Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/File:Temple Church 5, London, UK - Diliff.jpg

Temple Church, London, UK[edit]

Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes. Voting period ends on 10 Jul 2014 at 23:49:18 (UTC)

Looking east from The Round
Looking west from the altar to the Round
The altar, reredos and stained glass
The organ, featuring the Royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom

Reason: These four images illustrate, in high resolution, different aspects of the Temple Church, a small but notable 12th century church in London built by the Knights Templar. I was given special permission to photograph this church so there were no visitors walking around to spoil the images.
Articles in which this image appears: Temple Church
FP category for this image: Wikipedia:Featured pictures/Places/Interiors
Creator: User:Diliff

Support as nominator – Ðiliff «» (Talk) 23:49, 30 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support! Hafspajen (talk) 00:13, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support — Nice images of a (an) historic edifice. Sca (talk) 01:14, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support - Excellent images. Thanks for sharing. Coat of Many Colours (talk) 03:03, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support - All superb... - Godot13 (talk) 03:59, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support - You don't really need my vote here, but you've won it with your beautiful HDR images. Another 50 image stitch? — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:14, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- These ones are 30 images (3 columns x 2 rows x 5 exposures). I usually go for 50 when I need the additional two columns for horizontal width (in retrospect, the second image would have benefited from additional width to include more of the organ). Ðiliff «» (Talk) 08:57, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  - Just beautiful. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 15:15, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Comments (although minor conflict of interest seeing as I'm a member of Inner Temple and so this is my "work chapel"!) You had got your wests and easts muddled up in the captions, so I've changed that - the altar is at the east end, so photos from the altar towards the Round are looking west, etc. It's a shame that you've not got any exterior pictures of the building in this set, as the Round isn't really shown well in the photos we've got (although I know that positioning a camera is difficult here). However, I'm not entirely happy with File:Temple Church 5, London, UK - Diliff.jpg since it looks as though the Round is the Oval... surely the three central arches at the top of the Round ought to be the same width, not one narrow in the centre with one wide on each side? It looks too distorted compared to reality - compare [1] [2] for example. The other three images are excellent, but then I am biased! Bencherlite^Talk 19:30, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- Thanks for your comments. Apologies for getting the ends mixed up. As for File:Temple Church 5, London, UK - Diliff.jpg, it's not really possible to show this angle of view without some distortion. Yes, the 'roundness' of the Round is compromised slightly, but in the example you provided, the vertical columns are leaning inwards (due to the camera being pointed upwards). This is just a geometric limitation when projecting a three dimensional scene onto a two dimensional plane and you have to accept one kind of distortion or the other. It's generally accepted that for architectural photography, it's more important to keep verticals vertical except when distortion becomes too excessive (that's why you would never see a skyscraper photographed from nearby at ground level with corrected verticals). As for the three central arches and the expectation of them being the same width, no, I don't think that's the case. The central arch is facing directly towards the viewer but the two on either side are at an oblique angle (as they follow the circumference of the Round). It's the same as having three books standing up on a table facing the viewer and then twisting the two outer ones inwards. They present less of a face to the viewer and therefore 'appear' thinner. Ðiliff «» (Talk) 19:52, 1 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  - Regarding my last point, I just realised that I misunderstood what you meant and you were actually suggesting that the middle arch was narrower, not wider. Although my point is still valid and the side arches would be narrower due to the angle of them, the width of the arch is also affected by distance to the viewer and the middle arch is further away than the side arches which contributes to it looking both narrower and shorter. There are a number of geometric factors at play here. In any case, I can't think of any other angles or views that would be an improvement on the image. Moving further back would have obscured the roundness of the Round, moving further forward would have increased the distortion of the Round, and shifting the perspective so that the vertical lean inwards would have been a distortion in itself and would reduce its usefulness as an architectural image IMO. Ðiliff «» (Talk) 16:27, 2 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I know I'm not going to win any technical argument with Diliff on architectural photography, and my opinions won't actually affect the final result, but... I went back into the church this lunchtime to look again at the views from the far west and the far east (photos 1 and 2). In both cases, the effect of the image is to make the church look much, much longer than it actually is. In photo 1, for example, there looks to be a massive distance between the first two pillars on each side, whereas in reality they are not far apart at all. Similarly, photo 2 makes the Temple Church look more like Winchester Cathedral in length. Photograph 3 is excellent, and I love photograph 4 of the organ (I'm listening to a CD of it that I bought today, having had the pleasure of giving two recitals there in the past - I particularly enjoy seeing the organist's copy of Jehan Alain's Litanies on the console!) So, the net result is that I just don't think that photos 1 and 2 are truly representative of the interior, fine images though they are, leading me to oppose 1 and 2 though I support 3 and 4. Bencherlite^Talk 12:52, 3 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- You're right, wide angle photography does often have the effect of making the interior space look larger than it actually is. If you were to crop images 1 and 2 and only keep the centre, suddenly that effect would largely disppear. I've had a similar debate to this with others, and what I keep finding is that, a) the eye perceives a scene differently to how a camera captures it, and b) some people are more sensitive to certain geometric distortions than others. Some, like yourself, are bothered by the way certain parts of the image appear larger than others. I might know the technical reasons why certain illusions/effects occur, but I can't argue with subjective opinions on what looks good or not. ;-) All I can say is that distortions are unavoidable in any wide angle view and the struggle to represent a subject both accurately and aesthetically is never easy! Thanks for your thoughts and your votes anyway. Ðiliff «» (Talk) 13:26, 3 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support -- Colin°^Talk 11:41, 3 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Strong support Very nice technical achievement. Also, the result looks very natural despite the (I guess) very heavy processing behind it. On a subjective side, I'd only have straightened (?) the organ picture. - Blieusong (talk) 17:22, 3 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Support Yann (talk) 07:30, 6 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Promoted File:Temple Church 5, London, UK - Diliff.jpg Armbrust ^{The Homunculus} 00:02, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Promoted File:Temple Church 3, London, UK - Diliff.jpg Armbrust ^{The Homunculus} 00:02, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Promoted File:Temple Church 2, London, UK - Diliff.jpg Armbrust ^{The Homunculus} 00:02, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Promoted File:Temple Church Organ, London, UK - Diliff.jpg Armbrust ^{The Homunculus} 00:02, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]