Springtime at Busch Stadium Photo

Photographer’s Note

We went to the Cardinals baseball game a week ago, caught the third game of the season. I think there are about 160 left to go, but one of the harbingers of spring in St. Louis is a Cardinals game at Busch Stadium. Even though we wore jackets (well, I wore a coat so I could carry an extra lens), we still got that feeling that spring is here.

We had a clear, if chilly, night for the game. It started at about 7:15, right in time to catch that evening sunlight on the third base side of Busch. This is just some detail of the stadium - others shoot the entire thing, I just thought I would put up part of it for a taste of the architecture. I did take a few sweeping panorama's inside, but I have yet to get them stitched properly. I've taken so many photos over the past two weeks! Of course, many of those were of the family over Easter, but they still have to be sorted out, post-processed and filed.

So, this is just another of my favorite places in St. Louis. Maybe you have noticed a trend lately - cool places to visit in STL. Maybe I have to make a theme!

Have a great night and a nice Friday. I'm getting up early to drive south, hope to see the sun rise on a couple elephants.

BlueRaven, phwall has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

davidsinger (2061) 2009-04-16 18:38

Nice composition, good use of the red frame corelating with the subject of the picture, nice job Reed!

Cheers
David

sayantan20023 (162) 2009-04-16 21:10

I like the colour composition more in this photograph.

The partial display of the second flood-light in this photograph is a distraction IMHO, probably either adding both flood-lights in the frame or adding one flood-light (right one) would've improved the composition. Also the red structure could've been included more.

Overall a good photograph.

Thanks for sharing.
Regards,
Sayantan Mukherjee

jasmis (50010) 2009-04-16 22:03

Interesting facade in superb dark colours. Amazing mood.
Regards.

francesav (608) 2009-04-17 1:32

Hi Reed,
very nice pictures! Good colours, good POV and great composition.
Regards.
Francesco.

BlueRaven (35) 2009-04-17 3:13

Hi Reed,

You should indeed make a theme with your cool STL shots!
The colours here are stunning, and even enhanced by the perfectly fitting frame. As opposed to Sayantan, I think the composition is just fine. It focuses on the writing and the fact that it's not totally symmetrical makes it look more dynamic.

Have a great weekend,
Claudia

PS: Don't know if you saw my reply in the thread at my "Golden Light" photo about Monsieur T. ;o)

delpeoples (5722) 2009-04-17 18:29

Hi Reed, whilst i understand NADA about baseball, I really like the shot. I like your POV and the inclusion of the men talking next to the writing give us an idea of scale. It's almost a documentary shot for my money. Have a great weekend and thanks for sharing, Lisa.

phwall (5528) 2009-04-18 4:14

Hi Reed,
Nice shot, I like the colours, especially the red against the blue background and the dark grey of the steel work. Amazing clarity you've got here, it's as sharp as a tack all the way through. The two people standing against the rail give a good perspective on the size of the Stadium.
With regard to composition I have to agree with Sayantan based strictly on the rules of composition. Claudia likes the composition from a subjective point of view, and there's nothing wrong with that, but technically Sayantan is right, the balance in the frame is not correct. The two areas that don't work are the partial light tower on the left of frame and the lack of headroom for the tower on the right. Is this really a problem in the grand scheme of things, well not really, but we're here to look at each others work and learn from what we see. I have to ask myself would I have framed the shot like this. When I went back and re-looked at your "Theatre in the Loop" shot from the perspective of composition, I couldn't fault it. I've made a workshop and set the composition as to how Sayantan would have liked to see it, is it any better, for me, I don't think so, but that's not the point. Where it is better is, it is balanced correctly compositionally. There's a really good lesson to learn here, sometimes even though a shot isn't technically correct, it is still correct if you get my drift. I don't think Claudia is wrong in her subjective point of view, and I don't think I'm wrong either, it's just that according to the book Sayantan is right. Thinking about it more, I guess a vertical crop using just the sign, one light tower and more of the bottom of frame could have been a different way to go.
Thanks for posting such a great shot, it is a welcome chance to exercise the grey matter, and thanks too to Claudia and Sayantan for the differing opinions. Good stuff.
Regards
Pete

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