Urbane IVCalm and Serene or
Hectic, Unquiet City --
A Dichotomy

The third in my series of images from the recent Julia Anna Gospodarou workshop in New York is titled Urbane IV. It’s also part of my Urbane series of cityscapes and urban architectural images.

The caption is:

Calm and Serene or 
Hectic, Unquiet City —
A Dichotomy

This image of Downtown NYC was made from from Brooklyn at Brooklyn Bridge Park.

My intent was to create a dreamy, calm, atmospheric, soft image that contrasts with the structure and harsh angularity of the City, presenting a dichotomy. What’s the reality? I believe they both can be real depending on one’s mindset, vantage point and perspective. The idea was to create that duality by using a long exposure to soften the water and the sky, and by using local contrast on edges to make certain buildings stand out. 

This particular vantage point was spectacular in that there were the strong lines in the foreground water leading into the downtown area, and especially to the brightest building in the center. The weather was generally clear that morning but luckily there were enough faint clouds that I was able to coax them out in post processing to create the soft sky with fluid-like clouds.

I visited this vantage point a few days earlier but was not pleased with the images due to the flat lighting, so I returned. It seems there is always something to forget to check. On the return visit the tide was about 1 to 1.5 feet higher, but luckily the center line of posts was not completely submerged.

The exposure was 5 minutes and 27 seconds using a 16 stop neutral density filter and a polarizing filter. The image was made with a Fujifilm GFX100S medium format camera and 50mm Fujinon lens.