I’m not sure what to do with this photo. It’s from a series that I did back in January where the goal was to take at least one photo per day all in B&W. It was just something fun to do that would rekindle some inspiration and help me in a time I was feeling very uninspired.
I chose B&W to give myself less to think about when shooting. Too often with color photos I want to edit the colors to make them pop or look more like they did in my mind’s eye when taking the photo. But with B&W that isn’t so much of an issue for me because now the photo looks nothing like it did when I was shooting and can it kind of be it’s own thing. I like that.
It’s challenging for me to edit any photo, and this one is no different. I like that without color you can pump the contrast and exposure and really darken the shadows and make it kind of how you want just in messing with the light sliders. I’m pretty happy with how the lighting turned out. I wanted it to be very contrasty much like tri-x but when I did that intentionally it felt kind of wrong so I backed out and went with this. Maybe because the image is too clean and most of the shots I’ve seen on tri-x are very rough, gritty, etc.
As for the framing and whatnot, this photo is quite cropped. Originally I did not notice the man lying on the bench and was moreso just taking a shot of the tracks to pass the time waiting for the train. When I got back to view the photos I liked the way he was off to the side on the right of the frame but he wasn’t the focus. So I cropped in maybe like 25% to get the frame we have here.
I like the emptiness/loneliness of the photo, but I feel like it’s a bit too empty and is missing something to tie it all together nicely. I would have liked it better if maybe there was a group of people waiting near the man but no one was paying him any attention, just like I didn’t notice him at first.
So, what are your thoughts on the edit? Should I go full crazy and blast the heck out of that contrast slider? Should I have cropped differently? I just feel like this could be a great photo and it’s one I look at often. It just needs a little something more in my opinion.
ISO 100 | 50mm | f8 | 1/100s
Before I got to the “tri-x” comment in you explanation - the only thing I felt was lacking was some beautiful grain of a good ‘ol film photo. (Something to rough it up). The darkness of the photo reminds me of shooting with Poloroid Polapan (a film I loved so much in art school). It had the richest blacks and was moody like nothing else.
I also agree that you shouldn’t pump up the contrast any more. I like the cropping you did. The eye runs down the platform to the sign and back up the rail. I also don’t think having more people in the photo would have improved it. I think it would have made it too noisy. It feels implied that the man sleeping on the bench was forgotten because no one is there.
That missing grain is a lot of what is missing from the whole black and white January series! Haha Anyways, I’m happy to hear it reminds you of film school.
I feel gross adding in grain though, it just feels disingenuous to me. Guess I just need to get in on the film stuff but I don’t have the patience for all that….yet! And it was popular before my time so I have NO experience with it & it’s so expensive to learn!
I’m glad you like it as-is. Thank you so much for your input :)
Yeah - I’m with you on adding in grain. I’ve never felt comfortable with doing it on digital images.
Film is very expensive. Even back in the day it was expensive - but that cost was a great way to slow down the work and force you to think through the whole image. I miss the entire process, but love the immediacy of digital. Maybe try large format class? Like this: https://theimageflow.com/photography-classes/large-format-photography/