Two Towers...

A quickie post. This to illustrate why press photographers often say we aren't specialists; we have to be able to get something from anything. It might not be great, but it will pretty much always be useable...

The brief here was to photograph two blocks of luxury flats, built on St Mary's Island, Chatham. One is still empty, despite being completed for some years now...

From the list, the newsdesk had already decided the shot needed to be after dark to show the lights on in one, the other dark.

1) Look at time it will be done (earlier jobs on list) - will miss twilight and sky colour, which means it could be a dark building against a dark sky. Grrrr...
2) Check forecast. Aha, yes!! Cloudy evening forecast! It's not quite the same, but I'll be grateful for light pollution today, as there's a good chance the clouds will be lit up by the town lights below.
3) Find a location. Not too difficult, the buildings can be seen in their entirety from St Mary's Island proper, looking back into the mainland.
4) Arrive at gone 7.30pm. It's cold. Grab coat, torch, tripod and kit.
5) Set up, right by the water's edge, Camera D3S, lens 24-70 f2.8. ISO set to 400, aperture to f5.6. Focus camera, turn focusing off.
6) Stand and look at scene and camera settings, say "Meh! Start at 10 seconds..."
7) Set self-timer on camera (to minimise vibration) and press the button.
8) Watch image pop up on LCD screen. Smile to self. Pretty close from the outset...

Anything else was just adjusting the shutter speed/aperture combination to give slightly darker or lighter images choices, plus upright and view versions.

St Mary's Island Apartments.
Enough light reflecting back from the clouds to see the buildings on their own, yet also see that one is lit, the other
not. And all surrounded by the lights of Chatham Maritime.
Nikon D3S, 24-70 f2.8 AFS, 15 seconds, f7.1, ISO 400. Tripod. With a mix of lights,
I let the Auto White Balance do its thing and decided I rather liked what it had made of the scene...