I had taken this picture while passing through Fleet Street on Christmas evening. I was held spellbound not only by the tall spire of this church, but also by the way it was illuminated by the dying rays of the weak winter sun. The radiance almost felt divine; as if the cathedral wasn't merely reflecting light, but held a luminescent source in its walls that was its own.

For the photographically inclined: A 17mm lens mounted on a camera body with a crop factor of 1.6x, would have never allowed me to capture the entire building in one frame; the street being too narrow for me to step back far enough. I therefore contended myself with a shot of just the spire - the sky behind being too irresistible to miss. I also shot the lower half (spire cropped) desultorily (hence the parked van which I now wish were missing), and for some reasons allowed it to linger on my hard-disk till date. Today, some two months later, it occurred to me that I could stitch the two halves up into a "vertical" panorama! The awkward distortion at the bottom is an artifact that arose out of having to "fit" two discrete pictures; taken without the intention of being sewed into a panorama.

Woohoo! This is awesome!
Nobody else in the world cares about the tiny churches that dot Fleet Street. Nobody else with a camera, anyways.
And oh, cannot forget the stares we got from passers by when this was being clicked. They don't turn and look at couples making out in the middle of the road, but they stop and stare at photographers who are accompanied by human beings.

By  Anonymous, at 23.2.06  

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I really like this picture, it somehow reminds me of pop art images that show a bovine skeleton bleaching in the sun. I don't know why, but there is a starkness to this photograph. Its like its beyond death, its great.

By  Pareshaan, at 23.2.06  

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Wonderful effort.. Indeed great lighting on the church's spire..

By  Rahul Kumar, at 23.2.06  

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Looks photoshopped. If you're going to photoshop it, nuke the van.

BTW, you are full of yourself, aren't you?

By  Anonymous, at 24.2.06  

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I agree. I also remember getting curious looks when I was hunched over a puddle of water trying to click the spires of Royal Courts of Justice!

Thanks Pareshaan, Rahul!

Well obviously it is (I don't yet know how one stitches a panorama with a needle and a thread). The van is here to stay.

And touché! To tell you the truth, having not yet learned the art of auto-cannibalism, and having just returned from lunch, I am so full of rice :-). Can we:

a.) Not post anonymously? (I promise to delete it if you do)
b.) Not get personal?

By  Deepak, at 25.2.06  

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Thanks Richa,

I had used a polarizing filter on the lens and that causes the sky to appear as a beautiful blue gradient. I haven't altered the saturation of the original so yes, the sky is what the camera recorded (with the aid of the filter).

By  Deepak, at 26.2.06  

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When a 'Y' axis meets a curved 'X' axis.Perfect.

By  Soumitra Sengupta, at 26.2.06  

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