County Office Building, St Charles, MO

[The Barbarian]

Just before sunrise.

 

[amolitor]

Great technique, here. The light is non-existent, it looks like a drawing. The clouds are kind of a mess, but perhaps you wanted a painterly look up there?

The subject is pretty uninteresting, though. What's interesting, here? What am I supposed to be looking at, what's it supposed to mean to me, and why should I care about some office building with an empty parking lot? The USA is littered with what are essentially copies of this building. These are not questions meant to piss all over you, these are questions to make you think about what you're shooting. I'm sure this was a fair bit of work -- spend that effort and skill on something better!

 

[Parker219]

Dont mind him^. Lets come back to reality here, it is a very nice photograph. 99% of us can appreciate the building for what it is. The architecture is beautiful and you were able to pull a lot of detail out of the exterior.

With the micro smoothing turned down to bring out the building details, it also made some of the clouds look a little off. I'm sure you can play with the sliders till you find what you want though.

I do think I would like this picture better with a different sky, if you can you should go back and re-shoot at different times of day to see what comes out the best.

Thanks for sharing :thumbup:

 

[The Barbarian]

The subject is pretty uninteresting, though. What's interesting, here?

The architecture. Except for that unfortunate addition of an annex for HVAC, the building is pretty much untouched. If you know of another one like this, I'd be pleased to know where it is. Mostly, they were built along the three major rivers, but fires seem to have gotten most of them.

What am I supposed to be looking at, what's it supposed to mean to me, and why should I care about some office building with an empty parking lot?

Probably nothing, if you don't care for the subject matter. It was just at sunrise, BTW, so fairly long exposures which is probably why the clouds were so messy and the light so even.

The USA is littered with what are essentially copies of this building.

Tell us about that. Where? Not all limestone buildings are the same.

These are not questions meant to piss all over you, these are questions to make you think about what you're shooting. I'm sure this was a fair bit of work -- spend that effort and skill on something better!

Actually, not very much work. Four exposures, a bit of noise reduction, and the rest an attempt to deal with clouds moving during the shot. Otherwise, the HDR was pretty much a matter of adjusting local contrast to fit.

For me, buildings are interesting.