Halcyon Hall

[Bert]

Halcyon Hall,

This more than 100 year old building is located in Millbrook NY.

The outside looks like something out of a movie. Recently my

friend and I went to see what it looked inside, knowing it has been

abandoned for 33 years. Shaky wooden floors, ceilings on the verge of collapse

and police patrolling regularly outside made for an adventurous photo shoot.

All the inside pictures are done in HDR to get the look we liked for this show.

You can down load it from the Beechbrook site. (thanks Bill.

http://beechbrook.com/pte/downloadfile.asp?id=1923

Comments welcome.

1920x1200 6min. 40.9MB

[cottage]

One of the most interesting shows I have seen in quiet some time. Very unique approach. For me, a show that makes me feel like I'm there, actually walking the halls of this grand old building. Great job with the HDR Bert! Hope to see more of your work soon.

Regards,

Bill

[BootZilla]

Bert -

Great show and good choice of music. I love the HDR work. Made for a more spooky look.

Greg

[mhwarner]

Fantastic show, Bert! I loved it! The music was right on and the animation was perfect. I felt as if I was peering over your shoulder as you walked through the building. I am not normally a fan of overdone HDR but in this case I think it lent exactly the right touch to the photos. Which program did you use for the HDR?

The only negative, and this is not directed to you, but it is so very sad to see such a magnificent building allowed to go to ruin. At least with your show, though, perhaps it can live forever. Thanks so much for sharing this interesting show. I look forward to seeing more of your shows.

[orizaba]

Hi Bert,

Here I am again!

I just saw this "Halcyon Hall" project of yours.

After all... I had to see the work of fellow members who spend time commenting my own work... I think it's fair!

I was delighted with your show! Great, great work! And your HDR technique simply fabulous!

Starting by the idea of keeping a memory of such nice building, till the choosen music, everything results in a very good and nice show.

Comments still welcome?

Here I go!

I would only point out one small detail and should appreciate to hear your opinion on it.

In my judgement, I would try to make transitions more "somewhat synchronized" with the music, I mean, the more dramatic music points should underline some transitions and not be 100% independent of them.

In fact, I found music very much adequated to the "dramatic spirit" of the show, because this music is dramatic itself.

However, all along the show I feel that music "runs" quite apart of the visual sequence, which, by the way, I found too much "monocordic", I mean, without rithm, without dramatism (the sequence, not the photos one by one, which are indeed very hard and dramatic). Some more zoom-ins, "violent" zoom-ins could add, as well, to such dramatism, in accordance with hard points of the music.

Please, feel free to say that I am thinking 100% wrong. May be I am, indeed.

Congratulations and best regards,

Jose

[Bert]

Fantastic show, Bert! I loved it! The music was right on and the animation was perfect. I felt as if I was peering over your shoulder as you walked through the building. I am not normally a fan of overdone HDR but in this case I think it lent exactly the right touch to the photos. Which program did you use for the HDR?

The only negative, and this is not directed to you, but it is so very sad to see such a magnificent building allowed to go to ruin. At least with your show, though, perhaps it can live forever. Thanks so much for sharing this interesting show. I look forward to seeing more of your shows.

Hi Mary,

Thanks for your nice comments, To answer your question, I used Photomatix 3 for the HDR images. By researching the building for this show, I fond a few websites with some old pictures from when it was an all girls school and also with an more extensive write up. http://www.opacity.us/site11_bennett_school_for_girls.htm

[Bert]

Hi Bert,

Here I am again!

I just saw this "Halcyon Hall" project of yours.

After all... I had to see the work of fellow members who spend time commenting my own work... I think it's fair!

I was delighted with your show! Great, great work! And your HDR technique simply fabulous!

Starting by the idea of keeping a memory of such nice building, till the choosen music, everything results in a very good and nice show.

Comments still welcome?

Here I go!

I would only point out one small detail and should appreciate to hear your opinion on it.

In my judgement, I would try to make transitions more "somewhat synchronized" with the music, I mean, the more dramatic music points should underline some transitions and not be 100% independent of them.

In fact, I found music very much adequated to the "dramatic spirit" of the show, because this music is dramatic itself.

However, all along the show I feel that music "runs" quite apart of the visual sequence, which, by the way, I found too much "monocordic", I mean, without rithm, without dramatism (the sequence, not the photos one by one, which are indeed very hard and dramatic). Some more zoom-ins, "violent" zoom-ins could add, as well, to such dramatism, in accordance with hard points of the music.

Please, feel free to say that I am thinking 100% wrong. May be I am, indeed.

Congratulations and best regards,

Jose

Hi Jose,

Thanks for your nice comments.

To comment on the points you make.

I have tried to synchronize the images with the music, but I must admit, I have kind of a tin ear and may not have been that successful.

What I did was, first made sure all the images were on the screen long enough to get a good view of them. After that I looked where they were on the timeline and tried to make the dissolves when it looked right in the wave form. Sometimes there were no high points in the wave form and I had to rely on my (tin) ear.

For making dramatic zoom-ins and maybe some hard dissolves, I tried a view of them and was not happy with it. I can see from your show that you have experience as a film maker and make your comments from that point of view I think.

Thanks for taking the time to make your points, everything helps me to make better shows in the future.

Bert

[Barry Beckham]

Bert

That was an interesting slide show.

What a place, I would love to be let loose in there for a few hours. Quite a shame to see it going to rack and ruin, but on the other hand as a pristine building it wouldn't have half the appeal. There looks to be lots of salvagable stuff still in place. I enjoyed the show, but do have a couple of comments, the first of which is that you won't please all the people all the time:rolleyes:.

I thought the HDR worked very well with this subject, but the colours were a little overpowering for me at times. I always take my Photomatix HDR images into Photoshop via Camera Raw. I find that helps me to temper some of the worst effects of HDR, like excessive colour, noise and sharpness.

I thought the animation was measured and was just about right for my tastes. I like animation delicate and I havn't seen any fast zooms they add anything to a slide show. They also don't always work so well with images this size. By the way it was nice to see full screen images filling my Dell monitor too. The show looks impressive at that size.

I thought the music worked very well with the haunting appearance of the place. I would loved to have seen a few close ups of the super textures inside the building, rust, flaking paint etc and the white line around the edge is a bit powerful for me. I am a supported of a thin line, but not too thick or too bright. Have you thought of making it a dull grey. It will still do the job, but without causeing any distractions.

Lastly, if I ever come to NY, will you take me there?

[macsrus]

Great slideshow Bert, What a fantastic place!

I too would love to spend a few hours there, Not overnight though!

A Photographers dream...An Estate Agent's (Realtor's) Nightmare!

It would be great to see a different version, one where the colours were muted, really toned down or even B&W to emphasise the sombre nature of the dereliction and create an atmospheric effect, just an idea as it's a great show nonetheless.

[Bert]

Bert

That was an interesting slide show.

What a place, I would love to be let loose in there for a few hours. Quite a shame to see it going to rack and ruin, but on the other hand as a pristine building it wouldn't have half the appeal. There looks to be lots of salvagable stuff still in place. I enjoyed the show, but do have a couple of comments, the first of which is that you won't please all the people all the time:rolleyes:.

I thought the HDR worked very well with this subject, but the colours were a little overpowering for me at times. I always take my Photomatix HDR images into Photoshop via Camera Raw. I find that helps me to temper some of the worst effects of HDR, like excessive colour, noise and sharpness.

I thought the animation was measured and was just about right for my tastes. I like animation delicate and I havn't seen any fast zooms they add anything to a slide show. They also don't always work so well with images this size. By the way it was nice to see full screen images filling my Dell monitor too. The show looks impressive at that size.

I thought the music worked very well with the haunting appearance of the place. I would loved to have seen a few close ups of the super textures inside the building, rust, flaking paint etc and the white line around the edge is a bit powerful for me. I am a supported of a thin line, but not too thick or too bright. Have you thought of making it a dull grey. It will still do the job, but without causeing any distractions.

Lastly, if I ever come to NY, will you take me there?

Barry,

Thanks for your comments. The few close-ups I had made did not look good in HDR (to much grain and noise) and I decided not to use them.

The white line I got was a template on your CD , but I should have made it grey.

My friend and I have decided not to go there again as we feel we pressed our luck. Some parts are very dark and with holes in the floor and hanging ceilings you never know when something falls.

Our main concern however was the police, they patrol a lot there and it would be a little embarrassing for two guys in there mid sixties to be arrested for trespassing.

But if you come up here of cource I will go in there with you. You have to hurry up however, because the latest news is that the town of Millbrook wants to tear it finally down this spring to build condominiums on the property

[Bert]

Bob,

Thanks for your comments, I will give it a try in B&W and see how that looks, I have tried it with the pictures less saturated, but it became to dull I found.

[snapcam]

Hello Bert

Really enjoyed the HDR images in this sequence.

I am not a fan of animation for animation's sake but in this show I would love to be taken down some of the corridors.

The images cried out for slow zooms into some of the detail.

Without this in this type of show, it tends to become a little repetitive, dispite the top quality of the images.

If it were possible arranging the images so as to take the viewer on a tour ie through doors ,up stairs into and out of rooms

would be another possibility.

I hope you don't mind my comments as I did enjoy the show.Its unusual to see a sequence in HDR.

Snapcam

[Bert]

Hi Snapcam,

I don't mind your comments as they express some of the thoughts, when I was making the show.

If it were possible arranging the images so as to take the viewer on a tour ie through doors ,up stairs into and out of rooms would be another possibility.

I did not have enough pictures for that approach.

The images cried out for slow zooms into some of the detail.

I tried that but the HDR images had already a lot of noise, and zooming to much make that really stand out. I took 3 pictures all the time, normal exposure, 2 stops over, and 2 stops under (1 minute sometimes). The light was uneven and some rooms where very dark. The close-ups I took that way had so much noise that I could not use them.

Thanks for your comments, everything helps me to make better shows.

Bert