#project365 [day 91] Domed ceiling from the Schwarzman Building

NewYork_20150327_098

This is a detail shot of the domed ceiling on one of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building's stairwells. It depicts a glorious ornate Beaux-Arts architecture that can be found all over the main building of the New York Public Library. And although in day 84 that it would be my last image from this building, I couldn't resist adding this one to the project. 

-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : HDR photomerge, initial tone and final crop.
Photoshop: Perspective correction, clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.

#project365 [day 84] Down the corridor, at the NYPL

NewYork_20150327_081

This is my last image from the inside of the Stephen A. Schwarzian Building, the epicenter of the New York Public Library. I just loved the paneling work of the ceiling of this corridor, showing it proved a bit more complex than what I had expected. Shooting into a dark corridor that has a strong natural light source at the end is never simple. And this was one of the busiest corridors in the building, since at the end you could find the ladies washrooms. So I decided to point my lens more upward, and get the nice stone arch to frame the ceiling, and waited until there was only enough people in the scene to give it some idea of dimensions but not to become a distraction. And of course using exposure bracketing to get enough information in the shadows and highlights for post processing.

-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : HDR photomerge, initial tone and final crop.
Photoshop: Perspective correction, clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.

#project365 [day 81] Upstairs, Downstairs at the NYPL

NewYork_20150327_066

Another product of my wanderings along the Stephen A. Schwarzian Building of the New York Public Library, in Midtown Manhattan. And another stairwell, but this building is full of lovely details it's hard to stop rising the camera and creating another image. When I stopped here, there was a lot of people going up and down the stairs. So I waited a while until I had the stairs completely empty, but felt that the image was too sterile. After a few more minutes I could get a single figure walking up on the opposite side, this gave the scene some scale and a bit of movement. This only lasted a few seconds, as more people followed him. Here we have some very tricky lighting to contend with. The artificial light coming from the chandeliers is not strong enough to light the whole scene, and the natural light is very strong at the window, but very faint everywhere else. So I used exposure bracketing to try and get as much of the scenes details exposed correctly and some very light HDR techniques in post-production.

-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : HDR photomerge, initial tone and final crop.
Photoshop: Perspective correction, clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.

#project365 [day 34] Going through book cards at NYPL

Wandering inside the NYPL building, I found one of the small reading rooms actively being used for research. Looking through the cabinets full of book cards, one of the readers tries to find the right book. In an age of digital, where all information seems to be found at the click of a mouse, it seemed an action out of time. The Library seems to still be the guardian of old times, where a physical interaction was needed to be able to find what you wanted, and time had to be invested with delayed gratification.

Being an active reading room, I had to stay outside the door shooting through the glass, hence the reflections. But the action being capture seemed to outweigh the technical flaws of the image. Hope some agree... 

-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : Initial toning and final crop
Photoshop: Sharpening and clean up
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction