Lens: Voigtlander color-skopar 35mm f2.5
Camera: NEX-7, ISO320, f11, 1/500, Panorama Mode
Since we moved in our new home, I wanted to get a clear shot of the Gazometro (gas-holder), the most majestic (among the few) old industrial structures towering Rome. In the past, the gas-holder was used to generate and stock the gas necessary to heat the houses and to light the streets. With the advent of the gas methane, gas-holders were abandoned and became, all around italy, archeological remains of the first industrial era.
There’s been a lot of talking about what to do with the Gazometro. It’s such a distinctive and beloved element of our skyline, that no Roman would ever think about getting rid of it. So the point is (as it often is, in my country) how to develop the place in order to exploit it’s attraction value.
The main problem is that the whole area surrounding the Gazometro is quite “under-developed” too. It’s one of those frontier areas so common in my city, where unclear activities are carried on by uncanny people, where the night is darker than elsewhere, where large scattered communities of homeless are left to proliferate without much control. So, before the Gazometro can be exploited, the whole area should be deeply developed.
About the photograph, it’s a panorama taken with the Panorama Mode of the NEX-7. The program works extremely well in well lit situations, returning crispy and detailed jpegs. I set it in vertical mode, since I like to have more vertical space than the horizontal mode provides. With this panorama, for example, it was fundamental to include the whole gas-holder plus the trees coming straight out of the river, a perspective that the horizontal mode wouldn’t have allowed. The post production was aimed at giving a bit of a vintage feel to the image, which I feel suits very well the 70’s like mood of the view.