Fort Nelson #4

You did (somewhat) achieve a prevention of tonal (thus, total) disaster here. The floor does, indeed, carry a good amount of unwashed out detail. - David Lyga

Well if it's not a total disaster that's something. Perhaps I can improve it. The shutter speed (1/15s) is much lower than I would usually even try handheld so to get a picture at all is a bonus.

These are difficult situations and, though the negative can usually capture all, the reflectance print, if it DOES capture all of such situations (note the outside is completely washed out), the midtones would suffer greatly. You did well here, under the circumstances. - David Lyga

I may go back specifically to take photographs (and with a tripod). How would you approach such a scene? Should I just bracket a lot and hope one negative hits the spot? I was lucky to have the 24mm lens with me because it has quite a decent DoF even wide open but ideally I would have stopped the lens down.

You seemed to meter accurately, giving credence to the mid and lower tones and letting the sunlit outside 'go to hell' as was necessary. Meter the interior withOUT metering that window or too much floor glare. In other words, do not let the meter think that that glare is 'normal'. - David Lyga

Thank you. I will do that.

This might be a case where pre-flashing the film could help. If you can lift the shadows a bit that way, you could reduce the main exposure by maybe a stop and reduce the window over exposure. Whether it would be enough... On the printing side there are other options.

I like that the perspective seems normal.

Someone pressing against the window from the outside or looking out would be nice, and helpful for the exposure. I see this turned into a dream or nightmare self-portrait.

All there was outside was brightly overcast sky. There’s nothing there. The window is 20 feet up or more. The “window” is for a canon. Yes perhaps it could work with somebody lit by light from the window but personally I would rather it didn't have a person in it but maybe I could reconsider that. Self-portrait? Hmm. Interesting idea.

It is actually the most extraordinary space. It is reached by a tunnel about 300 feet long. The tunnel descends steeply and is very dark and you might expect to emerge in a space below ground but that is not what happens. After climbing some stairs one emerges into a space quite high up (one of the 3 caponiers). It is absolutely silent there. This might spook some people but I found it rather wonderful. Absolute silence as if completely cut off from the world except for the light from the windows. A prison or a refuge from the noise of an over hectic world depending on the point of view.