View Full Version : Beetham Tower
Apologies for blowing my own trumpet here… :o
Got some photos of buildings published in this months 'Black and White Photography'. I was pleased they included this one, as it's the first digital photo I took with the express purpose of convering it to monochrome.
Upto now, I've always shot film if I wanted black and white, but I'm starting to come around to accepting converting digital colour images to monochrome.
Anyroadup, this is the Beetham Tower in Manchester, which is at 171m tall the tallest residential building in Britain.
http://dpnow.com/galleries/data/500/medium/beetham_tower.jpg
Wow I feel dizzy just looking at this. Powerful display of height here and I like the obvious comparison with the lamp standard.
I'll leave the techy stuff to the experts. I just like it for the effect it had on me.
A terific image all round, no wonder they published it, viewpoint, composition and processing first class in my humble opinion. What a stroke of luck the lamp post being in the right place, and a brilliant piece of observation on your part.
You'll have me blushing.
I always carry a spare lamp post just in case…
I should point out this was about my tenth attempt to photograph this building. Perhaps one day I'll be able to take a decent photo of a building without converging verticals!
You'll have me blushing.
I always carry a spare lamp post just in case…
I should point out this was about my tenth attempt to photograph this building. Perhaps one day I'll be able to take a decent photo of a building without converging verticals!
Its easy enough to de-converge verticals (using the free transform tool) but it would spoil this great photo which relies on it to convey its height. Just imagine living up there!!!
You'll have me blushing.
I always carry a spare lamp post just in case…
I should point out this was about my tenth attempt to photograph this building. Perhaps one day I'll be able to take a decent photo of a building without converging verticals!
Hey along with everything else, it is the dramatic converging verticles that make the image stand out, if you want to spoil it you can always use software such as PS or PSP, or get a very very long pole and stick ya camera atop that, or buy a very very expensive shift lens:D ;)
Stephen
06-01-07, 11:10 PM
I should point out this was about my tenth attempt to photograph this building. Perhaps one day I'll be able to take a decent photo of a building without converging verticals!
I'm not entirely sure what you mean here David. Are you saying that your usual building shots are a bit naff unless you point the camera up and get the converging verticals, or that they usually suffer from Converging verticals anyway :)
Obviously the impact of this shot is from the exagerated CV's, but then its not really a photo of a building is it, more a geometric shape that happens to be a building in juxtapsition with the contrasting lines of the lampost.
Personally I don't think I would have thought to have included the post, and I'm a little undecided about it even now. :) If I'm honest the image doesn't do a great deal for me, and I'm not sure why. Maybe its because of the camera angle eliminating everything else and the only real point of reference is the lampost, even that shows a false perspective.
I've actually used this building in some of my own shots around Manchester. It dominates the whole of the city IMO with its mega monolithic style, but I managed to use it as a background to a much older part of the city. THIS (http://www.pbase.com/steveanstey/image/66090769.jpg) was my shot, you may have seen it before
That's a cracking shot Stephen.
In this shot I thought I'd make the most of the converging verticals.
My original comment was a moan that nearly all my building shots have them and I think I should try to have more variety.
Congratulations DTD. For some time now, I have been planning to take some shots of tall buildings angled from the corner. You must be very pleased with yourself to get it published.
Audrey
I'm not entirely sure what you mean here David. Are you saying that your usual building shots are a bit naff unless you point the camera up and get the converging verticals, or that they usually suffer from Converging verticals anyway :)
Obviously the impact of this shot is from the exagerated CV's, but then its not really a photo of a building is it, more a geometric shape that happens to be a building in juxtapsition with the contrasting lines of the lampost.
Personally I don't think I would have thought to have included the post, and I'm a little undecided about it even now. :) If I'm honest the image doesn't do a great deal for me, and I'm not sure why. Maybe its because of the camera angle eliminating everything else and the only real point of reference is the lampost, even that shows a false perspective.
I've actually used this building in some of my own shots around Manchester. It dominates the whole of the city IMO with its mega monolithic style, but I managed to use it as a background to a much older part of the city. THIS (http://www.pbase.com/steveanstey/image/66090769.jpg) was my shot, you may have seen it before
No Stephen, I have not seen this one before. I love the colourings - so subtle and what an interesting sky to surround the tall building.