Downtown Breda NL

[Cem_Usakligil]

Hi All,

The other day, a friend of mine and I went to Breda, which is a historical town in the Netherlands, for some street photography. Unfortunately, the weather was very overcast so we did not have many keepers.

Some (almost) acceptable pictures are on display here should you want to take a look .

A famous old "brown" cafe in Breda: "De Bommel"

Enjoy, and in case you're in the mood, please let me know what you think about them ;-)

 

[Marian Howell]

wow, your country has *very clean* urinals LOL
actually, i like the above photo and think it captures your day pretty well. i like the angle of the bar and your exposure very much. it is frutrating when you don't have conditions you like, but sometimes it forces us to take photos away from our normal style. as we say in this country, "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade"!

 

[Cem_Usakligil]

Thanks a lot Marian for your feedback, I appreciate it.

The urinals were indeed very clean ("spick and span" as we Dutch say sometimes -LOL).

I actually had to resist the urge of staying in that cafe for the rest of the day for some heartwarming drinks instead of going out and taking some more pictures, but my hobby has won in the end. The exposure was indeed OK, but the camera was not on a tripod so I had to improvise a bit. I am happy with that picture myself too .

Cheers,

 

[Asher Kelman]

What is Konick Hoge Gisting? Is it a beer and how old is that sign do you think?

Also what's the story behind the place?

Re the bad weather: I love it then people rush around trying to get where they are going and one can photograph them with less bother and everything is more reflective.

Asher

 

[Eric Michelson]

Nice barroom image. Good atmosphere. The dog is great touch. I wish I was there. Just curious, what time of day was it made?

Eric

 

[Cem_Usakligil]

What is Konick Hoge Gisting? Is it a beer and how old is that sign do you think?

Also what's the story behind the place?

Re the bad weather: I love it then people rush around trying to get where they are going and one can photograph them with less bother and everything is more reflective.

Asher

Hi Asher. Yes, it is a very tasty famous Belgian beer brewed by De Koninck, for details see here. Unfortunately, I can't convey the great taste in writing, you'll have to come discover it yourself one day. The brewery was established in 1833, so the sign can be as old as 100+ years. My wild guess is that it is from 1930s or 40s.

The cafe is called De Bommel, a very famous one in this region. The name is taken from a cartoon character called Olie B. Bommel by Marten Toonder, a Dutch cartoon artist.

Olie B. Bommel:

I'll keep your advice re. bad weather in my mind, thanks!

Nice barroom image. Good atmosphere. The dog is great touch. I wish I was there. Just curious, what time of day was it made?

Eric

Yes, the dog was indeed a bonus. To be perfectly honest, I saw it walking towards me just after making the photo, must be due to the small/dark viewfinder of my 400D . I have some other pictures of the cafe as well, but this one I liked the most. It was 16:19 (4:19 PM) to be precise. Thanks to the EXIF info, we can nowadays find out when exactly we have messed up a potentially great photo in the making (LOL). Thanks for your comments, I appreciate it.

Cheers,

 

[Eric Michelson]

Hi Cem,

I would be interested in knowing if the raw file has detail in the lower part of the bar. It looks like there might be some interesting detail that might be worth bringing out. 12 bits of raw data might hold some detail.

I ask about time of day because it appears to be an "off-hour", an interesting time for photography in a bar.

Cheers!
eric

 

[Cem_Usakligil]

Hi Eric,

There is a lot more detail in the RAW file. I chose this particular exposure for maintaining the "atmosphere" of the image. Do you want me to mail you the RAW so that you can play around with it?

Cheers,

Cem

 

[Jörgen Nyberg]

Goedenavond Cem

My favorite is the bench, don't know why really, maybe something about straight lines and the small amount of fisheye effect...

Did you try it with some more of the legs showing?

Jörgen

Ps I don't speak dutch ;-) Only know Goedeavond and Dank Je

 

[Cem_Usakligil]

Goedenavond (i.e Good evening) Joergen ,

I have indeed another shot of the bench with more legs showing:

Cheers,

 

[Jörgen Nyberg]

Thank's Cem, I think you choosed the right one, the legs didn't add anything only distracted.

Jörgen

 

[Eric Michelson]

Goedenavond Cem,

Yes, may I look at the raw file please?. You can email it to eric at pixelleadership.com or provide a link to download from.

Best regards,
Eric

 

[Cem_Usakligil]

Hi Eric,

You can download the RAW image from the link I've just sent to you by PM.
As per OPF's regulations, here are the conditions of use (quoted from Asher from another thread) .

Add © Cem Usakligil 2007 to an edge and embed it in the EXIF to if you know how to......
License is given only to edit and repost here.....
Post at 800 pixels wide. Keep the original and layers at 16 BIT and in PSD form in case Cem needs it or OPF wants to publish it. In accordance with OPF policy, in return for sharing you donate and grant all artistic contributions you make to the original photographer.

If anybody else would like to have a go at the RAW, just let me know by PM please.

Cheers,

 

[Eric Michelson]

Hi again Cem,

There is a lot of information in that file! it's Amazing how much more than slide film and how easy it is to recover.

So here is my take on your interesting bar document.

I didn't reference your version posted here. But I note that mine has lower contrast as well as opened shadows, especially in the foreground. I understand your thinking about justifying sacrificing detail for the sake of keeping atmosphere as you envision. I respect that completely. Nonetheless-- the I personally find the detail interesting for documentary purposes.

Is there a professional critic who reads this site who can comment on such choices?

Best regards,
Eric

 

[Cem_Usakligil]

Very nice rendition Eric, thanks. As you wrote yourself, it is a matter of where one is coming from really. My goal was to reflect the cosy atmosphere of the bar. If one wants to have a documentary approach, your conversion is indeed much better. Even then, you haven't taken it to the limit since there is even more detail to be extracted from the RAW. Can I ask you which raw converter you've used?

Cheers,

Edit: Silly me, in hindsight I should have known that you probably must have used the C1 (LOL)

 

[Eric Michelson]

For this image I used Capture One PRO for Windows. I converted it to 16bit Tiff with embedded camera profile, the generic 400D profile that Phas One provides. In fact, come to think of it, it may still be embedded in the jpg image rather than changed to sRGB. Which may explain why the color is not that good. Actually I prefer the Mac version of Capture One but my work PC is more convenient for these sorts of things.

As I look at the image above it is not very close to the image seen in Capture One or Photoshop. I'm gonna repost the file with sRGB.

Edit: Image above now reposted in sRGB Color Space.

Cheers!
eric
www.pixelleadership.com

 

[Asher Kelman]

Your workflow is much appreciated Eric. Yes, these files are magnificdent compared to film.

I like that you have extracted more detail and the dog is easier to see. That's important in case you move too close to its master!

Asher