Twilight Over Hackney
August 3rd, 2008 Chris Beaumont
Hackney. Beautiful Hackney. I don’t know if it’s true for all cities, but London has a way of pushing people up against each other that’s very appealing. A row of Georgian houses costing the best part of a million pounds each will rub up against sprawling council estates, and while there’s obviously crime and societal problems a plenty, for the most part, everyone just seems to get along.
This image is a panorama, stitched together automagically by Photoshop. It’s the first time I’ve used Photoshop to perform the task. Previously I used a little app called Autostitch. It feels a little dirty using Photoshop - like shopping at Tesco’s because it’s just down the street when you could be using the little independent deli round the corner. Convenience is king, though, wot wot?
Photoshop does the task admirably. The problems this image has are to do with the way I took the shots rather than Photoshop not being up to the task. I was waiting for a train at Cabridge Heath train station having attended a talk about Sylvia Plath by the Last Tuesday Society (rah!), and had had a couple of drinks (Gin served from Teapots, specifically), and it was dusk and there was no light, and the train was about to arrive, and I rushed it, basically. The shots were taken on an 800 iso, which left an undesirable amount of grain that showed up horribly in the colour version, so I went for black and white and broke out the dodge and burn brushes in Photoshop.
I like the final image, but I’d like more to go back with a tripod and take the shots properly. Of course, Hackney being what it is, setting up shop with a tripod and an expensive camera might not be the smartest idea.
