T & P depot, Downtown Fort Worth.
The T & P railroad came to Fort Worth in 1876.
The current Texas & Pacific terminal complex was built in 1931 to serve the city of Fort Worth. The upper stories have served a hotel and office space during WWII, and from what I have heard the building is also haunted. The building has been empty for many years, and is now finally being restored to it's former glory. The ground floor still serves as a passenger train terminal with the upper floors being converted into high rise (and high cost) apartments. The building is currently fenced off for construction, but luckily I happened across some very nice and very freindly security guards who agreed to let me in to take some photos of the deco exterior and the beautiful original art deco interior.
used wide angle lens
straightened
sharpened
added a bit of blue
saturation
curves
viola
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Hello, and greetings from the Critique Club. The critique you are about to recieve is tailored for DPC challenges alone, and is not intended to be seen as an artistic critique per se.
Initial Thoughts
I like the coloring, but the sky is too flat and this is a little bit "same ol'"
Composition / Content
Compositionally, I feel that it's ok, but nothing stellar. The little shift of the blue/grey posts at the bottom off-center things a bit and lessen the symmetry that could have been there. Whether this is something that could have been helped by a photographer shift, or if it's a design element of the building itself, I don't know, but it just doesn't work for me. Another aspect is the landscape orientation. This really would have benefitted, to me, from a portrait orientation.. giving us less of the building, but really adding to the perspective. The building itself has some nice coloring, but the lighting is really dull and flat, and it just loses appeal that it could have had with some more dynamic lighting (say sunset, or night-time long-exposure). Howeveer, the artwork on the building is very pretty.
Background
flat, grey skies are never really big with the DPC crowd.
Camera Work / Technical
Focus seems a *little* bit soft, and it looks like that was over-compensated with sharpening a bit too strongly, resulting in a few artifacts here and there. Exposure is good, but with that lighting, again, just a little too flat.
Digital Processing
It looks to me like it has been slightly over-sharpened to try and compensate for a slight focus issue. The rest of the work you've mentioned seems to have been done nicely. The blue tones work well, and could have been really nice with different, warmer lighting
Fits the Challenge
Certainly does, but as I mentioned in my initial thoughts, I feel that this is another casualty of the "same ol' same ol'" line of thinking. That is, it's a shot that we have seen a thousand times before, and unless it's an amazingly good/dynamic/different take, it just doesn't do that well. Your shot, to me, just doesn't have that extra.
My Opinion of the Photo
A nice attempt at a classic perspective that just falls short because of the flat lighting, gray uninteresting sky, and the landscape orientation of the photo. Keep shooting, and don't be afraid to try looking at things in all new ways. Good luck in future challenges.
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