Today was one of those days that had meetings non-stop, including a 2-hour meeting that stretched right through lunch. I had no opportunity to get out for a photo during the day, so the only decent option left was a night photo after dinner. It's very common to take night photos of city skylines, or as I did the other night, do some nighttime street photography in the city, so I wanted to do something a bit different. Not too far from my house is this very busy strip in Johnston, Rhode Island near the junction of Routes 5 and 6. It's busy at any time of day, and I thought the lights of the traffic and the signs of the businesses lining the road would make an interesting scene. The decision to do it in black and white was a last minute choice, but I think it works a bit better this way. There's nothing special about this particular section other than there being a convenient place for me to park for the photo with a good selection of the lights I wanted to depict being visible on both sides of the street.
Post processing started with a classic filter in Topaz B&W FX. I adjusted color sensitivity sliders, adaptive exposure, regions, contrast, boost black, boost white, and protect highlights. I removed 50% of the noise using Neat Image, and then applied a levels adjustment in PSE.
For those interested in night photography, the settings were: ISO=3200, Mode=Aperture Preferred, Aperture = f/2.0, Shutter = 1/1000, Exposure Compensation = +1/3. White Balance was adjusted in Camera RAW on the conversion. Temperature was set to 3700, and Tone was +19 off center.
It's photos like these that we look at to understand the history of a place a couple of decades down the road. What is Riccotti's? If it's an Italian restaurant, is it good? I love mom and pop Italian places.
@cejaanderson It's interesting you say that since one of my goals is to try to capture those photos that will be "nostalgia images" fifty years from now. The scene may look common to us today, but then again, those faded street scenes with Model A Fords looked common back when they were taken! As to Riccotti's, it's a sandwich shop. They make what we call in Rhode Island, "Grinders." Other parts of the country call them subs, or heroes, or hoagies. It's one of my favorite grinder shops, though! If you want Italian food, I'll try to get a photo on Federal Hill one of these days. It's non-stop Italian food places the length of Atwells Ave.
@taffy Thanks for the follow, Taffy! I look forward to browsing through your album.
November 5th, 2013
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@taffy Thanks for the follow, Taffy! I look forward to browsing through your album.