My new image in the series Fluid Time, Fluid Time V – Aligning Paths is a new occasion for me to do what I like most – telling stories in photographs.

The image shows the Trump Tower & IBM Building, two highlights of Chicago, two iconic buildings, the first designed by Adrian Smith and the second designed by a legend of modern architecture, Mies van der Rohe.

I’m only posting the image today, together with a few details and I invite you to have a look at my book From Basics to Fine Art – Black and White Photography, written together with Joel Tjintjelaar, to see many more details about how I created my images in this series and 

how I create my photography generally, from all points of view: vision, composition, and processing. If you don’t already own the book, you can purchase it from the link above and I’m sure you’ll find it very helpful, as thousands of others did.

This is the fifth image in the series, and again it shows two of the most representative and beautiful buildings of Chicago, one of the most fascinating cities from the point of view of the architecture you can find there and not only.

The history and atmosphere of the city make it one of my favorite cities in the world. The range of architectural wonders that you can find in this city is huge, from classical skyscrapers, the first that were ever built in the world, the wonderful and so elegant Neo-Gothic and the Perpendicular American style of its older buildings till the contemporary architecture of buildings like the ones I’m presenting in my image: Trump Tower, IBM Building and many more, some of which you can see in the other images in my series Fluid Time, a series that was entirely shot in Chicago, during the workshop I have taught there with Vision Explorers.

UPCOMING VIDEO TUTORIAL

In addition, because I’ve been asked many times to talk about my work in a video form, which frankly is not my first choice, I’m more the book and writing style (old style, I guess, or classic style to make it more “classy”), I decided to do it for this image and I put up a 30-minute video tutorial about the creation of this image that I will post tomorrow. I would have posted it today, but editing a video is not that easy and, because I’m a perfectionist, I started with the idea of making a short presentation video of a few minutes that ended up being half an hour long, so working on it became quite complex. But I’m very close to finishing it and I’ll show it to you tomorrow.

I hope it will give you some answers to your question and that it will be a nice option for those that prefer to watch a video instead of reading my blog articles or books.
So, stay tuned and I’ll be back with the story of this photograph tomorrow.

UPDATE

If you want to watch the tutorial I was talking about above you can go to this link and you will find the video tutorial where I analyze how I created the Fluid Time V image.

TELLING STORIES IN PHOTOGRAPHS

HOW PHOTOGRAPHY DRAWING WAS BORN

As you know by now, all my images have a meaning, a base they are built on, a story, a statement, this is why I say I’m doing (en)Visionography and not simply photography. Even if they seem to resemble images created by simply photographing or by simply processing a RAW capture, they are something else, they contain an entire story.

They are drawings of my life. I’m telling stories in photographs. One of the sources where Photography Drawing comes from, besides being an inspiration I took from my years of drawing in pencil and from my architectural background.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a painter (besides many other things) but I was only good at abstract painting (on my walls, even when I grew up I was still painting my walls, despite my mother’s vehement opposition) and at combining colors (funny I work in black and white now, isn’t it?).

So I turned to drawing, which seemed to be easier to control for me, and you can see some of my drawings on my website. I learned to tell stories with my pencil. Then came photography. And I had to use what I knew: to tell stories by drawing. Just that this time I was drawing photographs. And this is how Photography Drawing was born, as a way to draw my vision on the image I’m working on.

When I hear that people see something magic in my work, I can only tell them that they see life. That is what I try to show in my images.  Life, my life, my story. This is the difference between photography and (en)Visionography.

As I said, I will not give you too many details about the image today, so you want to watch my video tomorrow. Just be patient for one more day and I hope you’ll like it. And next time around, maybe I’ll make a Hollywood movie.
However, here are a few details about the image already:

TECHNICAL DATA

TECHNIQUE

Long Exposure base image combined with short exposure.
LE image: T/S LE = Tilt-Shift Long Exposure
– Camera settings:
241.0 sec. @ f/4, ISO 100
SE image: T/S SE = Tilt-Shift Short Exposures
– Camera settings:
1/320 sec. @ f/3.5, ISO 100

CAMERA: Canon 5D MKIII
LENS: Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5L II
– T/S lens settings:
8.5 degrees – maximum tilt, 12mm – maximum shift (rise)
ND FILTERS:
– 10+6 stops Formatt Hitech  ProStop IRND Filters – You can order any of the Formatt-Hitech filters or accessories with 10% discount if you use my code JULIA10 from Format-Hitech UK website or Format-Hitech US website.
OTHER FILTERS:
– Circular Polarizer

if you want to know more about long exposure you can read my Long Exposure Photography Extensive Tutorial that is a complete guide to this fascinating technique and you can also purchase my video tutorial Long Exposure, Architecture, Fine Art Photography – Creating (en)Visionography where I explain everything live in the field together we talking about many other subjects related to fine art photography. The video tutorial comes with an e-book about my post-processing technique.

PROCESSING:
– LR5, PS CC , Topaz B&W Effects +Topaz DeNoise + Topaz Detail + DxO View Point

Last but not least, I’ll have another pleasant surprise for you in a few days.
It is related to my status as DxO Labs Image Master for the internationally renowned software DxO Labs and it will be a very instructive and interesting event we are planning together. More details in a few days, but keep in mind, you can be a part of it too.

To download any of the DxO software, DxO PhotoLab, DxO VewPoint, DxO FilmPack or the NIK Collection, you can head over to the DxO website and find the latest offers.

DxO RESOURCES – DARK CITY PRESETS

If you work with the DxO software and especially with FilmPack or PhotoLab, you will surely like the preset series I created for FilmPack and Photolab. The presets, initially launched in 2014, have been updated and enriched with more presets and this is the latest extended version of the original fine art DxO Preset Series Dark City. Access the presets by clicking on the link or the image below.