One of the objectives of my latest London visit was to get some shots in of Big Ben before it is totally shrouded in scaffolding from early this year for the next 3 years. A lot of Tourist are going to be really disappointed. For this one I moved on a short way from the last shot to the standard viewpoint beside Westminster Bridge on the South Bank Path. The view is of course always different depending on the light helped by the sun setting in the general direction of Parliament all year from this viewpoint.

The picture was taken on a tripod with a Sony A700 with a Sigma 10-20 mm lens at 17mm. I took 3 shots for HDR but used the plus 2 EV image for the longest exposure of 25 seconds to process in the Develop Module of the just acquired Lightroom 5. Adjustments were made to the whites and blacks and with the adjustment brush to get the correct exposure throughout. Then edited in Photoshop. The RAW file adjustments in Lightroom could not cope with the brightness of the Clockface so I copied in the minus 2 EV image as a new layer, removed it with a black layer mask and then brought it back in with a white brush on the mask to bring detail back on the clockface. Further editing with Topaz Clarity. Some tidy up with the heal and clone tools.