view to st paul's

I couldn't really think of a decent title for this one, so I've gone for the obvious. This is indeed the (slightly hackneyed, I admit) view across the Thames from the Tate Modern side of the Millennium Bridge (which famously used to wobble, but now only has a slightly jaunty spring) to St Paul's Cathedral, Sir Christopher Wren's great masterpiece (which was built after the Great Fire of London destroyed the old Gothic cathedral). It looks incredible inside, but unfortunately you can't take photos. A shame...

Anyway, back to the view. It was a pretty murky evening, as you can see (about 5.20PM, here) and the city lights were reflecting strongly off the low cloud. I like the effect that this produces in the sky. Exposure was 25 seconds, which blurred the water and blew out the lights somewhat. (I don't mind that too much, though: although I've done a bit of recovery it adds a bit of colour to the image and masks the hideousness of most of the buildings on the riverbank.)

I made a few exposure and vibrance adjustments to the image in Lightroom and then altered the levels slightly in Lightroom. Finally I reduced the saturation 10% or so - because it was looking a bit much - and sharpened the image. Nikon D70s, as usual...

I'm hoping to do a few more of these kind of images as the nights close in earlier and it becomes easier to take these kind of shots on the way home in the late afternoon/evening.

I think that's the longest photo description I've written in a long time!