Beautiful shot.

Did you focus on the houses across the street? It's interesting because the clouds appear out of focus (it appears more than just motion blur from a long exposure), and I can't visualize this happening unless you blurred them in post-processing...

How cold was it outside when you captured this photo?

Very strange perspective... It almost looks like a tilt-shift photograph. There's something about it that I really like, but can't really put my finger on it. As you said, maybe it's the colours.

Eugene and Catalin: there is a reason this shot looks odd, but I'm just about to go out so will explain it later. In the meanwhile, feel free to speculate :)

They are fantastic colours indeed and a quaint little place. As Eugene and Catalin said, there is something about the focus of the buildings against the sky that makes you stop and study it and even after that I still can't work it out...

I loved the play of purple. It makes the whole pic look different.

Very cool, where was this taken?

Nice shot, great colors!

"The purple pale light of the frosty moon gave the secret agent the perfect cover for his mission..." (you guys can take it form there)

Very cool "cinematic" image. I happen to love the angle and "crowded" image. Nice.

C.

Thanks for posting this, despite not being 100% happy with it, David.
Photoblogs so seldom put up experiments, only their most polished work, and I agree with you both on the composition, and that it was worth putting up for the colour.

Also, there's a weird contrast in texture between the top and the bottom which gives it an abstract feel, even though it isn't.

Very nice image David. I like the different light sources and the shadows hide just enough to create more interest.

Awesome mood. Love the sharpness.

I'll join the "intrigued group" and wait for Dave's "behind the shot" explanation.

OK, here's the explanation ...

The reason that the sky is more blurred than you would expect is because the final image is a combination of two originals: one focussed on the buildings along the street (in which the sky was also sharp), and another focussed on the roof/guttering of the house next door.

My reason for this was because neither of the original shots worked. With the buildings and sky in focus the roof/guttering looked a mess, while with the roof/guttering in focus the background was too blurred. So, rather than throw the whole lot away, I combined the best aspects of both.

What I should have done is use a much smaller aperture from the outset ;)

Great shot. I love the clouds and long exposure shots.

Love it. The gutter looks like a cartoon dog's head (ie nose and mouth on the left, eyebrow raised). Just a random observation ;) Well done Dave :)

Great shot...reminds me so much of the streets in Romania where I grew up. What's the story about your family moving to Bulgaria? Would be interesting to hear it - you probably already told everything about it in a previous post way back, but I must have missed it.

Very surreal and I feel that it works well as simply being a moment in time captured. I also am curious to see how the same scene may look at other times of the year, throughout the seasons - Keep warm!

Thanks for the explanation of how this was done. I would never have guessed this as I would never have thought of doing it in the first place! Very creative :)

David, the thought passed my mind about this being 2 separate exposures, but then I disregarded it because I thought it must have been too cold for you to fiddle with the focus points on different exposures ;)

As I said before, very interesting shot...

This caught my attention. Even though the composition might be off, it is still very attractive and the sky is really awesome. Colours are great and the buildings are nicely lit and crisp for a night time shot. I like it!

what's crazy about this is that it looks like the building on the left is being lit by the photographer but it's really just that light on the right - so cool.

I love this.

Amazing!

this is intense, kinda horrormovie feeling...