Kit
Senior Member
Hey hi.
How did you manage to shoot with a plain dark sky background?
This is coool man I super like huge contrast b&w pictures
Thank you. Re-posting the info again.
Usually, these were done in the early evening around 17:30 to 18:30 where the sun angle is low. Pre-requisites are blue, cloudless skies and strong ambient light. All were shot underexposed by around 2 stops because I need to deepen the skies further(to almost pitch black after converting to B&W) and at the same time, controlling the highlights and midtones since they were exposed to very strong ambient lighting. That leaves the darker areas appearing to be in shadow.
Knowing what you are shooting is just as important to make full use of good weather conditions. For the Esplanade, the decision to go with B&W is because the sunshaders are reflecting light at different angles. That means I get a variety of grey tones to articulate the essence of the roof design.
B&W is also an excellent way to isolate your subjects. The distraction of colours are eliminated as in the case of Shaw Tower. Also shot in the early evening and strange as it may appear, the setting sun missed the top portion of the building. So the emphasis falls on the lit portion of the building. The shadowed area thus accentuate the converging perspective further.
Some exceptions though. The Church of St. Mary of the Angels was shot close to noon time. In all honesty, I was quite surprised to have the harsh sunlight shinning directly onto the cross. So the idea came, using the light to isolate the cross. Since the light was too strong, I underexposed the shot to keep the highlights under control. Like I said earlier, I don't really care about the darker areas. With a little further darkening of the corners, that's what I got. Flare was an added bonus I guess.
