Castle in Ukraine

[sbrigby]

Castle in Ukraine that was bombed during WW2.

[CLKunst]

Welcome to the Forum Sbrigby,

I'm confused. . . are these old pictures that you are digitally restoring or are they new pictures that you are trying to make old? I really like your second photo (upshot of the tower) as an abstract although it makes me nervous to look at. Hard to believe it's not all going to fall down in a moment and that it hasn't already. I look forward to seeing more of your photos.

Regards,

[sbrigby]

That's kind of funny that it's hard for you to tell. I guess in that I achieved my goal of making them look old. I took these this summer when I was in Ukraine on a missions trip. They're two out of 2,000 pictures that I took.

I am considering entering these into a high-school art competition, and would like some input from some other photographers. I have been experimenting with some different editing techniques. My limits in the contest are pretty much no spot-editing, and mainly "darkroom editing". The above pictures, with the exception of the vingette on the one, meet the guidelines of the competition.

Thanks for your input/critique!

[MB1]

The subject is quite interesting but the photo quality sucks. Grainy, color off, contrast issues and blown highlights.

I'm not saying you couldn't win a competition with one of these, just not if I was a judge.

[sbrigby]

I'm not sure if you picked up on this but the grain, off color, and "contrast issues" were intentionally done to make it look like an old photo. As far as the blown highlights which photo and where are they, because I have not noticed them.

The 3rd and 4th picture I do not see any grain issues, or poor picture quality.

[GB1]

sbrigby - Jumping into the debate here, though I can't quite articulate why, I've seen enough old photos to say that while they look similar they do not quite look like old photos to me. They do look processed.

However -- note that I don't mean this as something to discourage you from the attempting this. It just seems like they're not quite 'right' yet. I have no idea how to recommend how to do it though (gee, that was a lot of help !).

I bet the old Soviet Union is full of bombed out ruins. I read a lot on the German-Russian part of the fighting in ww2....

G

[jkriminger]

I think your crop is too tight and the foreground is not appealing. The subject..old ..or ruined..is kinda flat. Maybe a wide angle from a different perspective would bring you into the pic more..?

[reverberation]

I really like the photos. I also think MB1 raises valid points concerning contrast and grain. You say you are trying to make them look old. Grain in a photo like yours speaks to me more of time, sand in a bottle etc. To make a photo look old I would try manipulating exposure rather than grain. Soften it by underexposing and make it look like a wetplate. There is alot you can do to it other than grain and yellowing to make it look old. I think with the correct exposure manipulation you would not need to add the coloring. The only correct exposure is the one that achieves your vision. F-stop here would be considerably more important than shutter speed.

[gahspidy]

I agree that these look like recent digital shots that were of either low quality, or manipulated to look old. My first impression before reading anything was that these were shot with a low resolution point and shoot camera. That being said, I do still like them. My choice for best is the second down from the top. This one is contrasty but not too much as the first. Colors are more pleasing and subtle. The "grain" looks like a low resolution digital image (pixelation). I still like the "rawness" of it. Compositionally it is quite good.
I also like the last one looking up through the tower.
The third image is just all wrong as far as my opinion goes. the vignetting does not look right. The colors look wrong.
I like #2 and #4.