A night at the opera

[jetrim]

I need some technical assistance with this one. I'm not sure how to capture it properly, as this place is lit well enough to be seen from space! Here's the relevent specs:

Exposure time: 15 sec.
F number: 11
Exposure program: M
ISO speed rating: 100
Aperture: 7
Brightness: -2.83
Exposure bias: -2.5
Metering mode: 5
Light source: 0
Flash: 0
Lens focal length: 70

Even dropping the E/V by 2.5 I STILL had to add a 35% opacity burn layer over the building (more than that and noticable splotches started to appear) while lightening the background, and there are still parts of the building that are blown out, anybody got any suggestions?

[Frog]

Technical stuff isn't my forte' but did you try faster shutter speeds, say 10 sec?

[EOSThree]

I would try a neutral density filter with the dark side toward the bottom. You'll lose some detail in the bottom half of the photo.

An hdr technique would also work here, metering off of the building and bracketing, then combining the photos.

[SmartWombat]

My thought exactly, neutral density but upside down from its usual use to darken the sky at the top - to darken the building at the bottom instead.

If it's one of the ones that comes in a frame (Cokin?) instead of a circular one that covers the whole lens, then you can perhaps slide it up a little and uncover the road in front og the building - making the neutral density more of a band across the image instead of going all the way to the bottom.

You may find shooting in RAW mode gives you extra colour space to do the editing, so the blotches don't show up. If not, then shoot two pictures and edit them together. One exposing for the sky and one exposing for the building.

[Greg McCary]

I have thought about the upside down ND grad a couple of times but have never tried it and I am not to big on HDR's. I agree with opening the aperature and dropping the shutter speed. Also if you shoot RAW the exposure, lights, darks, fill light ect. can be more forgiving. I have actually tried a polarizer a time or two at night to help kill some glare. I think a little earlier before the lighting on the building had got to harsh would be a better solution.

[SmartWombat]

I wouldn't use HDR, I don't like the effect.
I was thinking of just layering the two images.

[jetrim]

Thanks for the input guys, the spot is close enough that I may try all three suggestions and see which works best.