Roppongi Hills was completed in 2003, long after my last visit here fifteen years ago. Built by Japan’s wealthy property magnate, Minoru Mori, the building has been the site of a number of unfortunate accidents and deaths feeding into feng shui beliefs that the location is cursed. None of that seemed apparent as we rode up the elevator to the Observation Deck on the 54th floor.
This was a great opportunity to try out my new Sigma 10 – 20 mm wide angle lens. I have some other views that proved to be just as interesting but for now I wanted to share this one image. Because it was such a grey overcast day, it provided the chance to practice my seldom used HDR skills to produce an image from just one file. Just to refresh, Photomatix can create an HDR image from a single file that does not exceed the normal dynamic range of the camera i.e. usually 5 stops. After the file is converted, you proceed with normal tone-mapping and once that is done, just open up the file in Photoshop to do final adjustments.
Prior to coming here, I did some research and found that there are a number of web sites with HDR images of Japanese scenes. For some reason, these scenes translate well into HDR with an almost cartoon or anime feel to them. Please let me know you think of this one by leaving a comment…thanks.
Very subtle HDR image
I liked how you used this image as the lead into your blog 