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Home » Blog » Tutorials Fine Art Black and White Photography » HOW TO CREATE A FINE ART PHOTOGRAPH OF EMPIRE STATE BUILDING

September 25, 2015 by Julia Anna Gospodarou

HOW TO CREATE A FINE ART PHOTOGRAPH OF EMPIRE STATE BUILDING

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Urban Saga II - Empire State of Light © Julia Anna Gospodarou

Urban Saga II – Empire State of Light © Julia Anna Gospodarou

In this tutorial, I will show how to create a fine art photograph of Empire State Building

Urban Saga II – Empire State of Light

ESB – The symbol of New York City. This is the way I see it.

The Story of the Image

In my new black and white fine art image in the series “Urban Saga”, Urban Saga II -Empire State of Light, I aim to show one of the symbols of New York City in a way that suits my idea about this city and the way it makes me feel.
Here is a quote from Tom Wolfe, that I totally agree with, because it is very close to what I think about this city and how I feel about it.

“One belongs to New York instantly, one belongs to it as much in five minutes as in five years.”

– Tom Wolfe

If you ask me what is my favorite city in the world I will always hesitate between Paris and NYC. I think a combination of both would fit my personality perfectly and would solve my dilemma about which city to mention first when I am asked which is my favorite one. A combination of both cities would be for me a combination of history and modernity, of softness and boldness, of thought and action. This is very much how I see myself, this is why I love these two cities so much.
To get back to the image, today I will show you how I see New York City, but my next photo will most probably be from Paris.

My Vision for the Image

We all have a certain way we see a place, and this has to do with our sensibility, with our experiences, with what we know about that specific place and, in many cases, it also has to do with that first impression that place made on us. As artists we feel the need to show all these things through the art we create and, since we photographers use photography to express ourselves as artists, we will feel the need to express all these feelings through the images we create. This is what I try to do in all my images, either I create a fine art photograph of Empire State Building or of any other subject, and this is no exception.   What you see here is how I feel about New Your City and about the Empire State Building in particular. I will continue my story about this city in my next photos and I will try to also share with you some of the things that helped me create these images, both artistic (vision) related, as well as more technical aspects (shooting and processing techniques).


 I use black and white photography to express myself because this suits my artistic sensibility, but just like generally in art, this is only a tool and not an end goal, I could just as well use color or even another medium than photography, because the end goal is to express myself and not to create a certain kind of art or use specific tools.


One of the things I intended to do in this image, besides recreating the feeling I have when I think about this subject and I relate it to my story, was to highlight some of the buildings I love most in New York City: the Empire State Building, the World Trade Center 1, and my favorite, the Spruce Street Building by Frank Gehry. How did I do this? By using light. By playing with intensities of light and giving more importance in the light chart to these buildings so they stand out and the eye can go to them. Also, I needed to prioritize the importance of these buildings in the structure of my image. I did this again by using light, which is the most important tool we have in photography, and by assigning a different light intensity to each building, using more or fewer highlights, depending on the role it plays in my image. I am not going to tell you the order these buildings should be seen but you can discover it if you look at the light and shadow intensities in the image.

You can read this article I wrote if you want to consult a more in-depth tutorial about the creation of a fine art architectural photograph.

Technical Realization – Processing

Working with Vertoramas

Trying something new as a different way of expression

The image is a 4 shots Vertorama, shot with Canon 5DMK3 and Canon 70-200 mm f/2.8.
Vertorama, which is in simple words a vertical panorama, is something I’m trying for the first time here and I love the result. These days I’m again attracted to the vertical format which was one of my favorites before my “square period” and working with vertoramas gives me a whole new way of seeing the vertical format, not to mention the extra detail you get from vertoramas and panoramas because you stitch more images showing each part of the scene in a larger size.

Image format – 6:13 – an original format you will not find in any book

The format I chose for this image is not a very conventional one, because honestly, I don’t care much about norms, but about what works best, and in this case the best for me was a 6:13 format. You won’t find it in any book, but just like one of my favorite photographers, Arnold Newman was doing, I’m subordination the image format to the aesthetic result and you will probably see more of these “original” formats in the future. It may give some more work to the ones who will print my work, but I’m sure they will be understanding.

Trying a new format, as this accentuated vertical format for me, or a new technique, like working with blended images in a vertorama, is one of the best ways I know to kick-start a new wave of inspiration in my work. The same can happen when experimenting with different subjects or different gear – lenses, filters etc.
If you need some inspiration in your work, this is one of the first things you should try: look at the world in a different way and the inspiration will come running.

A bit more on the technical side, working with panoramas or vertoramas requires for you to decide this in the first place so you be prepared to take more than one shot of your scene, that combined will cover a larger field of view. You can create still or long exposure panoramas or vertoramas, it is up to you and your vision what you opt for, and then you need to stitch them together. I use for this Photoshop that has a very straightforward tool for stitching panoramas and works great even when used in its Auto stitching setting. Its name is Merge to Panorama and you can find it in Lightroom too if you select your images to stitch and right click on them.

Black and white processing with Photography Drawing

After stitching all the partial images in a final one and cropping the result to the desired format, working on the image is pretty much like working on any other single image.

What I do, whoever is following me knows it already, is to use Photography Drawing, my black and white processing method to create my fine art images, to process them. You can find all the details on how to use Photography Drawing in my book written with Joel Tjintjelaar, From Basics to Fine Art – Black and White Photography – Architecture and Beyond and in my video tutorial and processing eBook Long Exposure, Architecture, Fine Art Photography – Creating (en)Visionography. Photography Drawing means processing a black and white image by using the principles of classical black and white drawing. In a word, applying Photography Drawing means processing your images as is you were drawing them. This is the method that gives you the most control over your image because, just like if you were using a pen to create on paper the effect you want where you want it, the same way you cause your software. All you need to do is to tell it what to do and where. This is what I do. I “talk” to my software and tell it what to do where.

Here is for instance how one of my “drawing layers” looks for this image. You can see here how I applied the light or shadow effect I needed, selectively and at the intensity I needed, so I can create more depth in the image, something that the original image lacked. It does look like a black pencil drawing, isn’t it? And this is because the final image is the result of combining the straightforward conversion to black and white with my “drawing version” of this image. This was a more difficult image due to the many details I had to deal with but generally the technique I use is much less complex.

Urban Saga II - Empire State of Light - Empire State Building, New York City © Julia Anna Gospodarou - Photography Drawing Processing Layer

Urban Saga II – Empire State of Light – Empire State Building, New York City – Photography Drawing Processing Layers

Working with selections

One thing that helps you to focus on a certain area in Photography Drawing is to use selections to isolate that specific area, so you can treat it differently from the others.

You can use all kind of selections to reach your goal, depending on the image. Starting with Quick Selection and going as far as Luminosity Masks or channel elections, depending on how complex the image is.
After you made your selections all you have to do is to draw inside these selections, by using a multitude of tools your software offers you.

Here is a fragment of my selection channels so you can see what were in this image the areas i wanted to process differently from each other so I can have the most control over light and shadow.

Urban Saga II - Empire State of Light - Empire State Building, New York City © Julia Anna Gospodarou - Selection Channels

Urban Saga II – Empire State of Light – Empire State Building, New York City – Selection Channels

Technical Data – Urban Saga II – Empire State of Light

TECHNIQUE:

Vertorama (vertical panorama) created by stitching 4 images
Short Exposure images shot on tripod
– Camera and lens settings:
1/100. @ f/6.3, 200 mm, ISO 100

CAMERA: Canon 5D MKIII
LENS: Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II

Black and white processing – Photography Drawing (PhtD)

– LR5, PS CC , Topaz B&W Effects  (B&W Effects extensive review) + Topaz DeNoise + Topaz Detail + DxO View Point.

FURTHER STUDY RESOURCES – FINE ART BLACK AND WHITE PHOTOGRAPHY, ARCHITECTURE, LONG EXPOSURE

You can find more resources about fine art black and white photography, (en)Visionography, long exposure photography and architectural photography in my extensive collection of photography tutorials. To receive my future tutorials directly via email you can subscribe to my website.

More about how to create fine art photography, from vision to processing and the final image you can read in my book From Basics to Fine Art – Black and White Photography, with co-author Joel Tjintjelaar and in my video tutorial Long Exposure, Architecture, Fine Art Photography - Creating (en)Visionography a hands-on tutorial accompanied by an eBook presenting my processing workflow, or attend one of my workshops.

Julia Anna Gospodarou - (en)Visionographer

Julia Anna Gospodarou Fine Art black and white photographer Julia Anna Gospodarou is an internationally acclaimed photographer, architect with a Master degree, author and highly sought-after educator, teaching workshops and lecturing around the world. Founder of (en)Visionography™ and creator of Photography Drawing™, author of the best-selling book From Basics to Fine Art - Black and White Photography , with high distinctions in the most important photography competitions worldwide (International Photography Awards IPA Photographer of the Year, World Photography Awards SWPA and Hasselblad Masters finalist, as well as 80+ more awards), widely published internationally in books and magazines, Julia is passionate about the art in photography and striving to spread it into the world.
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_VIPA 2021 Jury_ I have the honor to be part of th _VIPA 2021 Jury_
I have the honor to be part of the jury in the VIPA 2021 Visions International Photo Awards that has just been launched.

I am warmly inviting you all to submit your images to the contest and I wish you good luck to win one or more of the awards. 

Exceptionally, this year the competition will be free as a gesture to help the photography community that was so hard hit by the pandemic. The jury is volunteering and we are all happy to provide our work pro bono to keep the photography community alive and give the chance for exposure to more photographers.

Looking forward to seeing your images. Good luck! 

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Delighted to have won the Best of Nation Award for Delighted to have won the Best of Nation Award for Greece and be a Top 10 finalist in Commercial Category at WPC World Photographic Cup 2021.

I haven’t entered in photography contests for the past years after I had the honor to win the Photographer of the Year award at IPA International Photography Awards in 2016, but this was different. It was teamwork, and we represented Greece with my fellow photographers at one of the most distinguished international competitions, which makes me even happier to have been awarded. 
We are still waiting for the team awards. Wish us luck so Greece wins. And keep an eye on this space to find out the final results. 

For now, you can enjoy the finalist images at this link https://www.worldphotographiccup.org/wpc_gallery/finalists-2021/

Go Greece! 

Nikos Siamos Akis Douzlatzis Anna Pantelia Prokopis Manousopoulos Babis Tsoukias John Makris Nik Pekridis 

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Fluid Time V – Aligning Paths The 5th image in m Fluid Time V – Aligning Paths
The 5th image in my Fluid Time series, shot in Chicago in 2013. 
You can find limited edition prints of this and more images at www.juliaannagospodarou.com 
I’m quite fond of this image, and I remember how much fun I had playing with the camera and the geometry to get a dynamic shot of the convergence of these 2 buildings. The image was shot with the 24 m TS lens of a Canon full frame. 
The particularity of this image is that I wanted to emphasize the composition's dynamism even more by using selective focus with the tilt function of the TS lens. One of the challenges was to place the area of focus in the right spot, given that focusing with the tilt function of TS lens is entirely different than the way we regularly focus. It took quite a bit of work and patience to get it right but it was worth it. 
This is one thing you need to have when working with the TS lens, patience. And the second is the desire to think out of the box and play with your gear. I just love doing that. 

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Fluid Time IV – Stopping Time This is the 4th im Fluid Time IV – Stopping Time
This is the 4th image in my 2013 Fluid Time series and it shows one of the iconic historical buildings in Chicago, the Wrigley Building. Finished in 1924 and built in the Spanish Colonial Revival style, it was one of the first highrises built in the area. 
Here too, I used the tilt function of the tilt-shift lens, as in all the images in the series, and it was actually a quite challenging image to shoot because of the intensity of the effect I needed, which wasn’t easy to create. But the more challenging, the more I love it. Easy images are boring, isn’t it? As everything that is too easy. :) 
You can find limited edition prints of this and more images at www.juliaannagospodarou.com 

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Fluid Time III – Two Worlds The third image in m Fluid Time III – Two Worlds
The third image in my 2013 Fluid Time series. This is one of the most interesting buildings in Chicago, the Hancock Center. One of the things I love about this building, in terms of architectural design is that the structural frame of the building is placed exteriorly and not at the interior as usually, and it is visible on the façade. For those who are wondering, this x-braced reinforcement system allows for larger open spaces in the interior of the building which is why it is ideal for an office building like this, and it also allows for rising taller structures. When it was built, in 1965, the Hancock Center was meant to be the second taller building in the world. 
Like all the images in the series, here too, I used the tilt function of the tilt-shift lens, to focus on the relation between the 2 buildings – hence the title: Two Worlds. 
You can find limited edition prints of this and more images at www.juliaannagospodarou.com 

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Fluid Time II – Utopian Connections Second in my Fluid Time II – Utopian Connections
Second in my 2013 Fluid Time series, this image shows the Prudential Plaza Tower in Chicago, flanked by the Prudential Plaza One building and the Aon Center.
Here I used again the tilt function of the tilt-shift lens, as I did in all the images in this series, to isolate different planes of focus in order to create depth. 
There are three things that you can use to create depth: composition, selective depth of field, and selective work with light. All 3 of them are just as powerful if used right. 
I’m working right now on finalizing a video course about creating B&W photography where I will get into a lot of details about these aspects and many more. If you are interested, keep an eye on this space and I’ll be back with more about it very soon. 
You can find limited edition prints of this and more images at www.juliaannagospodarou.com 

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Fluid Time I – Parallel Realities One of my favo Fluid Time I – Parallel Realities
One of my favorite series, shot in 2013 in Chicago – one of my favorite cities. In this series, I worked with the tilt function of the tilt-shift lens to create selective focus, a technique that gained traction among fine art photographers after that. Which is one of the reasons why I consider this one of my most important series. I believe what we do becomes even more valuable if we can not only express ourselves through photography, but we can also inspire others. 
You can find limited edition prints of this and more images at www.juliaannagospodarou.com
Have a great weekend, everyone! 

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Happy New Year 2021! Wishing a wonderful new year Happy New Year 2021! 
Wishing a wonderful new year to everyone, filled with much love, peace, and inspiration. 
Yours truly.
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