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Lens-Artists Challenge #346 – Cinematic

The White Sands Motel.

This week, Sofia challenges us to demonstrate how our photos can have a cinematic feel. She writes in part, “…Emotion, mood, story. All things that can be accomplished with a few tricks like high-contrast light and shadow, layering and depth, interesting colour schemes (or monochrome), sense of movement, location.” You can read her entire challenge post here.

My opening photo features a scene that could be from a period movie: the arrival at a motel for the night. This mid-20th-century motel features a modest yet inviting design, featuring retro signage with neon lighting to catch the eye of passing travelers. The signage on this motel is known as a Googie sign (not Google) that helps define the era. I will post about those exuberant and eye-catching Googie signs in the future.

Metro-5
The Metro in Washington, DC.

Lighting, or lack thereof, can set the mood of a shot. Though the Metro is well lit at the stops, I used a telephoto lens to capture the arrival of a train while it was still approaching the station, focusing on the headlights and their reflection on the ceiling.

Madison Shake-12
Madison, Wisconsin.

Most of my choices for this challenge response would be “establishing shots” that introduce the viewer to the story in the film or photo series. Typical of establishing shots is a foreground frame, in this case, the shoreline with overhanging tree branches; a midground featuring the lake with a leading line allowing the eyes to wander toward the city; and the city skyline in the background.

Morlaix Blue Hour
Morlaix, France.

On a stop in Morlaix, France, we walked down a street in the old part of the city and captured the railway viaduct and an old church. This photo, taken in the daytime, required extra processing. One characteristic of movies, especially older flicks, is that often outdoor scenes were shot in the daytime with exposure adjustments to simulate night photography. The photo above exemplifies using modern tools like Adobe Lightroom Classic and Luminar Neo to convert a daytime exposure to a blue hour shot. In a future post, I will explain the process along with before and after photos for comparison.

London at Night
London at Night.

Black-and-white is an excellent medium for storytelling without the distraction of color. The juxtaposition of light and composition can create somber or joyous moods. I cropped the image into a wide-screen panorama and then converted it to black-and-white using Silver Efex 2. The wide image mimics 70 mm Ultra-Panavision 70, MGM Camera 65, or the earlier Cinerama three-projector wide screen systems.

AlaskaInBW-1
Backlit scene in black-and-white.

Alaskan landscapes are beautiful in black-and-white or color. I once posted images from Alaska converted to black-and-white. This low-key backlit image was taken from a cruise ship on the Inside Passage, a coastal route that weaves through islands and fjords, and is one of my favorites.

Kayakers-BW
Lake McDonald in Glacier National Park, MT.

I am concluding this cinematic challenge with a high-key image of kayakers paddling into the sunrise at Lake McDonald in Glacier National Park. Sofia’s challenge made me stretch a bit to find photos that would be good examples for cinematic storytelling. I’ve shared these photos on my Flickr site here as they are better displayed on a dark background.

I enjoyed your responses to my Go-To Places challenge last week. Next week, Ritva is our host. Be sure to follow her here so you won’t miss her post at noon Eastern time on Saturday. If you’d like to respond to our challenges but aren’t sure how to get started, check here.

John Steiner

49 comments

  1. You’ve found perfect photos for the challenge, John. I love your opener, and the train coming in. The Alaskan landscape is superb and it was nice to see London again.

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  5. All fantastic shots, John. London and Morlaix would be perfect for a crime movie, I imagine. The Alaskan landscape in black & white is breathtaking and the metro shot has IMO a fascinating futuristic touch. I love your detailed and always educational narrative including the description of the techniques you used!

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  7. This is absolutely a great response for this challenge John. I especially liked your neon shot just because I like neon. The rest are amazing choices. Well done!

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  8. John, these are all great. My favorite is the the White Sands Motel. It looks like the beginning of a 50’s movie. I really like the ones in black and white, too.

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  11. Great choice of images and interesting commentary on why you chose them and how you edited them to increase the cinematic effect. I love the opening shot of the White Sands Motel, the metro in Washington and the back-lit Alaska scene in particular. And I’m looking forward to hearing more about your editing process for the Morlaix shot as that’s something I fancy trying 🙂

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  15. Wonderful images for the prompt John, I especially love the way you captured the motel at night 😊

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  16. excellent variety for the theme and I liked the hotel opening ohoto the most – and look forward to hearing more about Googie signs….
    ~Yvette

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  19. A wonderful selection for the challenge.

    I love the first Retro scene in colour. I’d probably never see that here in Australia these days.

    I also like the B&W backlit scene.

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      • I didn’t even notice the modern car to be honest, John. I just loved the coloured lights and old-fashioned sign. Just goes to show sometimes I miss what’s right in front of me. 😀

  20. I do love that opening shot John and then as I was going through it was look ooh I like that one and yeah I like that one too, far too many good ones John. Great cinematic shots.

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