In April of this year I had a bit of an epiphany on the virtues of better composition in the field, and in particular better basics with respect to untilted horizons, and making sure my architectural shots were squared up instead of leaning left or right. Unfortunately my Los Angeles trip preceded this revelation, and my shots of this building are kind of a mess. Reviewing them, I still like many elements in this one, including the reflections in the bottom window.
I figured a black and white treatment would emphasize the patterns and shapes, and found a Silver Efex Pro 2 Preset for Portraits that added a white vignette that sort of hides, or at least compensates, for some of the weird compositional angles and tilting in the shot.
It was only after I finished treating the image that I checked the metadata and realized that this is an iPhone shot, which I likely took solely for the location data, and meant to use only to help supply that location info for the other shot I took with my Olympus Pen. So I probably gave zero thought to composition to this image anyway, but I now think it ended up better than the shots that I paid more attention to in the field.
This is 617 West Seventh Street in Downtown Los Angeles. It began its life as headquarters of the Union Oil Company, then for a while was known as the A.G. Bartlett Building and later the Security Pacific Bank Building. Now it goes just by its street address. Those are apparently Chicago-style bay windows running up to the top of the building.
Dave DiCello
2 Nov 2011What a cool shot from the iPhone man, I love the abstract feel to it
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Jim Denham
2 Nov 2011Great patterns Mark! And I like the black and white treatment too!
Jim Denham recently posted..Birches
Chris Nitz
2 Nov 2011I always love how b/w shots allow you to see so many of the little details. The lines of the brick work and the decorative touches really shine through here. Good stuff, Mark 🙂
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Jimi Jones
2 Nov 2011I’m really digging this shot, Mark Would have never connected it with the iPhone, although they do take some excellent photos. The white vignette adds a little mystery to the shot. Nice!
Edith Levy
2 Nov 2011I would have never thought this was an iPhone shot. Great job on the processing.
Steven Perlmutter
2 Nov 2011Great patterns and lines here Mark. The B&W processing works extremely well on this composition.
Mike Criswell
2 Nov 2011This is really good Mark, and from an iphone to boot
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chuijbregts
3 Nov 2011B&W works well here, not so sure about the fuzzy vignette
Laura
24 Feb 2012I love all those windows. Great shot Mark!
Stella
10 Apr 2012Originally built in 1923, 617 West 7th Street is a newly renovated 12 story Class B office building with prime ground level retail space. 617 is centrally located in the heart of downtown Los Angeles, CA complimented by an array of local retail services and fine restaurants. The renovations included demolishing and rebuilding the entire base building infrastructure and restoring and revitalizing the building to feature state of the art systems such as: High Speed Elevators, Individual Direct expansions HVAC units on each floor, new electrical service, direct digital control (DDC) building management systems and enhanced Life Safety Equipment. Alliance acquired 617 in July 2006.