2 cities in 2 days

The Boomerang (1 Blackfriers)

This photo of "The Boomerang", was taken from near the middle of the Millennium Bridge, (the footbridge in line with St Paul's Cathedral).

At first the light was very flat but it showed promise as a few breaks in the clouds were starting to blow across. Coming back 15 minutes later paid off.  The bright reflections off of the glass highlight the shape of the building and the blue cast. This is at odds with the building behind in green. The dark cloud behind best highlights the building with the more interesting sky filling the otherwise big void.

​

The "Blackfriers Railway Bridge", originally built in 1886 is another prominent part of the composition. The geometric regular pattern of the  "Solar" roof sections create the effective horizon with the graceful arches framing the Thames river.

​

You don't need a zoom lens always, the seemingly underrated 50mm is often the only lens you need. The natural perspective of this focal length is ideal when the composition allows.
 

50mm, 1/200, f/14, iso 100 

Helter Skelter & Cheese Grater

Contrasts in the buildings are stark here and the interesting weather on the day helped to pull this out a little. Whilst the "Helter Skelter" has it's head in the clouds, the "Cheese Grater" adds some variation to vertical lines. In the foreground buildings range from a 19th century Tea Warehouse to 1970's styled redeveloped buildings.

​

Timing was also important here, the wind was strong and the sky changing rapidly. Here the glass buildings are reflecting a bright sky to the right of the photo, while the highest is in the base of the darker cloud, the foreground is a contrast with low lighting.

​

85mm, 1/200, f/14, iso 100

Hong Kong Skyline

Here the way the sky can influence a photo is very apparent. The sky can and does play a big part in an image, but don't forget the reflections also. The water's surface completely changes and here is a clear example. Obvious when you think about it, but when concentration on camera settings and composition, weather changes etc. it can be forgotten.

​

This image is broken into two halves with a very different character to each, even the building materials on the right are warmer than all but one on the left where the glass keeps it cold.

​

The composition is dictated here by the distance from the subject, 22mm was the appropriate focal length to keep out the less interesting wider areas, it doesn't effect the perspective unless you move back or forth. There was plenty of light with nothing to close so playing with settings would have taken concentration away from the composition and timing. Enough light for iso100 don't change it, enough DOF with f/10 don't change it, shutter speed is all which is needed to set. Keep it simple sometimes works.

​

I personally don't like excessive editing and sometimes extreme editing looks like just that. All that was done here was a little contrast increase in the clouds so they didn't look muddy.

​

22mm, 1/320 sec, f/10, iso 100

Walkie Talkie office lights

With a little help from a polarising filter and a break in the otherwise cloudy sky,  the office lights show a uniform pattern and add interest to an otherwise ordinary photo. To the naked eye the lights were were visible but not as dominant, but with too much CPL the sky wouldn't remain true, so a balance was found.

​

A little contrast addition to the whole image is the only edit, but almost not needed.

​

This is full field 16mm hence care with the CPL. f/13 was needed as the DOF necessary was huge, iso 100 for detail so 1/50 left for the shutter.

​

With the 5Ds 16-35mm f2.8 combination, the mass and soft shutter action can easily be handheld at longer than 1/8 sec without wind.

​

16mm 1/50 sec, f/13, iso 100

Hong Kong Imperial Hotel

There was one simple though in this shot and due to the amount of space and minimal lighting. The building is 26 Nathan Road Hong Kong, quite low key compared to many buildings here but more interesting for me than most.

​

This was dark, very dark, there was no lighting on this side of the building which helped to bring out the vey low key lighting. Normally I like trees and natural elements but here the tree could not be bypassed and with the relative distances involved it was impossible without a tripod the have the leaves sharp, even with a heavy 5Ds, at 85mm f/1.8 the the wind gave a lowest shutter speed of 1/125 to stabilise things.

​

This night shot contrasts well with the Walkie Talkie photo here.

​

85mm 1/125 sec,  f/1.8, iso 640

An old Junk?

This river crossing, (big Taxi), is largely to add interest for tourists and it certainly succeeds. As you can see from another image here it's running more or less 24/7.

​

Anyway here it was turning slowly before heading back to mainland Hong Kong from Hong Kong Island.

​

With the weather on the day being a relatively constant flat bright grey sky and the modern buildings being aluminium, concrete and glass there are not many strong colours to fill a photo, this presented the chance.

​

The settings in the camera were very unorthodox as there was so little time to play with as the boat quickly turned, being hidden before. 85mm was the right length f/3.2 would not be the choice here but distances were such that I got away with it.

​

85mm, 1/1250 sec, f/3.2, iso 100

Huge night view

This view was taken from a snack lounge on floor 17 of my Hotel. You can imagine the view was huge, but as it was through glass not 100 clear and there were internal lights, finding a composition was not straightforward.

​

This was the better of a few images where there were extremes of lighting from near completely dark with not easily visible building lights to ultra-bright LCD advertising screens atop the buildings.

​

The 85mm compression effect allows the very distant signs to light up a seemingly too long stretch across the water, but it works very well. 

​

Here a tripod would help, but without the subject matter is able to overcome some limitations, Stopping down would have helped as the shutter speed could be lower, but when you're trying to be inconspicuous in a small space being steady handed is not always simple. As such this is only a social media image, not good enough for too much critique, but is an interesting record of a trip not possible with a mobile phone.

​

85mm, 1/160 sec, f/1.8, iso 640

Railway Station Architechture

West Kowloon railway station is huge in every direction, but the whole building is designed around a vast open space. There is lots of glass around the lower level but this is just a small section of the roof.

​

This award winning building is designed with climate management in mind, the roof naturally expels warm air to minimise the needs of air conditioning.

​

This part of the journey was testing a lens I opted not to get, however even with the lens quality limitations, (Canon 70-300 f/4.5 DO), enough detail is still present for the whole image with sweeping the geometry not demand cropping or pixel peeping so the image quality works. You don't always need high quality equipment to get some good photos. When travelling plan the compositions around what you have with you.

​

70mm, 1/250 sec, f/4.5, iso 400