You have always been a master of low-light work - this being no exception. Wonderful use of the available light and reflections. Compliments, Victor. Regards Nico
CJ, I'm glad you posted that. I actually posted another version of the picture with the bottom 2/3 of the picture cropped out, but then I deleted it because I didn't like how the processing looked on my other computer. I think that composition works better, but it needs to have been composed that way in the first place -- the image suffers too much from that severe a crop combined with the high ISO and low light. -- Victor
Interesting low key image victor and although the hinge draws the eye at first we then try to make ou what we are seeing in the shadows and I really like the cymbal. I actually wouldn't even miss the lower 2/3 of the image if you had cropped it out. The blue reflections on the cymbal and the highlights are really nice! :-) CJ
What you should be seeing is not much more than three concentric circles. These circles make up the hinge that holds a cymbal. If your monitor is calibrated properly, you should also be able to make out the hint of the cymbal, the hand of the bass player and the strings of the bass.
This image have very little processing done to it. I decreased contrast so that there would be SOME shadow detail. Any more and even though the picture was taken on a 5D, there would be excessive noise artifacts.
I happened to be sitting in a position where the hinge from the cymbal reflected the light from the music of the musician sitting between me and the percussionist. Normally, I suppose this would be a specular reflection, but I exposed in such a way that you can make out texture in the hinge -- the subject of the photo. If I exposed long enough to make out the background better, the hinge would be clipped.
The dark portion of the image, besides being nearly black, is also out of focus since it's behind the hinge.
