Hi Cedric,
thanks for sharing these! I have to say the second one doesn't do it for me. It might work if it was just the wall and the chain without the stones in the wall. A longer shadow of the chain would be nice too.
I do, however, really like the subject of the first picture. Yes it is very two-dimensional and formal but that could be developed into its strength. With your framing it feels a bit unbalanced to me. Positioning the door lock more to the upper right corner might improve this.
But: If I where to live close to this door I would wait for the end of a rainy day with the clouds just lifting short before sunset. Then I would take my 4x5 largeformat camera (or better 8x10 if I had one) and a few sheet film holders loaded with Kodak E100VS. When the light is down to a 6-8s exposure at f22-32 this film can give you some stunning results with incredible strong and vivid colours. Just perfect for this subject.
Cropping the drumscan of the 4x5 to a perfectly square format with the circle of the door lock dead center in the middle of the composition and cutting off part of the circle in the upper left corner would further intensify the formal charakter of the composition. Now some minor tweaks in Photoshop: levels, curves and sharpening in a way it affects the center and the major lines in the composition more than the rest; maybe a subtle light fall off towards the corners. All that to let the door lock pop out some more.
And finaly printing it at least 1,2x1,2 m on backlight ilfochrome clear-film. That way it would be an eycatcher even from far away and - thanks to the enormous detail captured by the 4x5 transparency - a real treat to the eye when watched up close. You could go on a journey through the image counting the worm holes ;-)
PS.: This is my first post on this forum. Your picture of that door made me finally register (after reading the forum for a couple of years?) and it made me want to go out and shoot some film. Thanks for that!
Moritz.
