Otto Berkeley
Future's End
A last-minute flurry of snow in Cumbria on December 25th meant the UK officially enjoyed a white Christmas. The scene in London on Christmas morning was one of rain and icy wind but, even in the absence of snow, the conditions across the West End had a moody and photogenic quality that made it a lot of fun to shoot.
The billboard lights at Piccadilly Circus were recently switched back on after being renovated throughout most of 2017, and with the streets almost empty on the quietest day of the year, it was possible to walk into the middle of the normally frenetic roads and to photograph a vantage point that included the lights reflected in the rain-soaked streets.
This image is a blend of several exposures, taken using a miniature tripod and with the camera a few inches off the ground. Even on Christmas morning, the traffic was steady enough to require returning to safety on the pavement and then going back to the middle of the road to continue shooting, capturing the details that I wanted several minutes apart and then manually aligning the exposures in Photoshop to produce the finished result. It was important to me to capture the Coca-Cola logo among the billboard's rotating brands as this has been a staple of the display since the 1950s, as well as a composition that would feature one car and one person, which I felt would create a sense of depth within the image and complete the scene.
Once the various elements had been blended, I used luminosity masks to protect the highlights in the billboard and to recover detail in the shadows, leaving the midtones intentionally muted as I was aiming to convey the cold early-morning atmosphere. The colour cast had a cold tint straight out of camera, but I used Curves and Colour Balance adjustments to enhance the blues in the shadows, as well as a Colour Lookup set to Soft Light and using the Moonlight preset. After this, the colour-grading process was mostly a case of fine-tuning to achieve the right shade of red in the Coca-Cola logo and the right balance between blue and magenta on the roads.
Setting adjustments inside Nik's Silver Efex Pro to Luminosity, I selectively increased the structure within the reflection and the buildings to give them more definition, while lowering the structure along the road in the foreground, where it seemed like a softer finish would prevent the gritty detail from potentially becoming a distraction. Finally, inside Colour Efex Pro, I used sparing amounts of the Low Key and Glamour Glow filters for a dark and slightly ethereal finish, portraying the tone of a usually bustling part of the city which, except for the occasional person and car, felt as if it had been abandoned.
You can also connect with me on Instagram, Facebook, 500px and Google+.
Future's End
A last-minute flurry of snow in Cumbria on December 25th meant the UK officially enjoyed a white Christmas. The scene in London on Christmas morning was one of rain and icy wind but, even in the absence of snow, the conditions across the West End had a moody and photogenic quality that made it a lot of fun to shoot.
The billboard lights at Piccadilly Circus were recently switched back on after being renovated throughout most of 2017, and with the streets almost empty on the quietest day of the year, it was possible to walk into the middle of the normally frenetic roads and to photograph a vantage point that included the lights reflected in the rain-soaked streets.
This image is a blend of several exposures, taken using a miniature tripod and with the camera a few inches off the ground. Even on Christmas morning, the traffic was steady enough to require returning to safety on the pavement and then going back to the middle of the road to continue shooting, capturing the details that I wanted several minutes apart and then manually aligning the exposures in Photoshop to produce the finished result. It was important to me to capture the Coca-Cola logo among the billboard's rotating brands as this has been a staple of the display since the 1950s, as well as a composition that would feature one car and one person, which I felt would create a sense of depth within the image and complete the scene.
Once the various elements had been blended, I used luminosity masks to protect the highlights in the billboard and to recover detail in the shadows, leaving the midtones intentionally muted as I was aiming to convey the cold early-morning atmosphere. The colour cast had a cold tint straight out of camera, but I used Curves and Colour Balance adjustments to enhance the blues in the shadows, as well as a Colour Lookup set to Soft Light and using the Moonlight preset. After this, the colour-grading process was mostly a case of fine-tuning to achieve the right shade of red in the Coca-Cola logo and the right balance between blue and magenta on the roads.
Setting adjustments inside Nik's Silver Efex Pro to Luminosity, I selectively increased the structure within the reflection and the buildings to give them more definition, while lowering the structure along the road in the foreground, where it seemed like a softer finish would prevent the gritty detail from potentially becoming a distraction. Finally, inside Colour Efex Pro, I used sparing amounts of the Low Key and Glamour Glow filters for a dark and slightly ethereal finish, portraying the tone of a usually bustling part of the city which, except for the occasional person and car, felt as if it had been abandoned.
You can also connect with me on Instagram, Facebook, 500px and Google+.