling rain and then some snowflakes, almost alone on the streets at the end of the night. After eleven hours of work I took a different way home, again in the dark and again in such fine weather 🙂
The results were some quarter-decent images with a potential to raise them to maybe three quarters in Photoshop. I tried some of them and this is one that I like pretty well. The pose of the person could be more dynamic, on the other hand the odd silhouette with seemingly only one leg has something disturbing, so I won’t complain 🙂
The Song of the Day? “A Walk In The Dark” is once more from David Byrne’s 1992 album “Uh-Oh”. See a video on YouTube.
There are 14 comments
Seinberg (2009-01-29)
The umbrella being visible at the top of the frame really makes the picture, I think. No longer does it seem like the person walking in the alley is scary, but that the perspective of the viewer, his/her motive perhaps stalking the person in the dark alley, becomes the dark aspect.
Markus Spring (2009-01-29)
Umbrella trick again - definitely working through that perspective it creates. And don't complain about the weather as long as it creates such gorgeous sceneries. The lighting is marvellous with the shadow of the person sharply dividing the image.
Andreas (2009-01-30)
Thanks. I didn't even think about the sinister predator perspective. I had to use the umbrella to slightly shade off the extremely strong light from the construction site ahead 🙂
Susanne49 (2009-01-30)
Sehr eindrueckliche Aufnahme. Ich mag das Spiel mit Licht und Schatten. Die Person im Bild macht das Ganze sehr dynamisch.
Sue's Daily Photography
J. L. T. (2009-01-30)
Lovely again, next I aspect you observating bycicles by night, with rain and umbrella ;-)) sunny greets
Bill Birtch (2009-01-30)
I just finished watching Werkmeister Harmonies (again), a Hungarian movie by Bela Tarr and this immediately put me in mind of its dark, sombre street scenes. Loving it.
Andreas (2009-01-30)
So so, "Werkmeister Harmonies". A friend of mine always tells me how sad it is that I don't go to the movies any more. In a way he's right, but, you know, one can only do so many things, and I really have my share 🙂
I've just watched the 10 minutes "Opening scene" on YouTube, and, yes, I can see what you mean. Thanks for the hint.
Larry J. Patrick (2009-02-03)
Nice shot. You did a really good job capturing the mood of the scene.
Andreas (2009-02-03)
Photoshop sometimes helps a lot. I was originally attracted to the colors in the scene. The wall to the left is yellow, the woman wears a red coat, the light in the background is from a construction site and is strongly greenish-white, the other street lights are orange, but along with the strong contrast it did not work that well.
Then I tried a B&W adjustment layer with setting "Maximum Black", which here is equivalent to a strong blue filter, and that gave me a completely different, darkly sinister mood. I liked it and kept to that.
julie (2009-02-03)
I don't have much to add except that it's a beautiful image and makes me want to make the effort to shoot at night. This is so much more than just acceptable - give yourself credit where it's due...
Paul (2009-02-03)
I keep coming back and looking at this. It has such a cinematic feel about it, similar to an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Lots of implied drama, here! Excellent.
1150 – A Walk In The Dark II | Photographer’s Blog (2009-12-07)
[...] of the Day is “A Walk In The Dark” from David Byrne’s 1992 album “Uh-Oh”. I know, I have already used this song and it would not have been that hard to find another title, but it’s so good, I just had [...]
Esther Emma (2009-12-09)
light is stunning, love the motion pretty dark lyric, but that's my opinion ;-) reminds me of the motion picture 'The Third Man' (Interesting movie qua photography) example (behind the link beneath) of the use of light in the movie. quit similar to yours 🙂 [http://www.daniellight.co.uk/uploaded_images/ThirdMan-779688.jpg]
Barry Armer (2009-01-29)
I think you have to give this one more than three quarters Andreas!
I like it a lot. To me it is very dynamic and of course very dramatic!
Well done!
Barry
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